Kenyan youth, 15 to 30 years old, comprise more than 30 percent of the population while those below 30 years old account for 75% of Kenyan society. Despite the fact that youths form the majority of the population, they are a generally marginalized group in the national, political, social-economic and development processes.

Today, young Kenyans are confronted with daunting challenges. Ninety percent of young people who are unemployed lack any vocational or professional training. Trends in primary school examinations reveal that 43% of young Kenyans miss out on secondary schooling. Indeed only 1% of those starting primary school get a university education. It is sad to learn that over 50% of all inmates in Kenyan prisons are young people; specifically young males aged 19 to 25 years. A third of all HIV/AIDS sufferers are young and over 70% of all new infections are found among the youth.

Against the backdrop of these issues, the Ministry of Youth Affairs was formed and mandated to coordinate and mainstream youth issues in the government agenda and to empower young Kenyans by addressing their developmental and socio-economic needs.

With an increasing young labor force, limited economic growth provides for only 25% absorption capacity in the labor market, leaving the majority 75% of the approximately 500,000 youth annually unemployed. Sixty seven percent of those who are unemployed are young people below the age of 30years and 45% are below 24 years. Clearly unemployment in Kenya is a youth problem.

While many challenges face young people, undoubtedly the most acute is the inability to access employment- the lack of opportunities to earn a decent and hones living. It is this that drives young people into crime and drugs, and a general state of hopelessness and despair. The issue of creating employment opportunities for the youth (formal, informal and self employment) needs to be addressed urgently with the kind of resources, focus and commitment as we directed at HIV/AIDS. A ''Marshal'' plan as was used to resettle landless people after independence is the only way to begin addressing this crisis. If the two million unemployed young people could be given jobs, and produce half the annual average industrial output per worker (Kshs1, 222,500) they would add Kshs 25 billion to the GDP! Or a 20% increase!

To get our youth working again, the ministry intends to push for the large scale youth employment in public works in the construction of mini dams, water pans, gabions, roads and maintenance of rural access roads. It is in the process of initiating a large scale re-forestation programme where youth groups will be paid for planting and looking after trees in designated areas. The Ministry will also push for the launch of a structured labor export scheme that will enable thousands of young people secure jobs abroad in an organized manner, initiate the construction of hawker markets and comprehensively support the informal sector.

What Kenya urgently needs for long-term quality youth employment are job creators rather than job seekers. This will entail enabling youths acquire technical skills, intensifying training in entrepreneurial skills, providing business development solutions and easily accessible capital through a youth Enterprise Development Fund. On that note, I greatly appreciate the work that Students in Free Enterprise (SIFE Kenya) is doing to achieve these objectives.

What should we do to take Kenya to the next level? What should we do to escape the poverty trap? As Students in Free Enterprise demonstrate, we are not short of ideas. Neither are we short of literate people and brain power. Our literacy levels are some of the highest in Africa. We have a wonderful country positioned astride the equator, with a sea front, and the only one on the equator with beaches and snow. It is a land that teems with wildlife. It brings forth fruit plants and produce of nature; from sisal to sugar cane, cotton to coffee, tea to tobacco and dairy cattle to dried fish. It is a land that has had peace for the last forty years. With all these, why are we still so poor? Why are we dying from famine? Why are our children dying from easily preventable and treatable diseases such as malaria and cholera? Why?

The answer lies with our attitude. The attitude that leads us to conclude that whatever is happening or has happened is God’s wish. If I drink untreated water and fall ill, it is God’s will. If I drink and drive, and get involved in an accident, it is not my fault. It is God’s will. If I have a problem and do nothing about it but pray, God will take care of it. Forgetting as John Kennedy said in his inaugural speech that God’s work here on earth must surely be our own.

It is the same attitude that leads us to blame everybody else, but not ourselves, for what happens to us. It is never our fault. If I harvest my maize and sell all of it and two months later I have nothing to eat, it is not my fault. It is the government's responsibility to feed me! If it rains and we watch all water flow to the Indian Ocean, and two months later we have no water to drink or give our cows, then surely it must be the government's fault!

It is the same attitude that leads us into a dependency syndrome. We believe that for an idea to be good, it must originate abroad and be backed by a foreign consultant. When a foreigner speaks, it is gospel truth that warrants front pages in our press. We believe that if we do not receive foreign aid, we shall surely starve and perish. Never mind that we have clearly balanced our budget for the second year running without such aid.

This attitude convinces us despite all evidence to the contrary, that things in Kenya are just awful. Instead of getting up and seizing opportunities, we are busy mourning and looking everywhere for new things to mourn at.

Youths! You have the possibility to change all these. You are young, bright and gifted. You have been given the opportunity. You belong to a new generation. A generation that did not experience colonialism. One that has interacted with different peoples on equal terms and found that you are either the same or better and so have no hang-ups and no inferiority complex. You are in a generation that is beginning to reject the notion that people must be judged not by their actions, but by the tribe they come from.

As Oscar Wilde said, ''you must be the change you want to see'', you must as budding entrepreneurs and change agents, aim high and dream big. Your thoughts and dreams act like a glass ceiling above which it is impossible to rise. Dream small and you will remain small, wallowing in the valley of mediocrity and the ordinary. Dream big and you will rise, soaring into the blue skies of excellence, achievement and personal fulfillment. You will stumble of course but you must get up and try again until you get it right. If we did not do this at an early age, we would still be crawling. Remind yourself frequently the words of Oliver Wendell Holmes that ''what lies behind me, what lies in front of me is nothing compared to what lies within me.'' Within you is infinite power, before you is endless possibility and around you is boundless opportunity.

You must transmit this passion, this resilience, this ability to dream to those you will come in contact with. You must do it with missionary zeal, acting like a searchlight illuminating the dark night of hopelessness, lethargy and apathy. Together, we must start to build a new generation of young entrepreneurs who through their ideas and industry will transform our society and lift our country to the ranks of the developed nations. Then shall we shall truly be able to say, I am proud to be a Kenyan