NDE Seeks Youth Involvement In

The Acting Director-
General, National Directorate of Employment (NDE), Mr. Kunle Obayan, has said that youth involvement in agribusiness would reduce the high rate of unemployment in the country.
Obayan who stated this recently in Abuja while speaking to journalists said the Federal Government could tackle the problem of mass unemployment through agribusiness.
According to him, youth unemployment features strongly in the critical agenda of the Buhari administration.
He said they could tackle unemployment through the revival of agriculture, solid minerals exploration and value addition.
“Government will also provide credit for small and medium scale agribusiness entrepreneurs to kick-start their businesses”, he said.
The NDE boss added that in line with the Federal Governments’ desire to modernize agriculture and related activities, the NDE had developed a new concept of agricultural practices and production.
According to him, this was strategically designed to take agriculture from subsistence level to modern agribusiness for value addition.
He said agriculture would also favour job creation, poverty reduction and wealth creation under the NDE Agricultural Park Initiative.
The NDE Agric Park is an agricultural commercial hub with high employment potential and it consists of basic infrastructure and equipment for technology-driven farming activities.
He listed the activities to include poultry and fish production, market gardening, open field cultivation of crops, produce processing and continuous capacity building and mentorship for  farmers.
Explaining further, he said that in order to deepen the prospects of creating more jobs for the unemployed, using the agricultural chain, the directorate had established common facility centres in selected states.
He said this was to enhance the commercial processing of agricultural produce and minimize post-harvest losses.
“The NDE provides the relevant technology in the form of processing equipment in a tripartite arrangement”.