The Nigeria Philanthropy Office said it is building a strategic partnership with the private sector and international community to boost the country’s fashion industry and energy sector.

The Chairperson of NPO, Thelma Ekiyor-Solanke, made this known at the Abuja Networking event on Friday.

The event was hosted by Senior Special Assistant to the President on MSMEs and Job Creation, Office of the Vice-President. Temitola Adekunle-Johnson.

Ms Ekiyor-Solanke stated that the NPO domiciled in the Office of the Vice-President, was established to raise finance to support job creation and the Micro Small and Medium Enterprises.

She said that the aim of the event was to raise awareness of the office, engage more stakeholders and build strategic partnership.

She stated, “The first sector that the office is focusing on is fashion industry, furniture manufacturing, renewable energy and sustainable agriculture. We already started the process of building partnership around that. I chair the implementing committee which is made up of a number of members.

“We have Bank of Industry, Wema Bank, Access Bank, Sambo Foundation, BUA Foundation, Nigeria Content Management Board and Impact Investments Foundation..

“For us at the Nigerian Office for Philanthropy and Impact Investing, this even is basically to raise awareness of the office, engage more stakeholders and build strategic partnership.’’

Also speaking, Adekunle-Johnson, reiterated the resolve of the Federal Government to partner with the private sector to bridge employment deficit in the country.

He stated, “We are trying to move with what is happening around the world. Every serious minded country is partnering with the private sector to get things done. Where the public sector is not able to achieve anything on its own it will extend a handshake to the private sector to get things done.

“We have identified certain areas where there are gaps and we want to fill those gaps, so we will reach out to some of the best around the world to partner with us to ensure that we keep promoting MSMEs space.”

 Group Deputy Managing Director, Access Bank, Victor Etuokwu, said every country depends on the MSMEs sector for job creation.

He said, “In every country of the world, 60 to 70 per cent of jobs are created in the MSMEs sector.  If you want to solve the problem of unemployment in any country then it means you must support MSMEs, and this government is kind in doing that.’’

Divisional Head for Retail and SMEs, Wema bank, Ayodele Olojede, said the bank had been involved in impact initiatives for some time.

Mrs Olojede stated, “This is one of the initiatives that the WEMA Bank is proud of. We are an implementing member, and today the gathering here is the testament to the fact that we all acknowledged that there are challenges.”

(NAN)