Unemployment: FG Begins National Job Survey

The federal government has instituted a national job survey targeted at ascertaining the number of skilled and unskilled vacancies in all sectors of the economy.

Minister of Industry, Trade and Investment, Dr Olusegun Aganga who gave the hint noted that the survey which is in collaboration with United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO) will assist greatly in giving accurate statistics of the number of skilled workers that would be needed in all the various sectors in the next 10 years.

Addressing State House correspondents at the end of the inaugural meeting of the Presidential Jobs Board chaired by Vice President Namadi Sambo, Aganga said ascertaining these figures became necessary in view of the investments being made in the sectors.

The minister said, “For the first time in this country, we have begun a national job survey of skills gap for the country so that by sector, we will know what the gap is and know what it is required to fill that gap.

“We are not just looking at the existing gaps today, we are looking at where the investments are going to. We are looking at the next five to 10 years.

“For instance, a lot of investments are going to automobile, we have automobile engineers, how many will we need in the next five to 10 years. A lot of investments are going to sugarcane, to sugar, do we have the skills to do that? How many will we need in the next three, five or 10 years?

“About N16 billion is going to petrochemicals, fertilizer, and methanol, we will need skilled players. A lot of investments are going to metals, iron ore and all that. Most of these positions at the moment in this country are not filled and if they are filled, they are filled by foreigners. We do not have anything to ensure that our graduates coming out from the universities are very relevant to the economy today.

“So for the first time in this country we have embarked on that national survey with UNIDO and that survey will be ready in January. That survey will be used by training institutions like Industrial Training Fund to ensure people are trained. But not just trained, but trained to work immediately.”

Aganga also said the survey result would also be useful to the Ministry of Education in preparing relevant syllabus from secondary school to higher levels.