Posted on September, 20, 2019 at 10:44 am
DEPUTY Minister in the Prime Minister’s Office responsible for Labour, Youths and Employment Anthony Mavunde has ordered district councils to put aside land to enable youth ventures in various sectors such as agriculture, livestock keeping and fisheries as a way of creating employment.
Mavunde said this shortly after a tour of various youth development projects in Dareda village in Babati District in Manyara Region and Hurui village in Kondoa District in Dodoma Region. The projects in question are sponsored by the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC) and the Netherlands Development Organization (SNV) through Oye Project.
The Prime Minister’s Office in collaboration with the Ministry of Agriculture teamed up and came up with the project aimed at involving youths in agriculture by creating an enabling environment, training and advocacy for attitude change as many youths underrate agriculture, he said.
“The first step in this mission will be to work in collaboration with the Sokoine University of Agriculture to train youths on modern methods of agriculture and help them change their attitudes,” he said.
The second step will be a massive investment on youth and to start with we have a strategic plan for capacity building for 100 youths from various regions, out of which 80 will be trained on vegetable farming in greenhouse mode, which have already installed in 12 regions. About 20 youths will be trained in building green house,” he said.
The third step is to enable youths to benefit though youth development funds where four percent of district council revenues would be allocated to that purpose.
“Agriculture has potential to solve financial challenges and provide solution to unemployment among youths. Therefore district councils should create enabling environments and we in the Prime Minister’s Office will ensure that through various development funds, youths are supported to achieve their goals,” he stated.
He called on institutions all over the country to assume the responsibility of making sure that the youth unemployment agenda is given due attention and thus support youth to employ themselves through agriculture.
“Such a move would give a boost to industrial economy philosophy,” he declared.
“Buildings with machines is not all it takes for a country to be industrialized., We need raw materials and livestock, agriculture, fisheries and even forests are crucial for an industrial economy to be sustainable. For example, youth farming tomato gardens can provide raw materials to tomato sauce factories,” he said.
The Oye Project Programme Manager, Jean Muthamia-Mwenda said there has been tremendous achievement in furthering that course, as youths have changed their lives through agricultural activities.
The Oye Project Business Advisor, Faustine Msangila said the project has supported over 8000 youths, above the targeted 6500 in the first phase of the project which started in 2016 in Shinyanga, Manyara, Singida, Tabora, Dodoma and Morogoro.
The target was to reach over 20,000 youths in the second phase which will be done in collaboration with the government, the consultant added.
Source: IPP Media