Business
Adesina Tasks Nigerian Youths On Entrepreneurial Skills
President of African Development Bank (AfDB) Dr Akinwumi Adesina, has urged Nigerian youths to acquire entrepreneurial skills so that they can brace up to challenges of labour market.
Adesina made the call while delivering a lecture at the 13th Convocation of Bowen University, Osun State last Friday.
Adesina said that the call became necessary in view of the need to make graduating students of the institution become entrepreneurs, create businesses, employ others and not job hunters. “Let’s talk about investing your talents through entrepreneurship. In my days at the university, you got a job immediately after you graduated. Your future was set. No longer. The graduate today is graduating into a world of uncertainty.
“Over 13 million young people enter the job market each year but only three million get jobs. Africa will have the largest number of youths joining the labour market by 2030 than all the world taken together,’’ Akinwunmi said.
According to him, “the higher ground is not to depend on others to employ you. The higher ground is for you to be job creators. The key to that is entrepreneurship”.
Adesina said there was the need for youths to persevere so as to be successful entrepreneurs.
“The key is perseverance, persistence in doing something in spite of difficulty or delay in achieving success,” he added.
Adesina also emphasised the need for universities to shift away from note teaching into allowing students to experiment, try things, put ideas to work, and innovate.
He said “to do this, universities need to have structured institutional arrangements for supporting innovations.
“Developing patents is not enough. Patents must lead to business and that can only happen through supportive environments for them to thrive. Setting up university foundries is a good way to achieving this,’’ he said.
While identifying Nigerian women as very enterprising, Adesina said that young females deserved special entrepreneurship programmes to unleash their potentials.
“Women are great entrepreneurs. Just take a look at women in Nigeria. They are very enterprising. Everywhere you look you see them hard at work. Women run Nigeria.
“No bird can fly with one wing. When women’s potential is fully unlocked, Nigeria will fly with two wings,’’ Adesina said.
He said that the AfDB was supporting entrepreneurship programmes in African universities.
“One example is the Rwanda Institute of Science and Technology, a collaborative programme on Masters in ICT, jointly with Carnegie Mellon University in the U.S.A.
“With 40 million dollars support from the bank, the school is world class, 100 per cent of their students get jobs even before they graduate, with many setting up their own ventures.
“Such is the case of Clarisse Irigabiza, a student who set up her own IT business, and sold it for 21 million dollars at the age of 27.
“What did the university do to help her? World class education, yes. But much more: exposure to entrepreneurship.
“Payment of tuition fees for undergraduate/postgraduate studies shall be subject to a maximum limit of $25,000.00 per semester,” the Manual states.
The expansion of international card limits also reflects growing confidence among lenders that foreign exchange liquidity has improved enough to support retail dollar transactions.
Speaking recently at the BusinessDay 14th Annual CEO Forum in Lagos, CBN Olayemi Cardoso, governor of the CBN said buying and selling activities now increasingly determine outcomes in the foreign exchange market, unlike in the past when market participants relied heavily on routine Central Bank interventions.
According to Cardoso, Nigeria’s net foreign exchange reserves have risen from just over $3 billion at the start of the reform programme to more than $40 billion, while gross reserves have climbed to about $52 billion, providing stronger confidence for investors and enabling the Central Bank to reserve interventions for periods of market stress rather than day-to-day liquidity management.
The restoration and expansion of international naira card spending limits are increasingly being seen as one of the clearest signs that the benefits of the CBN’s foreign exchange reforms are beginning to reach households, students and businesses making legitimate cross-border payments.
The Secretary-General and Chief Executive Officer, WEC, Dr Angela Wilkinson, disclosed this in a statement, last Thursday.
“Nigeria’s participation comes at a pivotal time as the country seeks to expand energy access, strengthen energy security, accelerate gas development and mobilise the capital required for industrialisation and sustainable economic growth.
“WEC Nigeria will convene leaders from across the energy ecosystem, apply the WEC’s globally recognised Energy Trilemma framework to Nigeria’s unique context, and promote evidence-based dialogue, practical collaboration and informed policymaking.
“It will also ensure that Nigerian and broader African perspectives contribute meaningfully to global energy conversations,” she said.
Wilkinson expressed confidence that Nigeria would play a significant leadership role at the World Energy Congress scheduled for Riyadh in April 2027 and beyond.
The statement also quoted the Chairman of WEC Nigeria, Isa, as describing the country’s participation as an opportunity to deepen national and African leadership within the global energy community through practical solutions tailored to regional development priorities.
He said the platform would promote collaboration across sectors and attract sustainable investments into Nigeria’s energy sector.
The Chief Executive Officer of WEC Nigeria, Wunti, was quoted in the statement as saying that the council would connect leadership, evidence and investment to build a secure, affordable and sustainable energy system.
“This system will be capable of driving economic growth and shared prosperity.”
According to him, the platform will also connect Nigerian institutions and businesses with international knowledge, technology, partnerships and investment opportunities through the World Energy Council’s global network.
Recall that WEC, founded in 1923, is the world’s oldest independent and impartial community of energy leaders and practitioners, advancing informed, collaborative and practical action across the global energy system.