The Lagos State Government, through the Lagos State Employment Trust Fund (LSETF), has supported 30,409 small businesses in the last five years.

The Board Chairperson, LSETF, Mrs. Bola Adesola, said this on Thursday at the Lagos Employment Summit, with the theme: ”Sustainable Job Creation Strategies: Collective Action and Prosperity for All.”

Adesola said that the small businesses were supported through the Micro, Small, and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs) Loan Scheme.

She said that the scheme was designed to promote entrepreneurship, by enabling access to affordable finance to residents of Lagos State.

According to her, the programme also provides institutional support to the MSMEs toward enhancing their operations, bolstering profitability, and by implication, creating wealth and putting the productive population to work.

She said that in ensuring that Lagos responded proactively to the dynamic challenges of unemployment and unemployability, the fund was established in 2016 to create employment and entrepreneurship opportunities for all Lagos residents.

”Our employability programme, which is equipping our youths with relevant skills needed to take advantage of today’s employment opportunities, has also been delivered in conjunction with our partners.

”In addition, we have created needs-based interventions such as the Lagos MSME Recovery Fund and the Job Hubs.

”The Lagos MSME Recovery Fund supported 2,000 businesses, whose shops and stalls were vandalised during the #EndSARS protest in October 2020. That intervention alone saved over 50,000 indirect jobs across the state.

”The Job Hubs on the other hand is reducing the barrier of entry to entrepreneurship for Lagos residents by providing access to needed business tools and infrastructure in sectors such as laundry, catering and fashion,” Adesola said.

She said that the phenomenal achievements of the fund within five years had made it a model across the country, hence, spurring other states to create similar agencies to ensure that employment and entrepreneurship opportunities were created for the youths.

The LSETF Executive Secretary, Mrs. Teju Abisoye, said that 45 percent of the skilled labour force in the country was concentrated in Lagos.

Abisoye said that LSETF, through its interventions, had created over 182,000 direct and indirect jobs in Lagos and 2,335 young persons were trained in modern skills.

She said that 413 tech start-ups were supported through soft financing, while 68,582 new taxpayers were added into the tax net of the state, through the fund’s intervention.