The issue of high unemployment rate in the country deserves urgent attention because of its effect on productivity and security. No nation can make progress when majority of its youths and young are jobless. This not only fuels crime, it remains a factor that limits the ability of the productive age to contribute its quota to national development. It is for this reason that the existing structure should be reviewed in meeting up the employment requirements and demands of the nation.
At a public discourse on youth employment, the Ogun State Coordinator, National Youth Service Corps (NYSC), Dr. (Mrs.) Belinda Faniyi, has charged Nigerian youths to surmount the challenge of high unemployment rate in the nation by embracing vocational skills. Delivering the keynote lecture at the Corpers’ Week, organised by the Federal University of Agriculture, Abeokuta Corpers Association (FUCA) titled, “Skills Acquisition and Entrepreneurship Development: Panacea for Unemployment – A Case Study of the National Youth Service Corps”, Dr. Faniyi stated that the development of vocational skills by youths was critical to economic survival of any nation. According to her, for a country to achieve its national aspirations, youths should have adequate access to education that would enable them improve their standard of living by gaining competitive skills that would be in high demand at the labour market. She noted that young people that lack valuable skills in global and local economies face limited job opportunities and income growth, stressing that the changing nature of work today was on putting increased pressure on the youths to acquire technical, vocational and educational skills.
The State Coordinator identified youths among the big losers in the recent economic crisis, identifying technical and vocational education as the ‘silver bullet’ to solving the problem of joblessness. She reiterated that in 2012, the Federal Government directed NYSC to establish the Skills Acquisition and Entrepreneurship Development (SAED) Department, to address the issue of joblessness in the country, stating that the Department was tasked with sensitising corps members on the realities of the Nigerian job market and providing foundational, entrepreneurial, and practical skills that would allow them explore the options of self-employment, or starting up their own businesses.
Dr. Faniyi explained that the unemployment rate in Nigeria had increased to 23.90 per cent in 2011, from 21.10 per cent in 2010 and 19.70 per cent in 2009, as reported by the National Bureau of Statistic (NBS), reiterating what a former Nigerian Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development and incumbent President, African Development Bank (AfDB), Dr. Akinwumi Adesina had said that Nigeria’s unemployment rate was spiraling growing at 11 per cent yearly and is driven by the wave of four million young people entering the work force every year with a small fraction being able to secure employment. She added that the NYSC-SAED mandate was to contribute meaningfully to the attainment of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) by reducing extreme poverty and hunger, stating that the programme was a nationwide initiative by targeting Nigerian graduates that were mobilised for the one year national service programme, designed to be implemented within the framework of camp (In-camp), and the service year of the corps members (Post-camp).
The Vice-Chancellor of FUNAAB, Prof. Kolawole Salako equally urged corps members participating in NYSC to be proactive and bring out initiatives for their survival during the harsh economic environment. He gave this charge while speaking at the a programme put together for corps members. Represented by the Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Development), Prof. Clement Adeofun, the VC said the corps members should endeavour to look around and create special need that can be satisfied with their skills, stressing that employment opportunities were dwindling and Nigeria needs a paradigm shift. As Dr. Faniyi had earlier said, the VC also stated that there was an urgent need to have a survival strategy that would make corpers visible locally and internationally, adding that they needed to be great thinkers with capacity for a strategic plan and not living in fantasy, noting that all over the world, the opportunity of getting grants and fellowships was reducing, noting that youths needed to be great, fast thinkers and be able to impact the society by creating a special need that can be satisfied.
The representative of former corps members, Mr. Kehinde Ogundora stressed the need to always support them while commending Management for taking care of corpers. The new set of corpers led by Mr. Mayowa George disclosed that they had gained a wide range of experiences in various departments and advised his colleagues to be good ambassadors of Nigeria and learn to create job opportunities for themselves and those coming behind. Now the questions to ask are: how do our young people create jobs when funds are not easily come by? This is where financial institutions and government agencies should come together and grant soft loans and cheap credit facilities to genuine youth entrepreneurs not the well-connected, lazy and unserious ones. These are crucial points that deserved being looked into towards truly addressing the challenge of high youth unemployment in the country.
