Stakeholders Harp On Capacity Building To Address Unemployment

Participants have described targeted education and capacity building as veritable tools to tackle hardship and unemployment in the country. Targeted education, they said, is a situation whereby people are trained for proper skill acquisition, especially, among women, adding that this will go a long way to prune unemployment and hardship in the country. Speaking at the 15th Delegates Conference of Food, Beverage and Tobacco Senior Staff Association (FOBTOB), stakeholders claimed that teamwork can only be used when both men and women are equipped with necessary skills, suggesting more participation of women in all fields. Describing inflation as a threat against industrialisation, they charged President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s regime to tackle the menace, reiterating that the effect of high cost of production is denying customers from buying products that were produced in high cost, thereby, they are recording many unsold products. This is just as the deputy comptroller of Immigration, Mr Matthew Izediuno and deputy comptroller of Customs, Mohammed Madu Sarkiyo, in separate presentations, sought the partnership of labour unions in tackling expatriate abuse in workplaces. On his part, the managing director of Nestle Nigeria Plc., Wassim Elhusseini, advised the federal government to diversify energy and invest in boosting local resources to save the food and beverage industry from collapse. Likewise, the registrar of Trade Union, Mr Amos Falonipe, urged stakeholders in the industry to take stock of past activities and chart new courses for the future. Similarly, the managing director of 7-up, Mr Ziad Maalouf said, when there is an open door for innovation without gender bias, then, there will be potential for development of the country. In the same vein, the president of FOBTOB, Comrade Jimoh Oyibo, who was re-elected in the Delegates Conference, while speaking on the theme: ‘Rescuing the Food, Beverage and Tobacco Industry from Danger of Collapse,’ lamented that the country has continued to witness downturn despite all the fiscal and monetary policies.