Africa-Press – Tanzania. ZANZIBAR youth were on Tuesday challenged to embrace innovation and hard work in devising solutions to their social and economic problems.
Health Minister Nassoro Ahmed Mazrui told the youth that they must think wide and grab opportunities out of the problems they encounter.
“Youth make a huge and highly influential group in our society; and the young people face many challenges, some are destructive but others offer immense opportunities,” Minister Mazrui said in his speech at AMUA Zanzibar Demonstration Day.
He argued that globalisation and internet have exposed youth to a huge package of information and knowledge but some of the information is just harmful.
“All youth have right to correct information on especially their sexual and reproductive health,” charged the minister.
He decried teenage pregnancies and abortion as serious problems that haunt the islands, putting the rate of early and unplanned pregnancies in the country at eight per cent.
The minister further revealed that 2.6 per cent of Zanzibar children start sexual relations below 15 years and without using any protective gears against sexually transmitted diseases and unwanted pregnancies.
He said provision of friendly and reliable sexual reproductive health services to the youth remains a serious challenge in Zanzibar, challenging youth to innovate solutions to address the problem.
“My message to all Zanzibar youth—this is the time, there is no other time; work hard, be innovative and demonstrate your ideas to bring change,” Minister Mazrui counseled at the Accelerated initiative, Modern technology, Universal access to sexual reproductive health for Adolescent and youth (AMUA-Zanzibar) event.
Under the Sahara Ventures coordinated programme, youth are trained on devising and nurturing business ideas, which also advance sexual reproductive health.
According to Sahara Ventures Executive Director Jumanne Mtambalike, over 200 youth were reached during the AMUA-Zanzibar programme, with 60 of them undergoing intensive training to improve their business ideas.
The youth were screened further with eight finalists invited to showcase their respective innovations to get the four best ideas for the 6,000 US dollars (over 14m/-) seed capital, each.
Solve it; Maskani Plus; Funzo; and Binti House were the four business ideas that emerged victorious to win the 6,000 US dollar grant each to develop their ideas into fully fledged businesses.
AMUA Project Manager Adam Mbyallu appreciated Zanzibar youth, saying they have appetite for innovative businesses but lacked role models and supportive infrastructure.
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