COMMENT: Young people are drivers of innovation, economic growth

12 Jun, 2022 - 00:06 0 Views
COMMENT: Young people are drivers of innovation, economic growth Minister Professor Amon Murwira

The Sunday News

Young people are agile, adventurous and delight in taking risks all of which are attributes that can make them successful entrepreneurs.”

The World Economic Forum further says that “regardless of their language, level of education or nationality, young people see entrepreneurship as a means to achieve social and economic development.

In order to succeed their start-ups, create jobs, and have a significant impact in their home countries, the serious commitment from their governments, and the private and financial sector in their home countries is a must.”

World Economic Forum

The World Economic Forum added that the participation of youths from 43 countries in its capacity-building workshops in 2015 demonstrated that young entrepreneurs are drivers of innovation, economic growth, and keen to make a positive change in their societies.

“By dismantling monopolies, creating new demands, and tackling old problems with new technology, young entrepreneurs prove to foster more competitive economies and are enablers of shared prosperity, while adapting more rapidly to ever more globalised societies.

“They are also the source of innovative solutions that governments and private sector need to address current and future development challenges, especially since the international community is enforcing the new Sustainable Development Goals in January, 2016.”

And true to the spirit of the World Economic Forum and the World Bank, among other key social and economic players, Zimbabwe has been for a long time opening up the space for youths to get into business.

President Mnangagwa

Even university graduates have repeatedly been counselled by President Mnangagwa to aim to be entrepreneurs, and not to look forward to looking for jobs.

The Zimbabwe International Trade Fair recently hosted the National Youth Business Expo, where youths left visitors in awe with world-class presentations, showcasing innovation, incorporating technology to help accelerate the country’s development trajectory.

Organised by the Ministry of Youth, Sport, Arts and Recreation with support from the African Development Bank, the expo ran under the theme: “Revitalising and Empowering Youth Business Across Value Chains.”

Young people from across the country came through to showcase their products and services which all had one key common feature: Innovation.

The innovation witnessed was testimony of the positive response to innovation hubs that have been established in the country’s six State universities.

The innovation hubs are part of a paradigm shift that has seen tertiary education playing a central role in developing appropriate home-bred innovations and technologies for the local industrial sector.

This will help spur the country towards the envisaged status.

This is a departure from the previous system, which was shaped to undertake only teaching, research and community engagement.

The purpose of universities under the old system was not to produce goods and services but only to design them.

Education 5.0

Speaking on the sidelines of the inaugural national youth business expo, Higher and Tertiary Education, Innovation, Science and Technology Development Minister, Professor Amon Murwira said any nation could be transformed through knowledge and innovation hence Government’s formula for Zimbabwe to industrialisation and modernisation being through its higher and tertiary education system anchored on the Education 5.0 philosophy.

Prof Murwira said there were a lot of young people who now believe they can do it and they were doing it.

“It’s a matter of putting self-belief in our young people, so that industrialisation and innovation becomes a backbone second nature of the people in this country because we have very intelligent people.

“The development of a country is a mental game; it starts with us. We have to believe that in order to develop this country it has to develop based on its natural resources,” he said.

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