As the globe marks Monday’s International Youth Day, entrepreneurship is burgeoning among Uganda’s youth as unemployment rises in the East African nation..
Shortly after graduating from university in 2017, Amon Bazira, a bachelor of education, unsuccessfully applied for several employment.
After several searches for formal employment, the 26-year-old person gave up and resorted to building his decoration skill and designing activities.
From scratch, Bazira began his company with about 100 U.S. dollars that his mom had loaned to him.
Bazira began to get more customers after managing the wedding of his first client. Every weekend, his business A-Classic Events handles multiple decoration ceremonies. He can earn about 500 dollars in a month, an amount he wouldn’t earn had he followed his teaching career.
“After fully establishing myself in the decoration sector, I have now expanded into the confectionery business,” he said.
“We have started making cakes for our clients so that we widen on our scope of products on an event. It is already working out well for me,” Bazira added.
With his company, he claims nothing can attract him to seek formal employment because he is already doing well.
Jonathan Lugumu, 24, a third-year student at the Makerere University in Kampala, the capital, did not wait to graduate before searching for a job.
He informed Xinhua that after attending a government-organized enterprise talk last year, he realized that the future was not as bright as it might seem on the job market.
Lugumu partnered with a classmate and set up a paper store just outside the university campus.
“We gathered some money and invested in stock worth 500 dollars for the start,” Lugumu said, noting that the shop is now worth 1,500 dollars.
“After acquiring my degree next year, I will go ahead and apply for a job. However, If I fail to get a job, I will concentrate on my business because it is already earning me some good money,” Lugumu said.
The company of Lugumu uses three individuals, all of whom are not university graduates.
Among many young people in Uganda, Bazira and Lugumu turn away from looking for formal employment and resorting to establishing their own jobs.
Figures by Uganda Statistics Bureau indicate that Uganda is one of the countries with the youngest population in the globe. Over 70 percent of 40 million individuals in the country are below 30 years of age.
Youth unemployment stands at about 70 percent, and around 400,000 youth are released annually into the job market to compete for about 10,000 employment accessible.
Fred Muhumuza, an economist at Makerere University, said most graduates who are not entrepreneurial enough are likely to discover it difficult to survive because even the informal sector is becoming more competitive.
“If the agricultural and industrial sectors can be empowered and developed larger to take on more youth, then the situation can change,” Muhumuza notes.
Government encourages youth, both trained and not, to be their own job creators rather than work seekers.
In a media conference held ahead of the International Youth Day, Florence Nakiwala, Minister of State for Youth and Children’s Affairs said there is a need to turn the education system into a bid to generate accountable citizenship and work development.
Nakiwala said education is critical in nurturing people who are productive and accountable for the socio-economic transformation of their societies.
She said government is also empowering young people into entrepreneurship.
She said some of the youth were provided money and equipment to begin them in company.
Uganda has set up several youth entrepreneurship training centres to equip young individuals with abilities.
“These are some of the initiatives that will continue to drive entrepreneurship forward and I advise unemployed to join these training centers,” she said.