Unemployment is a major issue in Nigeria. Each year, tens of thousands of students graduate from university but only 10% of them are gainfully employed 2 years after graduation. Disadvantaged communities account for a majority of these unemployed youth, many of whom are involved in criminal activities (including cyber crime) and whose negative impact on the society is high. PIN addresses this gap by providing demand-driven Information and Communication Technologies, entrepreneurship and life skills training through the Ajegunle.org project. As part of the Ajegunle.org training methodology, our graduates are connected to internships and small businesses which result in full-time engagement that improves their livelihoods and allows them to serve as role models to other youth.

Famous, like many other young people in Nigeria's most popular slum, was not sure of what tomorrow held for him. Now, he is a student at a university of his choice - following his employment at the Visa Section of the British High Commission in Abuja - thanks to his participation in the Ajegunle.org project. Funke, another project participant, grew her business of N2,000 by over 2,000% after the training. The project is also helping to change the perception of the Ajegunle community, and other disadvantaged communities by demonstrating that we only need to open the door to see how fast even the disadvantaged youth will run. We are presently working towards the replication of the idea beyond Ajegunle, and are also keen on establishing the first Innovation Centre, which will serve as a knowledge hub where more youth from the community can be empowered for the world of work.

The Innovation Centre will serve the purposes of training, incubation and outsourced service provision. Our Innovation Centres (see model video here) will provide: a space for our community-based training programmes and as a centre for the advancement of workplace preparedness for trained youth; workspaces for the entrepreneurs that we train so that they can overcome the infrastructure barrier and have a place where they can walk into and work to provide their services towards income generation and wealth creation; immediate employment opportunities for those who choose to join our outsourcing services while we pursue our ultimate goal of making our network of Innovation Centres competitive outsourcing hotspots.