 |
| | | Title | UNPACKING NIGERIA’S POLICY RESPONSE TO YOUTH UNEMPLOYMENT: The Youth Enterprise with Innovation in Nigeria (YOUWIN) | | Author | Olawale, Rotimi | | Subject | Youth Employment | | Date of Publication | 2014 | | Publisher | African Community of Practice on Management for Development result at the African Capacity Building Foundation (ACBF) | | Number of Pages | 5 pages | | Language | English | | Geographical Coverage | Nigeria | | Keywords | Youth Development, Youth Unemployment, Youth and Entreprenurship, Youth and Innovation | | Abstract | Arguably, youth unemployment remains one of Nigeria’s biggest challenges at the turn of the millennium. In comparison with unemployment figures from 2007 to 2011, unemployment has risen from 12.7% to 23.9%i in just 4 years. With a population of 168.8 millionii, Nigeria’s unemployment rate of 23% translates to 38.824 million people across the country. This figure is larger than the population of Malawi (15.3 million), Zambia (14.1 million), Sierra Leone (5.8 million), and The Gambia (1.8 million) put together. As part of the effort to solve the unemployment challenge, the Nigerian Federal Government has crafted a number of policies and initiatives aimed at creating employment for different categories of youth in Nigeria. This case study analyses one of the most prominent initiatives in this domain: the Youth Enterprise With Innovation in Nigeria (YOUWIN) is a business plan competition and a grant program that rewards 6,000 semi-finalists yearly with trainings around entrepreneurship and business planning and eventually 1,200 finalists with seed grants to implement their business proposals. This initiative is targeted at educated and skilled Nigerian youth. Despite the recorded successes of the YOUWIN program in Nigeria, including providing business grants to an estimated 24,000 beneficiaries and training over 12,000 semi-finalists, the program is still faced with specific challenges. Some of the challenges include the elitist nature of the competition, with only web-based applications, despite an internet penetration rate of 28% in Nigeria. Another challenge is that the YOUWIN program is meant for youth, however, applicants have to be in the age bracket between 18 and 45 years, which is 10 years above the youth age (18 – 35) as defined by Nigeria’s National Youth Policy. The case study points out a few policy recommendations including exploring other channels beyond the internet to enable young people especially in rural areas to participate in the competition. The study also recommends that the Government should review the number of beneficiaries upward considering the high rate of unemployment in Nigeria. | | Copyright Holder | African Community of Practice (AfCoP) | | Copyright URL | http://afrik4r.org/ | | Filesize | 211063 MB | | File Format | PDF | | [ View / download original document ] |
|
