One can say with any fear of contradiction that with the all-round education which includes academic and professional education, Leadership and Entrepreneurial training being dished out by Afe Babalola University, Ado-Ekiti (ABUAD), it will be next to an unpardonable crime for any of its graduates to still go about with the mind set of pounding the streets to shop for white collar jobs after graduation.
It is a known fact that Nigeria Universities turn out several hundreds of thousands of graduates into the labour market every year, but the question that keeps agitating one’s mind is: Are there enough jobs for all these graduates? The answer is an obvious NO! The next question will then be: Can we say the education sector is aiding unemployment? Not quite, because without education, there is will be no future and if there is at all, it may be bleak.
What then is the solution to the high level of unemployment? The need for the inculcation and the entrenchment of the culture of entrepreneurship among the youth is the undeniable answer. Since the concept of entrepreneurship has been clearly stated as an employment strategy that leads to economic sufficiency for people, youth entrepreneurship should now evolve through the practical application of entrepreneurship qualities such as initiative, innovation, creativity and risk taking by youths in self-employment aimed at success.
It is on this note that I salute the Founder and President Emeritus of Afe Babalola University, Ado-Ekiti (ABUAD), Aare Afe Babalola, SAN, for his vision and dream of wanting to change the face of education for the better and I equally congratulate the present crop of ABUAD students and those that will come after them for the great benefit and achievements the Founder has accorded (and will continually accord) them through the instrumentality of the establishment of the university to promote and lead others in the provision of quality, functional and reformatory functional in Nigeria.
Babalola has thus set the pace in the Entrepreneurship training that could serve as an added advantage for the students after graduation because while in the university, ABUAD students learn different skills such as catering services, hair making, fashion designing, barbing, printing, baking and photography as well as laundry work among others from ABUAD Venture.
The students may not know the import of the acquisition of these skills now, but most certainly, most assuredly; it will stand them in good stead upon graduating from ABUAD.
Students should take maximum advantage of the University’s massive Agricultural Enterprise Farm, which today boasts of 110,000 Mango trees, 500,000 Teak trees, 310,000 Gmelina trees, a Moringa Factory worth over N1 billion, a large expanse of plantain and banana plantation and cassava farms as well as a large Mushroom, farm to learn some useful skill in agriculture.
Besides, the Agricultural Enterprise Farm also boasts of an Animal section made up of 600 fish ponds with at least 5,000 different species of fishes in each of them, a Feed Mill worth over N500,000.00, a Piggery, Snailery, Turkey, Guinea Fowl, Quail, Australian Ducks and Geese, Ghanaian Geese and Mushroom as well as an Incubator for fingerlings, thus making it the best in the best in this part of the world.
Only recently, Aare Afe Babalola, a man who does not believe in half measures, procured and installed a Fruit Preservation House which was ordered from The Harvest Protection Network, a Philadelphia-based American company, another first of its kind in this part of the world.
While in school, Nigerian students should endeavour to acquire enterprise skills because:
- It promotes innovation and resilience in youths.
- It helps youths to be self-employed and useful to themselves and the society at large.
- It reduces socio-psychological problems and the attendant delinquency that may arise from joblessness.
- It is an easy response to new economic opportunities and trends.
- It gives youths a sense of meaning and purpose in life.
- It helps youths to develop skills and experiences that can be applied to many other challenges in and of life.