OVER 32,000 Tanzanians have benefited from skills training offered by the Skills Development Fund (SDF) in the past six years, with most of them having been able to create their own jobs.

The project, worth 9.7bn/-, has been implemented in 23 regions where 80 projects have been initiated through the funding from the SDF.

The SDF official Masozi Nyirenda, said through that project, several youths have been able to employ themselves, open companies and initiate various projects. Some of them went even far by employing their fellow youths.

For instance, the SDF sponsored the Mto wa Mbu-Folk Development College to offer training on tourism and hospitality which benefited at least 400 youths from Arusha and neighbouring regions.

"The objective of the training was to bridge skills gap among citizens dealing with tourism and to help the youth employ themselves and create jobs for others," he stated.

He elaborated that the SDF intends to empower institutions that offer training to enable them increase quality and efficiency in provision of skills training in six priority sectors in the country.

"We offer a lot of good training programmes but the youth need capital. Many of those who benefit from the training, they do not have access to capital from their councils, thus unable to utilise their skills," he said recently during the ongoing exhibition of Vocational Education and Skills Training held here in Dodoma.

He admitted that the SDF faces a challenge of receiving many applications from youths who need training but resources are limited.

Tourism sector is among six priority sectors which get subsidy from the SDF.

The SDF is the programme which implements Skills for Productive Jobs (ESPJ) and National Skills Development Strategy (NSDS).

The Fund is supervised by the Tanzania Education Authority (TEA) and gets funding from World Bank (WB) and the government through the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology.

Speaking at the exhibition, one of beneficiaries of the training Mr Lamnyaki Laizer, a resident of Mto wa Mbu, Arusha Region, said he was trained on cultural tourism.

Mr Laizer noted that cultural tourism has been a big attraction, especially through Maasai traditions and customs as many visitors loved to visit and learn Maasai traditions.