Causes Of Youth Unemployment In Nigeria

4.0 Causes of Youth Unemployment in Nigeria

Many studies have identified various reasons for youth unemployment. Some of them are briefly discussed below:

4.1 Rural Urban migration

Many youths view rural life as unattractive due to outdated or subsistence farming methods and lack of social amenities. Many youths therefore migrate to urban centers with the hope of securing better paying jobs and living a more fulfilling life. According to Sam (2000) cited in Okafor (2011), fifty (50) percent of the youths in Africa would reside in urban areas by 2010, despite the fact that jobs are limited in most of these urban areas.

4.2 Rapid increase in population

Nigeria, like most developing countries does not have effective population control mechanism.

Countries in South East Asia have achieved trade surplus by encouraging entrepreneurship. (Bello,2003).

According to Salami (2013), there is need for government to emphasise entrepreneurial education to solve the problem of youth unemployment. He advocated that the curricula from primary to tertiary education levels should be infused with entrepreneurship training.

Bello (2003) advocated for the linkage of agriculture with processing. He noted that the reason the full potential of agriculture has not been realized is because of lack of supporting infrastructure. He also stated that state governments should endeavour to develop their own innovative activities aimed at promoting entrepreneurial growth.

According to Metu and Nwokoye (2014), citing (Okonkwo, 1996 and Okonjo-Iweala, 2005), entrepreneurship activities are the prime drivers of economic growth. Its ability to empower the populace to employ local raw materials ensures both vertical and horizontal connection. The authors further noted that successful economic growth depends on a nation’s domestic entrepreneurship activities in addition to the growth of

Government has also established industrial development centers, credit schemes for small and medium scale enterprises, etc. The point made by Oxenfeldt (1943) cited in Anyadike, Eme and Ukah (2012), that people who are facing challenges of unemployment and prospects of poor paying jobs are likely to turn to entrepreneurial activities, is worthy of note.

Entrepreneurship development in Nigeria is faced with lot of problems. Lack of basic social amenities such as power, good roads, poor implementation of government policies and lack of access to information has often mitigated against entrepreneurial development.

It should be noted that even though Nigeria is a major producer of petroleum products, the comparative advantage of producing petroleum has not been felt by the citizenry. Cost of producing power, telecommunication and transportation of finished products has negatively impacted on entrepreneurship. Lack of access by entrepreneurs to international and local markets, multiplicity of taxes, lack of simplified credit policy, amongst others, have negatively impacted on entrepreneurship