Date: 2013-05-21

About 150 unemployed graduate youths in Kwara State that recently took part in  entrepreneurial training  have been presented with N45 million soft loans by the state government.

Speaking during the presentation of cooperative certificates and the financial empowerment to the youth in Ilorin, Commissioner for Commerce and Cooperatives,  Alhaji  Mohammed Raji, said the youth empowerment scheme was part of strategy designed to reduce poverty and create wealth among people in the state.

According to the commissioner, the N45 million was not part of the N100 million set aside from the state medium enterprises funds by the state government to empower small scale businesses.

The commissioner, who said the youth were trained on financial management, opportunity identification and customer relations under the entrepreneurship programme of the Kwara State University (KWASU), Malete for four weeks, adding that the 150 youth were later clustered into three registered cooperative societies to give them access to bank loans.

Alhaji Raji, who said that government could not absorb all its graduate youth into civil service, adding that the entrepreneurial training had equipped the youth to become job creators rather than job seekers.

Also speaking, Director, Entrepreneurship Centre, KWASU, Dr. Muritala Awodun, said the centre would monitor the youth for 12 months in their various ventures in order to see to their growth and development.

Dr. Awodun, who said the entrepreneurial training was normally a five-semester training programme that was collapsed into four weeks.

"As a result of the training, the youth have been able to identify what business venture they want to pursue. They can also be able to stand on their own and nurture their businesses to maturity together with likely challenges they may face," he said.

He, therefore, advised the beneficiaries to make judicious use of the training and financial empowerment package and not to see it as a share of national cake, but as capital to set up a legacy.

Source