Green entrepreneurship in transition economies: a case study of Bosnia and Herzegovina

• Entrepreneurs are not ready to respond to the challenges and take risk.
• Government and education institutions fail to support green entrepreneurship.
• Green entrepreneurship is poorly perceived and understood by stakeholders.
• Green businesses succeed in achieving economic, environmental and social value.
• Recommendations for fostering green entrepreneurship are given.

The countries with transition economies are under pressure to increase entrepreneurial activities that will enable fast growth with minimum impact on natural resources. Despite specific challenges the economies in transition face, development of (sustainable) entrepreneurship has not been in focus of the academic research. This leaves some open questions such as those concerning the role and mode of operation of public policies, level of risk and its influence on entrepreneurship creativity, role of knowledge in diffusing entrepreneurial values and fostering aspirations, externalities created for the society and the connection between sustainability and entrepreneurship.This paper aims to introduce a discussion on sustainable entrepreneurship in countries with economies in transition. The research carried out included (i) review of literature and statistical data on entrepreneurial environment, (ii) structured interviews with representatives of government, civil society, business sector and academia to understand the society's perception of green entrepreneurship and (iii) analysis of case studies on green entrepreneurs.It can be concluded that entrepreneurs in economies in transition do not seem to be ready to respond to the challenges or to take any risks by investing in green business, but also that the government and educational institutions do not recognize their own role and fail to support the development of green entrepreneurship. For those “green oriented” businesses, the key sociological constructs are personal motivation and mission, locality, and a forward-thinking orientation in terms of sustainability. All businesses managed to achieve the economic, environmental and social value creation without any support from the government.