Tanzania Students Urged To Embrace Entrepreneurship As Solution To Unemployment

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Tanga Regional Commissioner, Chiku Gallawa has advised Tanzania youths to create jobs themselves instead of depending on government for employment.

According to her, Tanzania has many job creation opportunities which are not yet tapped.

“Foreigners see those opportunities and that is why many of them scramble to invest here,” she said at a programme sponsored by Voice of America (VOA) in Tanga city.

She said it was astonishing to see graduates complaining that there were no jobs, while when foreigners come within short time they see the opportunities and utilize them by establishing big projects that could earn them huge profit.

"This is a matter of changing your mindset; if you think that after graduation you will be employed and if you do not get employment, you will be totally discouraged, and start complaining against the government ...while the same government has opened the chance for you to invest."

She added that the government has minimal chances to employ all the graduates; therefore, the best permanent solution was for the graduates to use their academic skills, create jobs because there are abundant resources in their localities.

Students complain that they have been facing challenges when it comes to the question of employment after graduation; citing lack of experience, corruption and favouritism in terms of "who you know and not what you know" in job seeking as some of the major challenges they face.

Meanwhile, a lecturer from Eckernforde University based in Tanga, Ancyfrida Prosper, said, entrepreneurship skills should be taught from primary school level as a subject, in order to prepare youths for self employment.

According to her, many graduates do not know how to prepare business plans, thus it is harder for them access loans, as financial institutes need such documents before releasing the money.

Additional Report: Tanzania Daily News