DUBAI, October 4, 2016 /PRNewswire/ --

The Mowgli Foundation, a UK headquartered award winning mentoring organisation in the Middle East and North Africa, recently published its latest impact report, spanning an 8-year time period. With the aim of empowering entrepreneurs to drive economic growth and employment generation, Mowgli focuses on the training and matching of mentors with entrepreneurs to support them in developing their personal and professional capacities. According to the report, over 790 entrepreneurs within the Middle East, North Africa and the UK have participated in Mowgli's mentoring programs to date and have on average created 3.3 new jobs each during their mentoring year. This led to over $18 million of economic growth (value of new jobs created and existing jobs safeguarded) within the region during their mentoring year and an average of 890% Return on Mentoring Investment for the program funders.

The impact report highlighted that over 80% of mentored entrepreneurs were able to build up their confidence levels, 70% gained a clearer direction for their business and 68% addressed and working on overcoming their fear of failure and developed confidence in their decision making skills, resulting in 89% of Mowgli Entrepreneur's businesses remaining operational and 90% of the existing jobs being safeguarded after the mentoring year.  

Kathleen Bury, Mowgli CEO, elaborated on these findings, "We have noticed that entrepreneurs in the MENA region face many interferences and obstacles when starting their own ventures. Our Impact report clearly shows that when those entrepreneurs are mentored, their potential of success and growth increases substantially leading the personal, business and most importantly economic growth"

Bury added, "The evidence shows that mentoring is a proven and critical way to build up the entrepreneurs' capabilities and core spirit, which we define as confidence, resilience, motivation. Without building up these capabilities first, investing in entrepreneurs will not yield the desired return on investment that we are all seeking as it will not create an ideal environment for entrepreneurs to truly grow, spur economic growth and create jobs"

Bury concluded, "The best way to empower entrepreneurs in the MENA region to drive economic growth, address unemployment challenges and alleviate poverty is to start at the foundation of what it takes to be an entrepreneur. This is where holistic mentoring comes in; by focusing on both the personal and then the business aspects of entrepreneurs' development, we will be creating a better-prepared and more capable entrepreneur that will grow to become a leader."

The full report is available on Mowgli Website: http://www.mowgli.org.uk/publications

About Mowgli Foundation 

The Mowgli Foundation is an international UK headquartered award winning mentoring organisation that works with international and local governments, financial institutions, philanthropists and corporates globally to provide mentoring programs that empower entrepreneurs to drive economic growth and strengthen leadership.

Mowgli provides mentoring programs that inspire, connect and guide entrepreneurs and leaders to overcome life's personal and business challenges through the:

• Training and nurturing of mentors
• Strengthening of entrepreneurs and their businesses by matching them with a trained mentor in facilitated and supervised long term relationships
• Building of a global community of trained mentors and entrepreneurs that are able to access networking, learning and growth opportunities

Mowgli has an alumni with over 1770 members and has matched over 790 entrepreneurs with trained mentors in 14 countries; Algeria, Bahrain, Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon, Libya, Morocco, Palestine, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Tunisia, Yemen and the UK.

Mowgli has received three awards to date which reflect its key purpose and impact:

2016:

• Employment Generation Impact - Employment Generation Award by Ta'ather Social Impact Awards
• Training of Mentors and Strengthening of Entrepreneurs Program Syllabus - The European Quality Award for its Mowgli Mentoring Experience (MME) program by the European Mentoring & Coaching Council (EMCC)

2012:

• Network/Community - Young Business Leaders Award for the Best Mentor Network in the Arab Region Award Mohammed bin Rashid Award

SOURCE Mowgli Foundation