Impact of entrepreneurial and digital skills on youth empowerment in the north west of Nigeria

This paper was undertaken as a result of the present challenges facing youths of Nigeria especially those from the north west region of the country. Empowering the youths with majority of population with necessary skills in entrepreneurship and digital industries would greatly help in minimizing or reducing the such challenges of youth unemployment, illicit drug peddling and other crimes in the society largely attributed to youths. The study explicitly designed to investigate the effect of entrepreneurship skills and digital skills on youth empowerment within the North-West Region of Nigeria. The study distributed a total of 280 questionnaires but was able to have 271 completely filled and returned from the students of Kaduna State University using the main campus of the institution. The study adopted a survey research design. Data were mostly gotten from the primary source using structured questionnaires. The study has found that proxies of entrepreneurship skills comprising of opportunity recognition skill and risk management skill were positive and significant and similarly digital skills proxied by digital marketing skill and e-commerce skill were also positive and significant in influencing the youth empowerment of the North West Nigerian youths. The study concluded that entrepreneurship kills and digital skills are necessary tools that agencies of government within the North West Nigeria could use to harness and enhance the empowerment of youths within the region.