The National Directorate of Employment (NDE) has disbursed a N100,000 loan each to 42 unemployed youths in Ebonyi to embark on sustainable agricultural development.

The directorate made the disbursement on Tuesday in Abakaliki at the 2022 Orientation of Loan Disbursement for the beneficiaries.

The loan was earmarked for the beneficiaries of four agricultural schemes of the NDE, mainly Agricultural Enhancement Scheme (AES) and Sustainable Agricultural Development Empowerment Scheme (SAES).

The Community-Based Agricultural Empowerment Scheme (CBAES) and the Graduates Agricultural Empowerment Scheme (GAES) are under its Rural Employment Promotion (REP) Department in Ebonyi.

NDE director-general Abubakar Nuhu-Fikpo said that 200 unemployed youths were earlier trained on the schemes aside from the loan disbursement.

Mr Nuhu-Fikpo noted that the schemes were part of its core programmes in generating employment opportunities for unemployed youths in the country.

The director-general said under the empowerment schemes, 200 graduated trainees of REP in Ebonyi were trained in different skills, including poultry, fishery, snailery, piggery, crop and animal husbandry.

“They were also trained in farm management and record keeping, crop processing, packaging and marketing,” he stated. “Today, 42 of these trainees are being resettled with a loan of N100, 000 each to enable the setting up and management of small-scale agricultural enterprises in their chosen areas of interest to become self-reliant.”

Mr Nuhu-Fikpo urged the beneficiaries to see the gesture as a rare opportunity which should not be allowed to fail.

“Remember that with the loan facility, you have been empowered,” he advised.

(NAN)