The Nigerian government has launched a new committee aimed at enhancing youth participation in economic development. Led by the Federal Ministry of Youth Development, the committee will focus on devising strategies to reduce unemployment and improve the economic well-being of citizens nationwide.
Ayodele Olawande, the Minister of State for Youth Development, inaugurated the joint committee, which includes representatives from the Ministry and the National Directorate of Employment (NDE), at a ceremony in Abuja.
Olawande noted that the NDE’s mandate to create and implement programmes targeting mass unemployment aligns with the Ministry’s goal of providing meaningful employment opportunities for Nigerian youth. He stressed the importance of collaboration, leveraging the NDE’s extensive reach to generate productive job opportunities across the country. The committee will review existing NDE initiatives, identify areas for improvement, and propose new programmes to accelerate job creation for young Nigerians.
The committee has been given two weeks to complete its assignment. Olawande outlined the committee’s terms of reference, which include: “Review all existing initiatives of the NDE and suggest measures for upscaling; including suggestions for new employment generation strategies, work out the modalities for mainstreaming NDE Schedule Officers at the Local Government Areas into the planned “Green House Initiative” of the Minister of State for Youth Development, Spell out the modalities and tools for harvesting credible youth unemployment data.
“Identify donor agencies and partnership organisations with specified contact persons, to support the work of the NDE, particularly the improvement in the performance of its skill centres, Explore the prospects of setting up a youth employment website that will constantly be updated to reflect the true reality and perform any other functions that may be incidental towards the actualisation of the objectives of the committee”.
Umaru Aliyu, the Desk Officer for the NDE, emphasised that the collaboration aims to comprehensively tackle Nigeria’s unemployment crisis. He noted that NDE officers have been appointed to cover all 774 local government areas nationwide, with efforts focusing on both formal and informal youth employment, as well as supporting senior citizens, women, and persons with disabilities.
Aliyu added that the initiative would feature a wide range of programmes and interventions designed to effectively reduce the overall unemployment rate in Nigeria.