Name: Hussain Topic: Unemployment in Nigeria (causes, effects and solutions) Lecturer: Date: 10/12/2012

Unemployment in Nigeria Every country in the world is familiar with the context Unemployment. The first feeling that flows into our minds when speaking of unemployment is a state where by people that are qualified for job are jobless. Jobless people have no means to provide for themselves daily needs. When they have family and jobless at the same time, life will be so much like a hell to that group

1|Page

of jobless people. In all society there are constantly a number of people who are not engaged in a gainful occupation, it due to the fact that there are no available as well as enough jobs for everyone. To have a clear understanding of unemployment and how to address it, acknowledging its meaning is at precedence. Broadly speaking, unemployment is an economic circumstance noted by the fact that people actively searching for jobs stay jobless. The level of unemployment is at variance with economic conditions and other circumstances. Any nation experiencing unemployment is likely for such nation undergo some major drawbacks and retreat. Nigeria is the most heavily populated country the whole African region and the seventh populated nation is the whole world, with majority of its population dominated by blacks. Its crude oil reserves have contributed countless revenues to the nation. It is recorded amongst the "top eleven economies, and is an associate of the Commonwealth countries. Upon all the resources and superb economy Nigeria is having, that doesnt stop unemployment from surfacing in the country. The unreciprocated question is what are induces of the rising unemployment is a country such flourishing economy? The basics causes of unemployment in Nigeria include Population outgrowth, ailment health condition, Poor Economic Growth Rate, Abandonment of the Agricultural Sector and Poor Supporting Environment. Unemployment is linked with various undesirable occurrences such as poverty, drug habituation, inadequate prenatal care, and religious violence. The above mentioned brings on of unemployment and the drawbacks will be discussed in depth (Asoluka Njoku, 2011).

Population outgrowth always takes the front seat as far as unemployment in Nigeria is concerned. Nigeria has felt a population outburst 50 years back owing to very high birth rates, multiplying its population at that period of time. 42.8% was the percentage of children under the
2|Page

age of 15, 53.8% was between 15 and 65 years of age, while 3.4% was 65 years and above. According to the recently concluded census, Nigerias population is roughly about 160 million people. However, it was predicted that by the year 2040, the population of Nigeria will hit 360 million which is totally undesirable. From the above statistics, 53.8% (15 to 65 years) are the most energetic youth in the society that are adequately prepared and capable of handling many jobs. Each of the 72 accredited Nigerian universities is graduating more than 9,000 students summing up to about 648,000 people yearly. Are these huge numbers of graduates get jobs even five years after their graduation? Moreover, for a country that is overpopulated, high rate of unemployment will emphatically surface because there will be no sufficient jobs to support the population since every individual will be moving helter-skelter for job.

Ailment health condition is another contributing factor to the current rising unemployment is Nigeria. People that are physically, mentally or psychologically incapacitated when applied for certain jobs, the window for securing the job is almost closed to that group of people, meanwhile even if they get the job, can they perform the required task perfectly? Majority of the people with ill condition are either born with it or it came to them from accidents originating from their profession, their family conditions, their imperfections of character and ability, careful consideration must be given to them all when studying the general problem. I believed no organization will employ workers that are either physically, mentally or psychologically unstable as doing so may hamper the forward movement of the organization (Eason, 1926). Ability to carry out things as they supposed to be is equally important and upon applying for job, employers give that special attention to the employees know how and special benefit is giving

3|Page

for that. Unable job seeker is usually disqualified from the moment employers realize his inability to perform task.

Poor economic growth of a nation also results to massive increment in unemployment rate. The high-ranking of corruption, mishandling of public assets, strict economic strategies and the uncertainty of the Nigerian environment combined with long term autocratic military rule are amongst contributing factors that have diminished the spirit of economic development for a long time. It is only when industries and factories are flourishing; enough jobs will be created so that more workers could get employed. It is paradoxical that country like Nigeria whose GDP is much better than that of many countries and second best economy in the whole African region is going through hapless economic growth which is giving place for unemployment to settle. Economic development in Nigeria is inhibited by poor infrastructure, electricity, inducements and policies that promote the development of private sector. When the available resources are underutilized, the outcome of it is poor job creation to youth and other people ready to work.

The act of giving up and abandonment of agricultural sector contributed tremendously to the current state of unemployment in Nigeria. The agricultural sector has been the principal source of employment in Nigeria particularly in the sixties and in the seventies when it offered employment to almost 60% of the Nigerian population (Asoluka Njoku, 2011). Long before the discovery of crude oil in Nigeria, agriculture was the primary source of income to Nigeria, and present day petroleum refineries Nigeria is having were built from revenue of agricultural sector of the country. Agriculture has been and will always be creating income, food and job to people. Now that the sector is lagging behind, majority of people are now suffering the aftermath of

4|Page

defection of this productive sector. Thousands of rural dwellers are vacating their respective villages abandoning their inherited farms that are providing them with food, income or employment in general. The migration of these dwellers into urban cities in search for a better job is not at all helping instead they are adding much load, unemployment and imbalanced to the host cities and at the end of the day, these very dwellers whose main occupation was farming and animals rearing will now end up not having the job desired in the city and they already abandon their farms back at village.

The last but not the least factor contributing to inching unemployment in Nigeria is poor supporting environment. The deprived economic assisting environment that symbolizes the economy for years has extended to put grievous challenges to employment generation in the country. This, together with inadequate security environment has continuous to hinder investment motivations and in so doing decreasing the chances of employment generation. A lot of job searchers who wouldve enter on freelance programs are incapable to do so due to the intimidating production environment. The rest who make effort are pushed to close up owing to lack of infrastructures and the general discomfort of the investment environment. Presently many industries and companies are forced to permanently shut down their operations and their workers are rendered jobless since the very place they are working at is closed all these because no sufficient supply of power, raw materials and government support to continue running the industries. Statistics indicates that 50 percent of industries operating in Nigeria are generating their own power and that is the reason behind relocation of many of these industries to neighboring countries such as Ghana and many others where they can continue their operations without any interception thereby causing mass increment of unemployment to Nigeria.

5|Page

Having heard of some of the induces of unemployment, it is equally important to dig into some consequences of unemployment. There is strong correlation between unemployment and poverty as the two go hand in hand. Poor masses have critically narrow access to as well as control over the key resources, such as land and human capital. Deficient production and labor market benefactions, the poor are having little income as well as low consumption. Majority of poor people are also educated inadequately and may be having fragile health conditions than the remaining of the population. Several rely on for their livings on subsistence form of agriculture where capitals are normally low. Poor people working in the informal sector have low salaries, inadequate security. These factors, together with absence of access to the institutions that reshape policies, inhibit underprivileged people from obtaining the abilities for proper and decent living. The amount of people living under the poverty and insufficiency line gives half the story. In Nigeria, not only do several individuals are living beneath the poverty line however they similarly stay poor for extended and continuous periods. Statistically, more than 50 million Nigerians are living with less than $1 a day which is so much below the poverty line. Lots of these inveterate poor masses only come out temporarily from poverty for the reason of employment seasonally (Raheem Olasupo Akewushola, 2007). Nigerian government recently initiated the poverty improvement actions applied and have concentrated much more on basic needs and rural development approaches and growth of the nation as.

Isnt it disturbing to see young fresh graduate doing drugs? No reasonable human would like to see someone known to him engaging in such devilish act of drug abuse. Most of these junkies graduated with first-class result but they couldnt find job that will make them committed and

6|Page

keep them away from such life threatening acts. Here goes a white mans saying an idle man is a devils workshop so it is not a thing of surprise seeing a jobless graduate embracing drugs they have nowhere to go and nothing to do. Drugging causes damage to brain as well as mental ability excessively making the addicts physically, mentally and psychologically unstable. Many go into drug due to frustration and idleness they are facing by living with no job thinking that drugging is the only way that can get them relief of their pathetic life not knowing them endangering their precious life to madness, lunacy and eventually death. Drug habit may possibly result to lung diseases. Drugs like marijuana, crack and heroin are smoked, and too much inhalation of smoke destroys lung cells, Smoking attracts poisonous chemicals into the lungs, and long term vulnerability to these chemicals contributes to lung irritation, and genetic mutations of cells in lung. As time goes by, these gathered mutations result to unusual cell growth and lung cancer growth.

Inadequate parental care is another product of unemployment. When the parent arent earning enough income to sustain the family, provide daily needs and requirement, then inadequacy in caring will arise. Imagine a family of twelve members and the monthly salary of the male parent is about $120; will this be adequate enough for all the family members? There will be no enough food to feed the entire family, some of the children would not be able to go to school for the fact that their parents are incapacitated to sponsor their education, eventually these children will end up as street homeless children, beggars and eventually they will start associating with bad companys and start participating in minor crimes which will finally transform into major community crimes. Majority these youngsters are malnourished and are more prone catching several diseases because their body immune system is lacking the necessary and vital elements.

7|Page

The highest percentage of the children getting run-over in Nigerian high ways are children of this sort.

The alarming issue of religious violence is calling for a greater concern in the Nigeria. A year will not elapse without violence erupting in one or more region of the country most of which are initiated by jobless youth of the societies. Countless number of innocent souls was claimed in course of religious crisis in the country. With rising youth joblessness, the gap between the rich and the poor increase, causing social instability which could have emotional impact on the entire state as well as the entire country. The current situation of book haram (a group of young men claiming to be Islamic jihadist) in the northern part of the country and Niger-Delta militants (Christian youth group from southern part of the country) is causing deteriorating effect on the nation and also life threatening to people. Since starting of attacks lunched by these two barbaric groups, human right watch said the number lives lost reached to 2500 which is totally inhumane. These militant groups of youth people which when provided with good would not engage themselves in heinous acts of killing people (Forstater, 1998).

The Nigerian government is making its hardest effort to combat and root out the current rising of unemployment in the country. Few of the ways of reducing unemployment includes government establishment of the National Directorate of Employment (NDE) which focuses mainly on Employment of youth and professional assistances, minor industries and graduate occupation programme and programme of Agricultural development. The government as well as the private sector should invest in Agricultural as that might attract foreign investment and at the same time creating jobs to youth. I personally proposed that family planning should be encouraged for it is

8|Page

one effective way of controlling population expulsion which is causing overpopulation and unemployment eventually. Infrastructure should be improved because no manufacturing industry can survive poor infrastructure and amenities. Adequate security should be provided to avoid scaring off of foreign investors from coming into the country to invest (Inuwa Ibrahim, 2011). I highly appraise the Nigerian government to lessen the retirement age of older workers so as to give chance to graduating energetic youth to participate in labor market. I highly encourage the youth not to depend only on the taught in class knowledge but also to engage in physical training that will add to their technical skills, test their ability and their know-how so as to enable them acquire job as soon as possible.

In conclusion, unemployment is an undesirable occurrence whereby people actively seeking for jobs cannot find jobs. Causes of unemployment in Nigeria are population outgrowth which is, poor health condition, poor economic growth, neglecting of Agricultural sector and poor supporting environment. Consequences of unemployment in Nigeria comprises of poverty, drug habituation, inadequate prenatal care, and religious violence. The intervention measure taken by the government to contain rising unemployment is establishment of the National Directorate of Employment (NDE) also in order to curb the problem of unemployment, the government and the private sector should invest in Agricultural so as attract foreign investors, infrastructure and security should be improve. Family planning should be encouraged to control hiking population and retirement age should be reduced to give chance to others.

9|Page

Bibliography
Asoluka Njoku, O. A. (2011). Unemployment and Nigerian Economic Growth (1985-2009). International Association for Teaching and Learning (IATEL), (pp. 1-11). Ibadan. Eason, J. (1926). Unemployment: It's causes and remedies. Unemployment. 10 | P a g e

Forstater, M. (1998). Flexible Full Employment: Structural Implications of Discretionary Public Sector Employment,. Journal of Economic Issues, 557-563. Inuwa Ibrahim, N. O. (2011). UNEMPLOYMENT IN NIGERIA: IMPLICATION ON THE GROSS DOMESTIC PRODUCT (GDP) OVER THE YEARS. Int. J. Eco. Res, 66-71. Raheem Olasupo Akewushola, O. I. (2007). POVERTY, UNEMPLOYMENT AND GROWTH IN NIGERIA: THE ROLE OF ENTREPRENEURSHIP. 157-166.

11 | P a g e