The Nigerian government has been advised to prop up its abundant talents in areas of comparative advantage, including the creative arts, craft and software writing, to earn more foreign exchange (FX) and shore up the value of the naira within a short space of time.
This is reminiscent of what the Edo State Government has been doing over the last few years, through the state sponsored Edojobs, Victor Uwaifo Creative Hub and Edo Tech Park initiatives, to transform the state into a hub for global talents.
These undertakings have graduated not less than 387 software engineers since 2021 and continue to empower several more talents in the creative arts industry in Edo State.
Giving the advice on youth development for FX earnings was Professor Bell Ihua, a Nigerian who has led teams of researchers to consult for major domestic and international organisations, including the World Bank, US Conflict & Stabilisation Organisation (USCSO), US State Dept. Office of Opinion Research (USOOR), British Council, UK DFID, German Embassy, GIZ and the United States Institute for Peace (USIP). Ihua spoke in a recent interview on Arise Television.
Ihua points out that a significant number of Nigerians are already earning foreign exchange, largely unaided, in these fields and that the volume of players and earnings would increase remarkably and lift the Nigerian economy if the government would step in to encourage with training, mentoring, marketing and grants.
“We should be thinking of grants to budding sectors, entertainment sector, music, movies, skit making and comedy. The top skit makers in Nigeria earn up to $40,000 per month from skits. We should train and empower hundreds more so that this revenue can increase. If we train more of them, more dollars will come into the country,” he said.
He further notes that those making beads and other such craft from Nigeria and trading online, earn as much as $4,000 per month, describing these areas as addressable “low hanging fruits,” to be pursued to significant advantage in the short term.
“Attend to simple and strategic things like these and bring more prosperity, create more jobs, create foreign exchange revenue and get our youths off the streets,” he says.
He states that the President Bola Tinubu government’s decisions to remove fuel subsidy and free float the naira had long-term benefits and short-term challenges. The challenges, he notes, include the spiraling costs of goods and services, food and transportation, as is currently being witnessed.
Another solution that the government could pursue, he observe, would be to go into procurements, which entailed issuing out contracts designed to generate a broad array of direct jobs, other spin-offs and bring greater liquidity into the local economy.
“We need to begin to think of kick-starting industrialisation and look to producing for export to earn foreign exchange. There is huge pressure on the dollar,” he notes.
He observes further that the government needs to provide incentives for growth and expansion for the country’s Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs) so as to create more gainful employment, recalling that MSMEs were responsible for 48 percent of Nigeria’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and over 70 percent of employment.
“Nigeria has 39million micro small and medium scale businesses MSMEs which employ up to 70percent of the labour force. We must look for how they can be empowered for growth. We should find how to empower businesses that employ up to 1,000 people and empower them for growth, so that they can employ even more. It will drive crime down and improve standard of living.”
He also observed that Nigerians are feeling the heat of the rising cost of living, that begging is on the increase and that the social safety nets are weak, noting that Nigerians have moved from a communal lifestyle to more of individualism and that one of the consequences of this was that it was difficult to find help when people found themselves in difficulty.
Institutions such as churches and mosques, which had been fulfilling the social safety net role have been largely overstretched and can no longer cope, he states.
Another expert, who did not want his name mentioned, wants the federal and state governments to be more serious with the nation’s agriculture sector.
He says: “Agriculture holds the ace. Nigeria has not exploited the sector fully. Countries like Malaysia, Indonesia make huge foreign earnings from the export of produce. Why can’t Nigeria do the same?”
