The Rivers State National Directorate of Employment (NDE) has commenced the training of 50 women in the state.

The women, drawn across various local governments in the state were taught various craft including bead making and other decorative ornaments

Speaking to newsmen in Port Harcourt, the Coordinator of the Directorate, Mr Nnamdi Asomugha, revealed that the training would empower the women to engage in income generating activities in the state and encourage self-employment.

“NDE’s focus is to alleviate poverty through empowerment of unskilled, unemployed youth and women through skills acquisition … This programme is designed to empower the women to engage in self-employment and enhance household income. The beneficiaries were drawn from the 23 local government areas of the state under the special training of Women Employment Branch (WEB)”, he said.

According to Asomugha, the mandate of NDE was to generate mass employment by ensuring that the large pool of unemployed Nigerians were encouraged to acquire necessary skills to boost job creation. In his opinion, training and empowering unemployed people in the country would enable them compete with others in the labour market. The coordinator further advised the women to enhance their economic status in production and contribute as partners in the family and the society at large.

One of the beneficiaries, Batubo, commended NDE for giving them the opportunity to acquire skills and called on NDE to continue organising programmes that would alleviate poverty in the country.

The Tide, 28^th October 2015