Challenges in Tackling Poverty and Unemployment: Analysis of Youth Employment in Agriculture Program in Alkaleri, Duguri and Gar Rural Communities of Bauchi State, Nigeria

Abstract

Historically, majority of the poor are rural people with income levels below the poverty line. In Nigeria, the situation becomes more persistent as majority of the population are highly poor and unemployed particularly youths in the rural areas. The dire situation demands that due considerations should be given to the constraints of poverty and unemployment reduction plans when deliberating the strategies that can efficiently enable people to escape the poverty and unemployment cycle. This qualitative study attempts to fill a relevant research gap by examining the constraints of the Youth Employment in Agriculture Programme (YEAP) in Alkaleri, Duguri and Gar rural areas. The findings indicated that the YEAP in Alkaleri, Duguri, and Gar, uses informational skills and economic resources to train and partially empower youth with very little allowance for managing small scale agricultural activities. However, only 7 youth were selected as beneficiaries despite the large number of the population estimated to be over 461, 200 within these rural areas with insufficient funding, irregular coordination, monitoring, and motivation after the training and skill acquisitions. These have endangered the goals of the YEAP initiative, because the percentage coverage of the target beneficiaries remains drastically low and the rural areas involved in these programs are densely populated. Thus, unable to reduce poverty and unemployment adequately and instead, the poverty and unemployment rates keep increasing. In conclusion, this study calls for the need to reconceptualize, extend, and modify YEAP toward providing sufficient financial capital for its beneficiaries, efficient training and skills, frequent monitoring, coordination and evaluation, as well as proper coverage and outreach for the majority of the poor and unemployed population.