Nestle Nigeria Plc, maker of Nestle Golden Morn has given a grant of five hundred thousand Naira each of the graduands of the Golden Morn Agripreneurship initiative to encourage young generation focus more on agriculture as a contemporary business away from their fixation on white collar jobs .
The ceremony which took place on Friday February 19,2022 in Lagos had seven graduands on the list. They are Shadrack Omale, Adeniji Mustapha, Gabriel Okonkwo, Andrew Samaila, Favour Adeleke, Emeka Nwachinemere and Onyema Nmachukwu.
The initiative according to Managing Director of Nestle, Wassim Huisseni received over 2000 applications but 150 participants were shortlisted to participate and at the end of the programme, only seven of them satisfied the criteria.
He said the company’s focus was on creative shared values and youth empowerment.
“The Agripreneurship initiative by Golden Morn is in line with our focus on the force of good and in touch with many objectives of the organisation. To mention a few, we are empowering the youths, providing them with knowledge also the resources to create future entrepreneurship opportunities. Making jobs attractive and creating jobs through creative shared value.
“Increasing our locally sourced raw materials and proud to say we crossed 85% in 2021in Nigeria. Also, improving the quality of crops and food in line with nutrition health and wellness to our Nigerian consumers.”
However, Huisseni who addressed the dignitaries and trainees virtually expressed his appreciation on the efforts of Lagos Business School and experts from private and public institutions in the agricultural sectors to complete the two successive cycles of Agripreneurship programme.
Earlier in the programme, Ifeanyichukwu Orabuche, Category Manager, Dairy has given insight into the Agripreneurship idea while addressing the graduands. She said,
Golden Morn was just one out of the many businesses of Nestle that benefits from the agricultural ecosystem. She added that the company remained in business because the it has a viable system. She further said that the company acknowledged the need to bridge the gaps of food security looking at sustainability and social development goals.
“Median age for farming is about 54% which tells us that we have a looming crisis in our hands if we do not involve the youths to step into the space. Today’s unemployment accounts for about 33% and a lot of the young population is either unemployed or underemployed.
” We want to amplify what you people are doing in the agric space. Some of you have been motivated through interaction with individuals or government agencies. We want to highlight the fact that agric is viable and knowing that agric will eventually account for a lot of business employment in Nigeria.”
Orabuche urged graduands to essentially maintain the value chain and show that they can deliver standard products to consumers.
Some of the trainees are said to be at different curves of the food chain such as food preservation, agric technology, farming, manufacturing second level product and others .
Some of the excited graduands were confident of what the future holds as they shared their experiences.
Onyema Nmachukwu, the only female trainee was serving her fatherland in Adamawa State when the opportunity came her way. She said youths need to be attracted with more campaigns as opportunities in agric space is limitless.
“Nestle has done so greatly for us but I think the campaign for youths to come into agriculture should be intensified.
“The youths should be made to see how attractive it is. The programme is superb and helpful to build a future but the campaign must be on the increase so that many youths would plug into it.”she concluded
Another trainee, Emeka Nwachinemere expressed his joy and promised to be the best. He said, “It is a wonderful opportunity to be here. The biggest challenge we face globally is the possibility that we may not be able to feed ourselves and the only way out is to figure out how to produce 60% more food to feed the population.
“This can only be achieved through collaboration. This initiative is dear to me and i hope to make impact in my community.”
Favour Adeleke also spoke glowingly about the project, ” My experience has been exceptional, seeing everyone here has given us hope . I had great experience with the lecturers and also learnt how we could add values to our country.
“We need to find synergy and all hands must be on deck if we are to be successful on this. We will unlock the wealth in the value chain of agriculture across Nigeria.
” I hope we can have this programme become more sustainable in the coming years.”
Obianuju Okafor of Enterprise Development Centre, Pan Atlantic University analysed the training and pointed out the criteria used for the applicants.
“The programme began in 2021 and we wanted unique entrepreneurs to come on board to make a change. We targeted between 18 and 35 years of age because they are the youths who want to go into work but evade agriculture.
“We want to change their orientation and tell them they are the future of the future. The focus is more on grains because the product, Golden Morn, is tied to it.
“We had over 2000 applicants, 150 were eventually chosen and pitches were also done.
“The training brought to fore business operations and marketing modules and shed light on values in business models.
” The seven graduands today were targeted to show forth these values in their various communities,”she concluded.
