An NGO, Biyafarms Initiative for the Less-privileged, is set to train 19,000 almajiris in the 19 northern states on different skills to make them self-reliant.
The Founder of the NGO, Alhaji Almustapha Bilyamin, disclosed this on Tuesday in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Karu Local Government area of Nasarawa State.
Bilyamin said that the training would also improve their standard of living, make them become employers of labour and help them to contribute to the development of the country.
He listed the skills to include wood-work, carpentry, automobile mechanic, welding and fabrication, fashion design and tailoring, plumbing, shoe making and production, decoration, hair dressing and plumbing, among others.
“Our goal is to register 19, 000 almajiris for training on different skills across the 19 northern states in order to improve their standard of living.
“This initiative is geared towards giving the almajiris vocational skills, which they can use to compete in the labour market.
“It will make them to be self-reliant, financially- independent, while it will also enhance their dignity.
“The main objective of the initiative is the long-term benefit, which is to address the vacuum which the system has created by equipping and providing the almajiris with skill acquisition, nutrition (feeding) and primary health care.
“The initiative also seeks to remove the almajiris from the streets in northern Nigeria where this is predominant and later extend same to Southern Nigeria by enrolling them in vocational training centres,” he said.
According to him, the training will also cater for their nutritional needs by providing meal a day for them, by involving food vendors to serve as food bank for them,” he said.
Bilyamin said that the organisation was currently training 120 almajiris in different skills acquisition programmes in Jos, Pleateau to enable them become self-reliant.
“We will continue to promote hygiene and sanitation as well as primary health care and insurance for the almajiris,” he added.
Bilyamin restated the NGO’s commitment to making positive impacts on the lives of almajiris, orphans and other less-privileged ones in the society.
