Behold the NYSC entrepreneurs

BY CALEB AYANSINA
There have been developmental initiatives across various sectors and
tiers of government, to address the problem of youth unemployment in
the country. However, these efforts have made little or no impact
considering the enormity of the problem. Most of the initiatives fall
short in terms of scope and scale.Today, the National Youth
ServiceCorps (NYSC) is probably the only government institution that
has presence (infrastructure and personnel) in all the 774 local
government Areas (LGAs) of the country, putting it in a position to be
reckoned with, in ensuring youth empowerment.
Created 40 years ago, the scheme annually mobilizes and deploys over
300, 000 young graduates from higher institutions across the
federation.
Recently, the scheme generated some controversy leading to the call
for its scrapping by critics who cited insecurity challenges while
others clamoured for its restructuring.
This scenario compelled the management to go back to the drawing
board, to reinvent a scheme that is tailored to the security and
socio-economic realities of the time.
In March 2012, to be precise, the NYSC leadership took a bold step by
introducing skill acquisition and entrepreneurship programmes into the
orientation course content, in order to raise an army of entrepreneurs
that will drive the economy and not job seekers that will trudge the
streets in search of scarcely available jobs.
To institutionalize this, the Federal Government raised the number of
departments in the NYSC from seven toeleven with Department of Skills
Acquisition and Entrepreneurship Development (SAED) as one of the
newdepartments.
The project is a nationwide initiative, targeted at young graduates
mobilized and deployed in a year mandatory service. Implementation of
the project would be cascaded down to the states and LGAs.
Sunday Vanguard learnt that the project was designed to be implemented
within the framework of camping exercise (in-camp) and the service
year of the corps members (post-camp).
The in-camp component of the project would focus largely on creating
the entrepreneurial and self-reliance spirit, helping corps members
explore income generation opportunities available, with a view to
identifying the one that best suits their personality/circumstances
and professional training, some sort of hands-on training, as well as
development of business plans.
The post-camp component would provide the platform for a more rigorous
training of interested corps members, with a view to equipping them
with the necessary technical/vocational skills, as well as business
competence needed to start-up business; this would be carried out by
various partner organizations with cognate competence and experience
in the identified skills sets.
There are about 10 skill sets, according to the Director of SEAD, Mrs.
Marry Damabia, which cut across various sectors of the economy,
ranging from energy, construction, agro-business and environment.
Some of the NYSC members told Sunday Vanguard that they were trained
on poultry, grass-cutter rearing, snailery animal husbandry, bees
keeping, fish farming, plantain and banana sucker multiplication, bead
making, tailoring, etc.
Not less than 131, 659 corps members were given skill acquisition and
entrepreneurship development training in 2012.
Speaking at the opening ceremony of the 5th edition of the NYSC/MDGs
War Against Poverty (WAP) at the NYSC orientation camp, Kubwa, Abuja,
the Director General of NYSC, Brig. General Nnamdi Okore-Affia, said
the scheme introduced skill acquisition and entrepreneurship
development training for corps members, with a view to providing the
graduate youths with skills, in addition to their academic skills for
self-reliance.
"The level of youth unemployment called for serious concern. We will
be glad if we can get all the help we needto properly drive this
programme. It is our expectation that if this collaboration works, we
would have contributed in no small measure towards driving national
socio-economic development," he said.
Okore-Affia explained that the project was meant to empower corps
members with entrepreneurial and agro-enterprise skills, with
corresponding interest free loans, to generate employment, eradicating
poverty and hunger, as well as creating wealth.
"Through continuous training, the scheme would be producing successive
and successful generation of corps entrepreneurs, who are expected to
be vanguards in the process of nation building.
"This segment of the population is highly productive and highly
creative, and if properly harnessed would contribute significantly to
the developmental aspiration of any nation. Nigeria therefore cannot
be an exception."Also, the State Coordinator, NYSC, LagosState, Mrs.
Adenike Adeyemi, said the introduction of SAED into the NYSC scheme
had helped many fresh graduates to be self-reliant, creating
employment opportunities instead of searching for non-existent jobs.
Recently, the scheme synergized with the Office of the Special
Assistant to the President on Youth and Student Matters, to work out a
more realistic approach to entrepreneurial empowerment for youths.
The two bodies jointly developed a model called the 'Micro Enterprise
Pack Model'.
The components of the new model were unveiled, when the SSA to the
President on Youth and Student Matters, Comrade Jude Imagwe,
visitedthe NYSC Directorate Headquarters in Abuja.
Imagwe observed that the previous approaches only brought people
together for entrepreneurship programmes and dispersed them to their
consistencies without any assistance.
Not only that, the NYSC signed a Memorandum of Understanding with a
private company, JFK Consult, on post-camp skill acquisition
programmefor corps members.
Sunday Vanguard gathered that the training programme which also
targetsother interested youths in the society will commence on
social-media from where qualified candidates are going to be selected
for two weeks training at the entrepreneurial academy in Abuja.
The Chief Executive Officer of JFK Consult, Mr James Abiona, said it
was important for corps members to get the basic entrepreneurial
skills before they get through with their service year so that they
would not remain job-seekers, but job creators.
At the signing ceremony, in Abuja, Mrs. Marry Damabia, who signed on
behalf of the NYSC noted that the programme would build on the
entrepreneurial lecture received by corps members during their
orientation exercise in camp.
Meanwhile, Damabia decried the non-chalant attitude displayed by some
government institutions which have direct bearing on the mandates of
the scheme, but refused to cooperate despite several letters written
to them, either for approval or partnership.
She noted that the scheme was facing some constrains ranging from
inadequacy of funds to drive the programme, to lack of materials for
practical hands-on training both in andout of camp, mentoring centres,
among others.
Damabia therefore, appealed to them for change of attitude, while
calling on corporate bodies and well-meaning individuals "to continue
support us, so that the real purpose of NYSC can be realized".