Universities in Africa have been advised to give priority to entrepreneurship training and research to help equip graduates with life skills to create employment.
Egerton University Chancellor Dr Narendra Guru Raval, regrets that governments on the continent are increasingly facing challenges in creating jobs, saying the reality was that there were more training opportunities than there are job openings.
The situation, according to Dr Raval is now creating a large population of young people in Africa with skills and knowledge but no jobs and called for a transformative philosophy of education that will produce graduates who become employers.
“I encourage university graduates to take risks, venture into uncharted territories, and use their skills to help others selflessly,” Dr Raval advised.
Speaking during Egerton University’s 48th graduation ceremony, Dr Raval advised graduates to innovate and explore entrepreneurship, pointing out that it is easier to take risks before settling into the stability of salaried employment.
He at the same time warned the youth against indulging in alcoholism and drug abuse, advocating instead for spiritual growth and the pursuit of moral values.
Dr Raval further advised graduates to gain experience through internships, volunteering, and industrial attachments.
The Chancellor extended an invitation to engineering graduates to explore opportunities within his 18 industries spread across the country and also called on the university’s institutional partners including the Kenya Commercial Bank Group to support the university by constructing lecture halls and personally pledged to donate furniture.
Dr Raval proposed that young people in tertiary institutions and universities be taught how to start and run enterprises, in effect, transforming them from job seekers to job creators.
He observed that in some countries, enterprises especially those that involve value addition, have become family traditions with skills handed from one generation to the other adding that the same trend has been observed among best known entrepreneurs in Kenya.
Ideally, he mentioned, universities should seek solutions to challenges facing society and added that they can only do this through research on such diverse subjects as soil efficiency, optimizing agricultural production, cures for diseases and social and economic problems like perennial traffic jams.
Dr Raval further reiterated that universities must train students in courses that meet the needs of the job market and regretted that higher education institutions continued churning out graduates who are increasingly finding themselves unemployed yet there are companies facing difficulties in recruiting workers with an appropriate mix of applicable skills and knowledge.
He suggested that Technical and Vocational Education Training Institutions (TVETS), polytechnics and universities establish business innovation and incubation centers to offer entrepreneurial training to youth for a period ranging from six months to one year.
“We need mechanics, plumbers, tailors, welders and carpenters just as much as we need doctors, architects, accountants, computer programmers and engineers. All these professionals can start enterprises, which then create employment for youth,” he affirmed.
By Esther Mwangi
