{The following essay was one of top three finalist essays selected from over 30 essay submissions as part of "The Power of Entrepreneurship" Essay Contest. This essay contest, hosted by the Babson-Rwanda Entrepreneurship Center (BREC), was an event held during Global Entrepreneurship Week/Rwanda 2012. }

Entrepreneurship as the key for development has many roles in society. Did you know that all of a community's needs can be supplied by entrepreneurship in all of its alternative ways of business creation?

Entrepreneurs start new businesses in order to get profit and in their journey, they are applying entrepreneurship.

Because they are part of their communities, their business profits do not reflect themselves or their families only, but they also benefit other community members in a number of ways that I am going to discuss.

As they consume profits from your daily activities, members of the community who are entrepreneurs also are materially nourished by their self-employment.

They also carry out their activities peacefully without the pressure that is experienced by other people who are employed by others. This is in addition to their extreme job satisfaction, self-confidence and flexibility as self-employed persons.

The entrepreneurs I'm discussing create employment for other residents when they offer jobs in their businesses. This is due to the will to seek business ideas and opportunities in different domains.

Hence, there will be more jobs that require different people with alternative skills. Therefore, more jobs are created and this improves the standard of living of the community.

Entrepreneurship helps the community members to develop their talents in different careers it offers. Some will become cashiers, managers, engineers or others will entertain people.

If a business is advertising its activities, it may use artists who are also members of the community and by their talents being developed, they will also earn money.

Entrepreneurship leads to the development of more industries, usually in rural areas, and this encourages the processing of local materials into finished goods.

So, if the community has high production of maize, which exceeds its market, local entrepreneurs, as initiators, can transform maize into maize flour, which can even be exported.

This will generate higher income for the community than what was expected from untransformed maize.

The business created by entrepreneurs using entrepreneurship will pay taxes to government and those taxes will reflect to the community because they will be used to build infrastructure.

For example, hospitals, schools, paved roads, and the other needs of the community can be satisfied in this way.

On the other hand, if a business offers security services to the companies or community, those businesses will employ people, pay them, and protect them and their property.

KK Security is an example of this. This shows the preciousness of entrepreneurship in providing many benefits to the community at the same time.

Many entrepreneurs use products in their business that are supplied by the community. This is seen in many manufacturing businesses.

Those businesses will provide a market for the local products of the community, such as products from agriculture and this will increase the income in the community.

You will find other entrepreneurs who have started businesses that recycle products of other companies. Such businesses help the community by saving its environment because they also use some products that were harmful to the environment, for example metal packages, batteries, and so on.

Some products that need to be recycled, such as metals or plastics, could harm the soil and reduce production in agriculture, but this can be prevented by recycling businesses.

But, this does not only clean the environment. It also minimizes the costs that would be paid by the community to buy new materials if the previous ones were not recycled.

Some businesses do community activities like sponsoring sports activities, building schools and hospitals or others invest in their sectors. You will hear from some companies that they help orphans or that they provide internet connection to schools for free.

This also shows a number of different ways communities benefit from entrepreneurship.

Entrepreneurs in their nature have the habit of seeing what is missing in the community and they take risks by planning accordingly how they may start to produce the missing products or services. By doing this, they satisfy the needs of the community.

Nowadays, people are taking loans from banks to start their projects or to pay their school fees. Such services show how entrepreneurs who start banks offer very needed services to the community and all of those are planted by entrepreneurship.

If many entrepreneurs start different businesses, there will be competition between their products and each business will try to produce products of high quality.

This will help the community to get such products of high quality. This competition between businesses also reduces the prices of products and services.

Let's take the example of three competing companies of telecommunication services: Tigo, MTN, and Airtel. Each one is trying to minimize their costs for maintaining their market; they are also improving all of their methods of customer satisfaction.

Also, due to their competition, and their successful activities, they initiate competition among the community of Rwanda. I will give the example of Tigo.

They have a new program, Tigo Reach for Change, which helps people who have planned successful projects focusing on the ways children may be saved.

If a member of the community is chosen as one who has a successful project, they will be helped by the workers of Tigo and they will be given money to start that project and I think this also helps to increase the capacity of the community to think or create new projects.

This isn't something that can be carried out only by successful companies, but it is also possible for small-scale businesses. Let us take the example of someone who is running a restaurant.

If he wants to hear from many people he may call them for a meeting in the restaurant and give them some tea while they are discussing about products that are missing in the community or other ways of doing things.

If they come to a conclusion of what is missing and how it can be fixed the owner of the restaurant may also help them to initiate or to start to do what they think is needed.

Even if he can't get money to give them, he may also give the help of advice as an entrepreneur. It will be easier for the owner of the restaurant to organize such meetings because if he sets there some tea for free even those who don't go to the meetings of local leaders will attend his meeting.

If people also see him as a successful entrepreneur, they will believe that, if they practice his advice, they will also be successful.

I can't discuss the power of entrepreneurship to the community only because it also has a significant positive impact on the government. It increases economic growth; all businesses are taxed by the government and the taxes are used to raise the national budget.

Entrepreneurship also reduces the level of unemployment in the country due to its ability to create jobs and this maintains a good relationship between the population and the government.

Because, in the case of a high level of unemployment, some residents demonstrate against the government, which may also cause insecurity.

In almost all countries there is high inequality in the distribution of wealth, infrastructures, and services between urban and rural areas, but when entrepreneurship is effectively introduced in the country, it improves the rural-urban balance by spreading industries and businesses in rural areas.

I may conclude by saying that entrepreneurship is very, very important to the community. Besides poverty reduction, it will help to protect the environment and provide significant participation in social activities.

So this is a very good subject in which any member of the community can take a career of being a business man or business woman in order to apply entrepreneurship and enjoy the countless profits it retains in the community.