By Emmanuel Elebeke

The Chairman and founder of Young Nigerian CEO’s Forum, Mr. Moses Siasia says lack of entrepreneurial culture among young Nigerians is killing small and medium scale enterprises in the country.

He stated this Monday at the 2015 Nigerian Young Professionals Forum held in Abuja.

He noted that the country is yet to harness her resources in the young people due to absence of synergy and inculcation of entrepreneurial skills in the youths and called for deliberate policy guideline to harness the resources.

L-R: Prof; Famous Izedonmi, Alexander Amosu, Prince Oyeniyi, Mr. Moses Siasia (convener), Amarachi Iwuanyanwu and Alistair Soyede at the Young Nigerian CEO’s Conference held in Abuja on Monday.

According to him, less than five per cent of youthful resources in Nigeria are utilized and this he said portends great danger to the economic growth of the nation.

‘‘What we lack is entrepreneurial culture. Lack of entrepreneurial culture is impeding our development. That is why we are here to network on how to move the country forward.

‘‘We need a deliberate effort to use the energy of the youth to grow. As a nation, we have not utilized up to five per cent of youthful resource we have. We need to develop our youths and redirect their energy into productive ventures. That is what we do at NYPF. We must network, spread our tentacles, build bridges to safe-guide our future.’’

The theme of the conference is: Promoting Entrepreneurship and Innovation in Building Economic Leaders for Tomorrow.

He listed lack of power, access to credits, tax incentives, multiple taxation, lack of mentorship as some of the major challenges militating against the growth of young entrepreneurs and demanded that government should come up with deliberate policies to ameliorate some of these challenges.

For him, government of the day needs to pay special attention to young people if it must get its priority right, especially in the area of job creation and economic development, asserting that no nation had succeeded without putting the young people first on list of their priorities.

‘‘It is our future, and we must give a guide towards policy formulation so that we can promote the culture of entrepreneurship in our young people. I think, that is one of the surest way to turn some of the challenges we are facing into opportunities. For me it is madness for banks to collect 21 per cent from entrepreneurs or to have only one richest man.’’

The conference is expected to change the mindset of all participants.

The NYAF is two and half years old organization operating in fifteen countries. Its main objective is to connect young Nigerian professionals in an international peer network.