Youth Advocates For Peace Justice And Empowerment Network (YAPJEN) A non- governmental, nation building, sustainable development goals, good governance, social justice and human right advocacy organisation has charged the Minister of finance and the governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria to support Smes across the economy across the six geopolitical zone by increase lending to small and medium enterprises as they are the true drivers of the nations economy.
Amb Timothy Nwachukwu, the Executive Director of the organization made in a broadcast to journalist opined that Small and Medium-scale Enterprises (SMEs), are now strategic and essential for accelerating economic growth in Nigeria. SMEs constitute about 90 per cent of all the businesses in Nigeria, creating more than 80 per cent of employment in the region.
“SMES are the engine of the nations economy and the growth of the economy will be dependent on the support which the federal government can make available to SMES” he stated.
He noted that SMEs have direct impact on the growth of any economy and contribute about 48 percent to Nigeria’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP), with employment generation.
He identified Small and medium-sized businesses as the real drivers of the national economies. Given the potential of SMEs to unlock Nigeria’s economic growth, one of the challenges, however, is access to credit.
He expressed hope that the Minister of finance and other relevant agencies under it’s purview will through robust policies accelerate the growth of Nigeria’s economy.
In another development, YAPJEN expressed its utter displeasure over schools in Nigeria that still operate the curriculum designed at their inception stating that the outcome is that Nigerian graduates when employed are first subjected to months of training and retraining before they can resume work as most lack the relevant skills and information.
Amb Nwachukwu further charged the National University Commission and other educational regulatory bodies in Nigeria to as a matter of urgency review the curriculum of the nation’s education at various levels to meet the challenges of the 21st century.
In his words, “We need to completely overhaul the curriculum in our schools as it is long overdue right from the primary school, we need to teach our children how to build apps, robots, drones which will in turn provides solution to our ever increasing challenges, therefore overhauling the school curriculum has become imperative amidst the global challenges which are threatening our environment and our daily lives”.
“Our current curricula cannot prepare students for the job of the future. We have to change, from now, the education of the future. It is no longer competition of knowledge but of creativity, learning and independent thinking” he said.
He lamented that a time was when Nigerian graduates were ‘hot cake’. But this isn’t the case today as the outdated curriculum being run in most tertiary institutions have contributed in no small measure to this change of status.
He clearly stated that the future is not knowledge driven. It is experience driven and that is what our educational curriculum should reflect. Today, you have to think outside the box but in the future, you will need to think without the box.
Nwachukwu also called for a collaborative effort between the private sectors, researchers and experts in our institution of learning to develop computer applications to teach problem solving and organisational skills, the development of Apps to teach these skills
He charged the nations tertiary institutions to address the daunting challenges of youth employment not only through conventional education but through technical, Vocational Education as well incorporation of entrepreneurial as well as technical and vocational education training.