Vice President Kashim Shettima on Saturday said the growing informal sector and low labour force participation occasioned by the staggering unemployment rate in Nigeria must be reversed.
Senator Shettima said this during the launch of the Nasarawa State Human Capital Development Strategy Document and Gender Transformative Human Capital Development Policy Framework held in Lafia, the state capital.
He said the Human Capital Development (HCD) Programme is designed to reverse the unemployment rate in the country under the administration of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu.
He said the administration’s goal was to empower Nigerians with globally competitive skills and enable Nigerian workers to excel domestically and in the international job market.
“Nasarawa State’s commitment to the Human Capital Development (HCD) Programme, a lifeline for our nation, is built on the collective realisation that enough is enough. Enough of the cycles that have held us back. Enough of the legacies of unplanned high fertility rates and alarming maternal and under-five mortality rates. Enough of our vulnerable populations facing low life expectancy.
“Enough of the distressing data on our education system — whether it is the mean years of schooling, the high pupil-to-teacher ratios, or the staggering number of youths not in employment, education, or training. The unemployment rates, the growing informal sector, and low labour force participation must be reversed.
“This is the dystopia our Human Capital Development Programme is designed to avert, under the mandate of His Excellency, President Bola Ahmed Tinubu. For so long, at the National Economic Council, we have debated the ideal nation we wish to build and the pathways to achieve it,” he said.
He said the quest for a reversal of the nation’s human capital challenges is at the heart of the HCD programme, which focuses on workforce development, education and health.
He said the unveiling of the programme reaffirms the Tinubu administration’s shared belief that the way forward for the nation lies in solutions fashioned to suit the unique realities of each state of the federation.
He said the federal government was committed to ensuring Nigerian youths acquire employable skills, stressing that empowering them to “export the acquired skills globally, competing at the highest levels of the international marketplace.”
“Our partnerships with the private sector are critical in achieving this. By facilitating access to resources, expertise, and innovation, we aim to make human capital development the cornerstone of a more prosperous and competitive Nigeria,” he said.
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