Public service, gender and youth cabinet secretary Prof Margaret Kobia advised youths to fully focus on small businesses that would yield them good profit, instead of looking for formal employment.
In a Citizen TV live interview, Kobia talked about steps taken by the national government to address the challenge of youth unemployment in Kenya, among them being a review of national youth policy.
She revealed that the ministry has found out skills gap in educated youths, which if filled, would significantly reduce the rate of unemployment in Kenya.
"We must ask ourselves why the youth are not finding jobs. From where I sit, we have looked at reviewing the National Youth policy so that we are able to answer some of these questions," Observed Kobia.
"The government has tried to find the gaps within the National Youth Policy," noted the CS.
She further said, "We have found very educated young people but the skills they have do not match the job market."
The ministry, she said, has established a youth empowerment program that would equip youth with information on available job opportunities.
Prof.Kobia attributed high unemployment rate to the country's slow economic growth.
The cabinet secretary disclosed that many youth and women she had earlier on interacted with had ventured into businesses which were doing quite well.
She, therefore, opined that they should concentrate more on the same endeavours since they seemed to reward more than white collar jobs.
"While interacting with a number of youth and women, I realized there are some waiting for that white collar job while still doing their small businesses; if they are making good money from that, they should totally focus on it," remarked the government official.