Throughout the Arab world the seeds of a renaissance in entrepreneurship are emerging. Youth are being encouraged to innovate, learn marketable skills and start their own enterprises. Hundreds of initiatives are being launched to promote this career path. Looking ahead 5-10 years, we can expect many new ventures. They hold the promise of providing meaningful jobs and income for the millions of emerging Arab youth.

But if this promise is to be upheld, then we must create a policy environment that is supportive of these youthful enterprises. "Cheerleading" youth to become responsible entrepreneurs is necessary and desirable but it alone is not enough. If, for example, youth face the prospect of serving jail time should their legitimate venture go bankrupt, then it is not simply a "cultural fear of failure" that thwarts them, but a rational response to incentive structures. If institutions are not designed to support these buds of hope, if non-market forces are allowed to stifle them, then our efforts will not only have been in vain but they will backfire, creating a generation who is cynical about enterprise.

This conference is designed to bring together the best minds who want to nurture this new generation, by identifying and pushing forward an agenda of best practices in the many areas that affect young entrepreneurs. These policies range from education, financial reforms (including angel investing laws and practices), bankruptcy laws, credit access, youth-enterprise tax-holidays, intellectual property protection, and competition policies to judicial practices, bureaucratic efficiency, capital requirements, and employment laws. We will bring together thought leaders from throughout the region, in the private sector, government, NGOs/INGOs and academia, in order to identify the policy challenges, the successes in addressing them, and the regional and country-specific agendas for moving forward.

All conversations are not for attribution, following the "Chatham House Rule," to facilitate a free and open dialogue. When a meeting is held under the Chatham House Rule, participants are free to use the information received, but neither the identity nor the affiliation of the speaker(s), nor that of any other participant, may be revealed.