120 YOUTHS RECEIVE 60 MILLION NAIRA GRANT TO START BUSINESSES 08-07-24
By Sadiq Aminu One hundred and twenty youths selected from from across the country have received 500,000 naira grants from the Unlock Training Programme to start businesses in their areas of expertise..
The Senior Special Assistant to President Bola Tinubu on Technical, Vocational Entrepreneurship Education (TVEE) Mrs Abiola Arogundade, stated this during the disbursement of the funds in Abuja.
She explained that it was the outcome of a six-week Campaign initiated by her office in which Nigerian youths were asked to record and submit a one-minute video on their current TVEE skills, their plans for the future and how they want government to assist them achieve their plans.
The purpose according to her was to boost their potentials for economic development.
“At the end of that campaign, we trained about 10,000 participants in a 10-day intensive training session on how to write and execute Business Plans. During the programme, both online and physical Participants were trained on the components of a good Business Plan including Executive Summary, Business Overview and Marketing Strategies, Pricing, Money Management and Risks, among others. After the course, participants were asked to write and submit Business Plans.
“Today, we are giving out N500,000 Naira grants each to 120 winners with the best Business Plans. We are also giving out honourary awards to 80 persons seen to be doing very well in their Technical, Vocational and Entrepreneurship skills but need support to upscale their businesses. We also promised to give Certificate of Completion to all participants who completed the training and to assist participants, especially new start-ups, to register their companies.Today, we are here to fulfill those promises. As you must have seen on your way in, there are four Solar Kiosks to be given away to winners to support the business development of their TVET skills. They include one designed for hair dressing, one designed for catering and food vending and the other two for general purposes.
Mrs Arogundade said the programme is among the job creation projects designed as a contribution to the Renewed Hope Agenda of the President Bola Tinubu Administration.
She added that the Tinubu administration has brought numerous initiatives across the country which includes the inclusion of TVET in the Students Loans, Inauguration of Skills Council in the Presidency, Human Capital Development Council, in collaboration with the Governors under the National Economic Council, SUPA (Skill-Up Artisans), ITF and numerous others.
The Minister of state for education Dr Tanko Sununu, stated that technical and vocational education is one of the areas that the Ministry of education is working on to tackle the problem of out of school children in Nigeria.