About 70,000 youths have benefited from ITF’s empowerment

The Industrial Training Fund (ITF) has disclosed that its empowerment programmes have helped in curbing insurgency, restiveness and migration.
The Director-General of the Fund,  Joseph Ari, made this remark on Thursday, in Jos, duringb the graduation of 70 trainees of culinary art of its Technical Skills Development Programme (TSDP).
He said that the ITF had engaged no fewer than 70,000 youths in getting jobs, and, so, help insurgency, restiveness and ill-advised  migration.
Ari disclosed that no fewer than 70,000 youths have benefited from the fund, adding that it has provided source of livelihood for the trainees.
According to Ari, “It is worrisome that hundreds of Nigerians are deported everyday now because they are desperate for better lives abroad. We plead with organisations to partner with us to train these youths on technical skills.
“When this is done, even when they even leave the shores of the country, they will generate revenue for Nigeria both at home and abroad for developmental projects as authorities in such skills,” he said.
Ari said that the programme was in partnership with Nigeria Employers Consultative Association (NECA) and had more than 24 public and private participating organisations to equip participants with technical and vocational skills.
He told the graduate that they have a large market because the hospitality business was on the rise as ‘man must eat’, pointing out that it also promised more healthy families for a productive economy.
The Director-General of NECA, Segun Oshinowo, congratulated the beneficiaries while tasking them to discharge their duties diligently.
Oshinowo represented by Nike Ajala, the Deputy-Director, Abuja Liaison Office, said that more than 1,000 youths applied for the limited allocation but only 70 became successful, stressing that it was a privilege.