ENTREPRENEURIAL ECOSYSTEM COMPONENTS AND POVERTY ALLEVIATION IN NIGERIA: EVIDENCE FROM SMALL AND MEDIUM ENTERPRISES IN LAGOS STATE

Poverty persists as a major global development concern, with sub–Saharan Africa bearing a disproportionate share of extreme deprivation. Available global estimates indicate that about 736 million people lived below the international extreme poverty line in 2015, while poverty remains deeply concentrated in Africa. In Nigeria, national statistics show that about 40.1 percent of the population were classified as poor, underscoring the urgency of effective, locally grounded poverty reduction strategies. Within this context, entrepreneurial ecosystem development, understood as the interaction of interdependent actors, institutions, and enabling factors that support productive entrepreneurship in a territory, offers a practical pathway for expanding opportunities and strengthening livelihoods. This study investigated how selected entrepreneurial ecosystem components, namely education and training development, access to finance, and physical infrastructure, influence poverty alleviation among Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) in Lagos State, Nigeria. A cross-sectional survey design was employed, with primary data collected through a structured questionnaire administered to SME owners and managers. Data were analysed using regression analysis, analysis of variance, and coefficient estimation in SPSS. The findings show that all three ecosystem components exhibit positive and statistically significant relationships with poverty alleviation. Specifically, education and training demonstrated strong explanatory power for poverty alleviation outcomes (R² = 0.815), access to finance showed the highest predictive strength (R² = 0.850), and physical infrastructure also explained a substantial share of outcome variation (R² = 0.829). Overall, the results suggest that strengthening human capital, expanding affordable finance, and improving infrastructure are complementary mechanisms for inclusive enterprise growth and welfare improvement in Lagos State. The study recommends coordinated policy actions by government, educational institutions, financial institutions, nongovernmental organisations, and the private sector to scale SME focused training, widen financial inclusion, and upgrade infrastructure to sustain poverty reduction impacts.