Govt told to interest youth in manufacturing

Government has been asked to promote manufacturing among the youth interested in entrepreneurship as a way of creating employment.

The call was made by the manager, Food Technology Business Incubation at Makerere University, Prof.William Kyamuhangire in a meeting aimed at tackling challenges of unemployment among the youth.

He said that majority of the youth entrepreneurs are into buying and selling products from countries like China, which limits their creativity.

"Government needs to go in and encourage them  to move into manufacturing ,if you buy a commodity from china, and sell in Uganda, few people will be employed but if you start manufacturing products here, so many will be employed  and that is what we want to see," said Kyamuhangire.

Youth working at a plastic recycling firm packaging finished plastic bags. Photo by Nandudu Prossy

He added that in the long run, it will encourage private sector growth and investment into the manufacturing sector hence increasing the tax base for the country at the same time improving the lives of youth.

Kyamuhangire emphasised that some of the areas that youth should be encouraged to embrace in manufacturing include value addition because these will then be exported as finished products, attracting a higher income than when exported in their raw form.

A recent study by the Uganda Manufacturer's Association (UMA) shows that overall, unemployment rate among the youth aged 18 to 30 in Uganda is 5%.Its even higher among females at 6.3% compared to males at 3.8%.

Further analysis shows that the youth unemployment has been increasing since 2005 to 5.1% in 2011 and now 11.2% in 2012.