The scheme's secretary-general Louisa Lau Wai-yi said the high success rate was due to the non-monetary support given to the young entrepreneurs.

'The biggest challenge is of course the lack of funds,' Ms Lau said. 'But other factors are whether they have people advising them on how to deal with business-related problems and if they have a good network so they will get business opportunities referred to them.'

The scheme, set up by the Hong Kong Federation of Youth Groups last year, chose 27 projects from 260 applicants. The successful applicants had to start paying back the loan in instalments after six months. Most had maintained a stable revenue and had been able to make the repayments.

Eva Chiu Man-wa, who started an umbrella-advertising company with a partner, said the support from her mentor was important when the business was desperate and clueless as to how to deal with a client who refused to pay. 'We managed to get most of our money back in the end,' she said.

Alex Tam Wai-kit, who started a waste-recycling company with a partner, said referrals from other businesspeople they met at networking functions were a major part of his business.

Andrew Devenport, the executive director of Youth Business International, a world-wide umbrella group for programmes like Ms Lau's, said the usual success rate for an adult starting a business and keeping it for three years was about 50 per cent.

By contrast the overall success rate of businesses supported by his organisation and its 39 umbrella groups - with a total of 15,000 young entrepreneurs - is 72 per cent.

Mr Devenport, in town for the Youth Business International Global Conference which opened yesterday, said such programmes had a higher success rate if they did not receive government money.

'When the money is from the government, people treat it as a gift,' he said. 'But when the loan is from a youth organisation, they would be careful using the money because they know they have to pay it back.'