The federal government has been called upon to refocus its attention on job creation if its current transformation agenda must be achieved and be meaningful to the people.
The Society for Youth Research in Nigeria (SYRN) in a press statement signed by its executive director, Mr Olawale Rasheed to mark the International Youth Day celebration also urged government to encourage skill training in youth for the success of its investment in power, agriculture, road revival and infrastructure.
The group observed that as the world celebrates International Youth Day there is urgent need for government to address the unemployment challenge through massive training and retraining of unemployed graduates and other categories of youth as government alone cannot employ millions of youth across the nation.
It said the National Youth Service Corps must expand its Agricultural Entrepreneurial Programme for some corps members. “the success recorded in the implementation of the programme can provide useful lessons for skill training in other sectors of the economy” it said.
The group posited that government at all levels should introduce a systematic skill acquisition programme for youth with a scheme for seed capital provision through the community banks. “Such skills should include trade skills after which the trained youth can set themselves up and even employed one or two young persons” it said
While commending government on its ‘You Win’ Programme, NYRN said the general feeling among youth development experts is that the project is not on a scale that can address the mass joblessness facing the youth.
However, it asked government to imbibe the Indian experience in mass re-skilling of about three hundred million unemployed Indians through a programme embarked upon by the Indian government and is today regarded as a shining example in youth sector internationally and which has served as a foundation for its growing prosperity.
Via Sunday Trust
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