Abstract

Agribusiness has become an important strategy with potentials for job and wealth creation for youths in Nigeria. It is a critical vehicle for social, economic, and political inclusion. Young farmers in Nigeria play a crucial role in food production and contribute to the agricultural workforce. Youth employment is a pressing concern in Nigeria, where a large proportion of the population is below the age of 30. The Nigerian youth face significant challenges in finding decent employment, with many struggling to secure jobs that provide a living wage, security, and opportunities for advancement. This situation has far-reaching consequences, not only for the individual youth but also for the broader society and economy. Nigeria’s youth employment crisis is characterized by varying levels of unemployment, underemployment, and informal employment. According to the National Bureau of Statistics the unemployment, underemployment and informal employment of youth were 6%, 16.3% and 97% in 2023. The situation is particularly dire in rural areas, where limited access to education, skills training, and job opportunities exacerbates the challenge. Therefore, the majority of youths who live in rural areas in Nigeria are engaged mostly in farming/agribusiness. There is an increasing need for sustainable food production to meet the growing demands as the country encounters high cost of food, hunger, poverty and malnutrition. A higher percentage of the population reside in the rural areas that mainly rely on agricultural related activities as a means of livelihood. Youth engagement in agribusiness provides an opportunity to address the multiple challenges of youth unemployment, poverty and climate change. Poverty reduction and food security depend on a vibrant commercial agriculture sector that includes young people. Agriculture value chains are rife with opportunities for entrepreneurial engagement; to provide critical goods and services to rural populations seeking stronger linkages to input and output markets. Over the years, governments at both rural and national levels in Nigeria with support from development partners have implemented various interventions that facilitate youth engagement in agribusiness However; there is a scarcity of evidence on the successes of these interventions. This has made it difficult to inform evidence-based policy making. Among many communities, the most vulnerable to the effects of climate change are the poor who are engaged in agriculture and highly dependent on the natural ecosystem. Despite numerous adaptations and technological advancements, research in this field using the Ricardian approach in South America (Seo and Mendelsohn, 2008) and Africa (Kurukulasuriya and Mendelsohn, 2008) has shown a decline in net farm revenues due to the rise in temperature. Further, it is posing different challenges in different countries (Din et al., 2022). Engaging rural youth in agribusiness has become an important strategy to create employment opportunities in Nigeria. While specific recent data on youth employment from agriculture is limited, recent estimates suggest that in 2023, 34.31% of total employment in Nigeria was in agriculture, a significant contributor to the economy. The sector has the potential to generate vast employment for the 53.4% of Nigerian youth who are unemployed, with some analyses suggesting that involving 14 million youths could generate over ₦21 trillion annually, according to ActionAid Nigeria. In a drive to fill this knowledge gap, a comprehensive literature review of the outcomes of interventions related to youth engagement in agribusiness was conducted using a deductive coding approach. Results showed that the interventions implemented by governments and development partners across Nigeria have succeeded in producing favourable outcomes despite some limitations. Interventions that integrate capacity development, financial support for start ups, and continuous mentorship on the technical and financial aspects of youth-run agribusiness projects proved successful in enhancing youth engagement in agribusiness. This study utilizes cross-sectional data from 700 rural youth farm households in Nigeria to investigate the welfare impact of agribusiness on household income. Potential estimation biases were corrected by employing the instrumental variable (two-stage least square and endogenous treatment) regression econometric method to analyze the data. The results reveal that factors such as education, household size, membership in youth forums, accessibility to information and credit influence youth engagement in agribusiness. The impact estimates show that agribusiness significantly increases rural youth’s welfare. Therefore, the policy framework on rural development could be directed towards encouraging and providing opportunities through agribusiness for youths. This suggests that the design and implementation of future interventions should be built on strong partnerships among rural communities, academia, research, and private sector for increased impact on livelihood improvements.