The Chairman of the Small and Medium Enterprises Development Agency, Olufemi Pedro, says entrepreneurship is the solution to rising poverty and financial insecurity among youths and women in the country.
He disclosed this at the 4th Moses Orimolade Memorial Lecture organised by The Eternal Sacred Order of the Cherubim and Seraphim Church in Lagos.
Pedro, a former deputy governor of Lagos State, said youths and women were vulnerable members of the society, but if given required empowerment and education, would transform the future of the nation.
Pedro said, “Statistically, there are over 45 million MSMEs in Nigeria, and the majority are owned and managed by youths and women.
“Youths and women constitute the backbone of the church but unfortunately, most of them are deep in poverty and struggling financially and primarily at the receiving end of the economic downturn in the country.
“Our spirituality has inadvertently promoted poverty, inactivity and idleness. The church has failed to provide its teeming members, particularly youths and women, with necessary support, empowerment, and education to lift them out of poverty amid the lingering economic crisis.”
He added that successful entrepreneurship was the surest way out of poverty to wealth creation and financial security and independence.