BMI Announces New Initiative To Inspire Young Entrepreneurs

Business Matters Incubators has launched its ‘Catch Them Young’ programme for children from 7 to 14.

The founder and senior consultant for BMI, Nnamdi Nnachukwu, said the initiative had come as a solution to the age-long vacuum in the educational system in Nigeria.

According to him, “We chose to say it this way: We found that missing link that will secure the future of the young Nigerians as future nation builders. This is a call to action for educational reform that will shape the future of these young minds here and hinder parts of this country.

“We have found the most innovative ways to increase the productivity of the teeming youths, reduce poverty, unemployment, fraud, and insecurity in Nigeria using entrepreneurship education.

“It took years of research, consultations and hard work to develop this initiative that will teach pupils from age 7–14 the requisite skills, mentality, and mindset to become great entrepreneurs. This initiative uses an inclusive methodology for entrepreneurship education in Africa. The initiative is called BMI-CTY (Business Matters Incubators: Catch Them Young).”

Nnachukwu also noted that the growing trend of unemployment, poverty, youths in crime, fraud, and many short-term approaches to address matters of the future worried the BMI.

He said, “It was also found that different methodologies deployed to address this evil trajectory were all short-term and fizzled away as the new government comes on board every four years."

Also, Nnachuckwu explained that the basic school had specific characteristics and challenges that required a well-structured methodology to harness their potential.

He said, “Our methodology is embedded in what we called a six-sense approach to entrepreneurship education for kids 7-14 years old. This comprises textbooks, workbooks, discussion book (The bridging gap) video recorded lessons, cartoon series, BMI-Fantasy games (Gamification), practical manual, and train the trainer’s manual."

While speaking, an Associate Professor of Entrepreneurship and Management at Lagos Business School, Henrietta Onwuegbuzie, defined entrepreneurship as a person who identifies the problem creates a solution, which is commercialised and continues to improve on it.

“If all of us are solving problems, very soon Nigeria will be transformed. Ask yourself, what problem can you solve?” she postulated.

She expressed concern that most schools in Nigeria were still programming students for job-seeking and not job creation.