From Abdulrazaq Mungadi, Gombe
Thirty women and youths have been trained on entrepreneurship in Gombe. The training which was organised by Kambu international in collaboration with the Bank of Industry (BOI) was borne out of a Public-Private Partnership (PPP) between the state government.
According to Mrs Debney Shall-Holma the Managing Partner of Kambu international, the training was aimed at improving and exposing the participants to business and encourage self-employment among the youths.
She said: ‘We provide this training programme to enlighten people on how they can improve their income, so that they can be independent, without waiting for the government to employ them.
She added that the targeted 30 participants are expected to train others, saying: ‘They will continue helping people and their community and Nigeria and their region and Gombe State.’
Debney explained that in the cause of the three days training participants will be introduced to ‘how to develop business plans, they will be trained on how to do business, those that are into business will get to know how they can expand their business, from a small to big,’ she said while adding that they would be thought how to use Information and Communication Technology (ICT) to expand their businesses.
‘So that they will get to understand ways to accumulate wealth, to expand their business to cross borders and African continental free trade area,’ Debney said.
She disclosed that they will be a target of 10 trainees to be trained by each of the 30 participants before September, ‘there will be a review of the programme by September this year, ‘so we want to have 300 people well trained and given a startup to do business.’
She said the partnership with BOI was to provide a loan for the beneficiary and to support the project.
On his part, the Gombe State Governor, Muhammad Inuwa Yahaya, who was represented by the Commissioner of Commerce, Industry and Tourism, Nasiru Aliyu Muhammed, flagged off training assuring of the government’s support to actualise the dream.
While commending organisers of training he urged the participants to utilise the knowledge to be acquired, to improve their business and to be self-employed
‘I called on the participants to make use of the knowledge they acquired in this training to impact positively in their life, because at the end they will be issued with a certificate, with which they can use to get loans for their business, without collateral from BOI,’ the governor said.