By Israel Joel
Director-General of the Jos Business School Ezekiel Gomos has said that unless Nigeria invests in human capital development through skills development and building of productive capacity to deliver quality services, the nation cannot overcome endemic poverty.
He made this known in Jos during a paper presentation at the Industrial Training Fund ITF’s golden jubilee celebration.
Speaking on the theme: Changing the poverty narrative through skills, The role of the ITF and the imperative for institutional synergy,” Gomos, a former Secretary of the Plateau State Government noted that in the 1960s, only 15% of Nigerians were poor but today, the country has 70% of the poor people coming behind India and China.
His words, “The 33% unemployment rate in Nigeria is quite challenging, Management of ITF, the National Assembly, the Federal Ministry of Industry, Trade and Investment and all stakeholders must do what is necessary to change the poverty narratives of the country.
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He added that “Poverty level in Nigeria is massive and devastating and leads to social vices, ITF’s impacts are just a scratch on the surface, more needs to be done to breach the skills gap in the nation’s economy. Nigeria should emulate Vietnam in aggressive skills education which helps them to lift 50 million people out of poverty within a decade.
“Skills remain the currency of the 21st century to pull Nigeria out of poverty. We must also focus on socio-emotional skills and digital skills must be fused into all we do and there must be synergy with relevant stakeholders. The nation needs a national skills development summit to improve and coordinate skills acquisition programmes.”
It would be recalled that the ITF was established on October 8, 1971, with the core mandate to develop human resources by training Nigerians on skills relevant for the industrialization of the country.
