Since the Apartheid era, the South African economy has been a mix of two separate anddistinct economies. The first world economy consisting mostly of white owned andformal businesses on one hand and the third world economy consisting of mostly blackowned and informal businesses.Economic activities of emerging entrepreneurs have been restricted to mostly the blacktownships and rural areas, whereas, first world entrepreneurs have been actively involvedin the mainstream economic activities.The separation between the two economies has resulted in a situation whereby there is awide gap in entrepreneurial and technical skills and knowledge between emerging andfirst world entrepreneurs. The result of this imbalance in skills and knowledge has been asituation in which a minority of the population has been in control of more than 80 % ofthe wealth of the country.Upon gaining independence in 19994, the new South African Government embarked onthe Reconstruction and Development Program (RDP) to redress the imbalances o f t hepast. More recently the government has adopted the Growth Employment andRedistribution (GEAR) macro economic strategy to grow the economy, createemployment and redistribute wealth.To accelerate the implementation of the macro economic strategy, the government haspassed a number of Acts namely: The National Small Business Promotion Act(102/1996), Skills Development Act (97/1998), Affirmative Procurement Act (5/2000),Mineral and Petroleum Resources Act (28/2002), in an effort to redress the imbalances ofthe past and most recently the Mining Charter (2003), Petroleum Charter (2003),Financial services Charter (2003), and the Information Communications Technology(ICT) Charter (2004), all efforts of the private sector to redress past imbalancesThe small business has been seen as a vehicle to create employment, promote economicgrowth and redistribute wealth; as such the promotion of entrepreneurship has beenidentified as a critical aspect of GEAR. Irrespective of all the legislation and programs inplace, the rating of South Africa in terms of entrepreneurship as evidenced by thefindings of the Global Entrepreneurial Monitor reports (GEM, 2001; GEM, 2002) isbelow average.The wide gap in skills and knowledge between emerging and first world entrepreneurs inSouth Africa is a contributing factor to the poor rating of the country in terms ofentrepreneurship. The gap in skills and knowledge between emerging and first worldentrepreneurs is expected to become even wider as the new knowledge economy unfolds,if corrective measures are not taken by the government or private sector.In order to improve South Africa's rating in terms of entrepreneurship, the governmentand private sector need to put programs in place to minimize the skills and knowledgegap between emerging and first world entrepreneurs. The changes in the economic andpolitical systems of South Africa from apartheid to free enterprise and most recently fromindustrial to knowledge economy have contributed to the widening gap in skills andknowledge of the two camps of entrepreneurs.The objective of this study is to come up with a development plan to minimize the gap inskills between emerging and first world entrepreneurs. The study proposes the need for aholistic approach to solving the problem rather than a piece meal approach. The studyproposes the need to clearly identify the factors responsible for the low level of skills andknowledge amongst emerging entrepreneurs, before any meaningful action can be takento address the situation.In terms of possible interventions the study proposes the application of lewin's model ofmanaging change, the principles of breakthrough thinking and the peak performanceenhancement model of Coetsee (2002:140).
