Best Empowerment Programs in Nigeria: Full List & Details (2024)

Give someone a fish, feed him for a day… Teach him how to fish, feed him for a lifetime. Empowerment programs are here not to give you a fish but to teach you how to fish.

These programs are designed to increase the degree of autonomy and self-determination of the people by equipping them with the knowledge and or financial requirements to excel in a specific career.

In Nigeria, many of the empowerment programs are youth oriented. Considering the fact that over 50 percent of the Nigerian population lies the age of 15 to 65 years, this is no surprise at all.

This article will list the best empowerment programs in Nigeria this 2024 and shed light on each.

Tony Elumelu Foundation (TEF)

Made more than 3000 entrepreneurs and still counting, the Tony Elumelu’s Foundation is one of the empowerment programs in Nigeria with emphasis on the youth.

They pride themselves as the leading philanthropic institution in Africa championing entrepreneurship.

This foundation support entrepreneurs in Africa build their business through mentor-ship and financial grants. It was founded by Tony Elumelu CON.

According to it founder, “As an entrepreneur myself, I understand what it feel like to yearn for a lifeline, to hope for a ‘big break ’, to look forward to enjoying some luck”. The foundation is here to help out.

N-Power Empowerment Program

N-Power is a youth empowerment schem. It is an initiative of National Social Investment Programme of the Federal Government of Nigeria.

This empowerment scheme addresses the challenge of youth unemployment by providing a structure for large-scale and relevant work skills acquisition and development while linking its core and outcomes to fixing inadequate public services and stimulating the larger economy.

The scheme is divided into two categories; The N-Power Graduate Categories and N-Power Non-Graduate Categories. The N-Power Graduate Categories includes programmes like the N-Power teach, Agro, health and tax. The Non-Graduate programmes includes N-Power knowledge and Build.

Tradermoni

This is a recent empowerment program in Nigeria initiated by the Federal Government of Nigeria under the Government Enterprise and Empowerment Programme (GEEP) scheme. It is an interest free loan scheme targeted at petty traders.

For the first time, a participant is eligible to get 10 thousand Naira, after he/she repays, he get 15 then moves from that to 20, then 50 and lastly, 100 thousand Naira.

Though the scheme had been bashed by the opposition party in the country as they see it as a sophisticated method of buying votes, there’s no arguing that the scheme would be a blessing to those who make use of it wisely.

Graduate Internship Scheme (GIS)

Most advertised jobs comes with a condition that scares fresh graduates away – demand for experience. It’s no news saying fresh graduates have certificates but lacks experience.

This is the gap Graduate Internship Scheme came to fill. To provide short-term job employment for graduates by attaching them to firms or organizations so as to gain relevant experience which would aid them in their career pursuit.

GIS is a social safety net component of the SURE-P and was implemented in March 2012.

Youth Initiative For Sustainable Agriculture In Nigeria (YISA)

As an empowerment program targeting the youth, this programs makes no discrimination against your level of education. Regardless of the level attained or not attained, there’s something for you in this scheme.

This program has the objective to correct, educate, encourage, inspire, train and support the youth to take up agriculture.

Agriculture is not just a development project, it’s an enterprise and this is how the scheme wants the youth to think about the program.

If you wish for a career in Agriculture, YISA is there for you!

African Youth Empowerment Nigeria (AYEN)

Africa Youth Empowerment Nigeria empowers youths through the organization of vocational courses, seminars and workshops for the youth.

It also provides financial and educational support for the young.

Youth Enterprise With Innovation In Nigeria (YouWin!)

Established by the Federal Government of Nigeria under the Goodluck Jonathan administration, YouWIN is a multimedia enterprise education initiative of the Federal Ministry of Finance (FMF) which supports young entrepreneurs as they plan, start and grow their businesses.

The empowerment scheme seeks to promote entrepreneurship among the youth by helping about 55,000 youths each year.

The scheme focuses on ICT, Agriculture and it associated fields, retail, construction and manufacturing as well as capacity building and fashion.

Subsidy Reinvestment And Empowerment Program (Sure-P)

As the name suggests, SURE-P is an empowerment program also created during the Goodluck Jonathan administration that re-invest the Federal Government savings from fuel subsidy removal on critical infrastructure projects and social safety net programmes with direct impact on the citizens of Nigeria. This scheme was introduced in 2012.

Youth Entrepreneur Support Program (YES-P)

The Youth Entrepreneur Support Program short formed YES-P focuses at equipping youths who are filled with innovative ideas and have attained a minimum educational qualification of Ordinary National Diploma (OND) with the proper skills and knowledge to be self-employed.

It’s part of the Bank of Industry’s aim to address the disturbing case of youth employment in Nigeria.

New Era Foundation

This foundation was founded by Senator Oluremi Tinubu in the year 2000. She is currently the president of the foundation.

This foundation provides youth development centres, organising contests with the mental and physical scope in order to encourage social and academic performance.

Young Entrepreneurs Of Nigeria (YEN)

This is another prominent empowerment programme in the country which involves business training, capacity building and facilitating the Youth Empowerment Summit (YES) which takes place annually.

This annual summit is to bring together Nigerian young entrepreneurs at all stages of business development, investors and public officials to discuss challenges and solutions to youth entrepreneurship and empowerment.

Over 8000 youths are empowered yearly by YEN and 500 are receive business funding/business tools through YEN and other ‘YES’ partners during the summit.

Youth Empowerment And Development Initiative (YEDI)

YEDI is a non-governmental organization that is aimed at reducing HIV and stigma in the community.

This is in response to the way people with disabilities are ignored in the society. Through the Youth Empowerment and Development Initiative, this people are empowered and given a chance to succeed in their chosen field.