Across Zambia, young people are constantly being encouraged to become entrepreneurs. Politicians speak about entrepreneurship. Development programmes promote entrepreneurship. Universities, colleges and training institutions encourage young people to start businesses and create jobs rather than wait for employment opportunities that may never come.
The message is consistent and increasingly urgent. According to the 2022 Census of Population and Housing conducted by the Zambia Statistics Agency, approximately 65 percent of Zambia's population is below the age of 25, making it one of the youngest populations on the continent. At the same time, youth unemployment and underemployment remain significant challenges, with many young people facing barriers such as limited access to finance, business networks, mentorship and employment opportunities.Entrepreneurship is often presented as one of the most practical pathways for economic participation, innovation and self-reliance.
For many young people, entrepreneurship is not simply about having a business idea. Ideas are often abundant. What is frequently lacking is the environment that allows those ideas to grow into viable enterprises.
Yet amid all this encouragement, one important question is rarely asked - Where do entrepreneurs actually learn to become entrepreneurs?
Entrepreneurship is learned through exposure. It develops through experience. It is strengthened through relationships, mentorship, observation and the opportunity to engage with people who have already navigated the uncertainties of building a business.
In many cases, the biggest barrier facing young entrepreneurs is not a lack of ambition. It is a lack of access. Access to networks, information, mentors and markets.
This reality raises important questions about how entrepreneurship support programmes are designed. If entrepreneurship is fundamentally a process of learning, experimentation and adaptation, then are traditional training approaches sufficient?
Many entrepreneurship interventions continue to rely heavily on classroom-based models. Participants gather in conference rooms, receive presentations on business planning, bookkeeping, marketing and financial management, and then return home. While these technical skills remain important, entrepreneurship itself is rarely a purely technical exercise.
Successful entrepreneurs often point to experiences that occurred outside formal training environments as being the most influential in their journeys. Conversations with peers, encounters with mentors, exposure to new markets, observations of successful enterprises and opportunities to test ideas in real-world settings frequently prove just as valuable as formal instruction.
In other words, entrepreneurship is not merely taught. It is experienced.
It is within this context that the Entrepreneurship Train emerges as an innovative response to a longstanding challenge. Implemented under the Shifting the Power Programme by the Zambian Governance Foundation (ZGF), the Entrepreneurship Train seeks to rethink not only what entrepreneurship learning looks like, but also where it takes place and how it happens.
From 6 to 9 June 2026, a cohort of young entrepreneurs will travel by rail from Lusaka to Livingstone, participating in entrepreneurship learning sessions, mentorship engagements, networking opportunities, peer exchanges and business pitching activities.
However, the significance of the initiative extends beyond the activities themselves. The Entrepreneurship Train challenges a common assumption that learning must happen within traditional spaces. Instead, it transforms a journey into a learning environment and travel into an opportunity for enterprise development.
Why a Train?
At first glance, the concept may appear unusual. Why use a train when workshops and conferences already exist?
The answer lies in the unique environment that a train creates.
Modern life increasingly values speed. Meetings are shorter. Interactions are brief. Training programmes are often compressed into a few intensive sessions. Yet meaningful learning, particularly entrepreneurial learning, often requires time.
A train journey creates that time.
More importantly, the train itself becomes a powerful metaphor for entrepreneurship. Entrepreneurship is rarely a short or straightforward journey. It is often long, demanding, and filled with unexpected challenges. There are periods of acceleration and moments when progress feels slow. There are obstacles to navigate, difficult decisions to make and times when resilience is tested.
Similarly, a train travels through changing landscapes, over difficult terrain, and across long distances before reaching its destination. Passengers experience the journey together, learning from one another, adapting to changing conditions and staying focused on where they are headed.
The Entrepreneurship Train embraces this reality. Participants are not simply attending a training programme; they are embarking on a journey that reflects the entrepreneurial experience itself. Along the way they will encounter new ideas, opportunities and perspectives, while building the skills, networks, and confidence needed to reach their goals.
The destination matters, but so does the journey. It is through the challenges, conversations, reflections, and discoveries along the way that entrepreneurs grow. The train provides a space where that growth can happen naturally, turning travel time into learning time and a physical journey into a transformative entrepreneurial experience.
Entrepreneurship Beyond Technical Skills
One of the most important lessons emerging from entrepreneurship research globally is that business success is influenced by far more than technical competence. Business plans matter. Financial literacy matters. Marketing skills matter. Confidence matters too. But relationships matter too.
Many young entrepreneurs possess the technical ability to run a business but struggle with challenges such as fear of failure, limited confidence, restricted networks or uncertainty about how to navigate unfamiliar opportunities.
These factors are rarely addressed through conventional training approaches. Exposure, however, can be transformative. Exposure broadens what people believe is possible. Meeting successful entrepreneurs can make success appear more attainable. Visiting new places can reveal previously unseen market opportunities. Engaging with peers facing similar challenges can reduce isolation and strengthen confidence.
The Entrepreneurship Train recognises that entrepreneurship development is as much about mindset as it is about skill acquisition. By creating opportunities for interaction, reflection and exchange, the initiative seeks to nurture both dimensions simultaneously.
Turning Travel into Opportunity
Rail infrastructure has often served as a catalyst for economic growth by reducing barriers such as long travel times, high transportation costs, and limited access to markets. For entrepreneurs and small businesses, these barriers can make it difficult to reach customers, suppliers and new business opportunities. By connecting different regions, railways facilitate the movement of people, goods and ideas, while also creating opportunities for trade, tourism, and business networking.
The Entrepreneurship Train builds on this legacy in a different but equally important way. Rather than moving commodities, it moves ideas. Rather than transporting goods alone, it facilitates the exchange of knowledge, experiences and opportunities.
The route from Lusaka to Livingstone itself carries symbolic significance. Along the journey, participants encounter diverse communities, industries and economic activities. They are exposed to different perspectives and business environments that can stimulate innovation and inspire new thinking.
By linking entrepreneurship with travel, tourism and exploration, the initiative encourages participants to look beyond the boundaries of their immediate surroundings. This broader perspective is increasingly important in an interconnected economy where opportunities often emerge from understanding markets, communities and challenges beyond one's own locality.
A Different Vision of Youth Empowerment
At its core, the Entrepreneurship Train represents a broader shift in how youth empowerment can be understood. Too often, youth programmes focus narrowly on providing information, assuming that knowledge alone will lead to transformation. While knowledge is important, meaningful change often occurs when people gain opportunities to apply what they learn, build relationships and expand their horizons.
Empowerment is not simply about providing answers.
It is about creating conditions in which young people can discover possibilities for themselves. The Entrepreneurship Train seeks to create such conditions. It recognises that entrepreneurship is not an individual journey undertaken in isolation. It is a social process shaped by communities, networks, mentors and shared experiences.
As Zambia continues to explore innovative approaches to supporting youth entrepreneurship, initiatives such as the Entrepreneurship Train offer valuable lessons about the importance of experience-based learning, peer-to-peer exchange and ecosystem building.
The initiative also invites a broader conversation about how entrepreneurial talent is nurtured.
If entrepreneurship is ultimately about identifying opportunities, solving problems and creating value, then perhaps the environments in which entrepreneurs learn should themselves embody those qualities. Perhaps entrepreneurship education should be as innovative as entrepreneurship itself.
Because sometimes the most important part of an entrepreneurial journey is not the destination.
It is the people met, the ideas exchanged and the possibilities discovered along the way. And sometimes, those discoveries may begin on a train.
If you would like to contribute to this discussion, please do so via info@zgf.org.zm
