Body decries youth unemployment

What you need to know:

Key issues. The National Association of Students Enterprise notes that there are few jobs for youth and career guidance in most schools has skill gaps.

Kampala.

Uganda is the most entrepreneurial country in world, yet it also has one of the world’s highest rates of youth unemployment, Mr Denis Aguma, the founder and chief executive officer of National Association of Students Enterprise, has said.

Speaking at a two-day conference last Friday organised to encourage students and graduates to literally take the “leap” into the world of business and entrepreneurship, Mr Aguma said while education has traditionally fought poverty, Uganda’s economy was not creating enough jobs to employ the youth.

More than 400,000 youth enter Uganda’s job market annually yet only 80,000 to 90,000 are absorbed in the labour market.

Mr Aguma said career guidance in most schools is patchy and too dependent on individual teachers having the right expertise- with employers often finding out that school leavers do not have the necessary skills or training to do the work which they are employed in, adding that it impacts on individual performance and economy.

Mr Aguma said NASE would equip young people with skills and confidence to develop their ideas and vocational interests into formidable businesses that will help combat youth unemployment.

Speaking at the event, Mr Dickson Mushabe, the chief executive officer of Hostilite schools and author of a book; I am not sorry for my mistakes encouraged youth to make an idea become a formidable business.

“Always avoid bad ideas, avoid negative people, make sure you surround yourself with people who think like you positively, focus, and do a lot of research listen and preserver you will succeed,” Mr Mushabe said.

He encouraged them to put an idea into action by creating a company with all the valuable details such as a logo and name.