YouWin! — A Gift of Nigerian Genius

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Notes by Nero Okwa

6 min readApr 18, 2021

“Your business may be small today, but it wouldn’t be after YouWiN! — The Youth Enterprise with Innovation in Nigeria competition is a nationwide job creation project organized by the federal government to empowered young Nigerians and is open to all young Nigerian businessmen and women as well as aspiring young businesspeople. Winners from each Geo-political zone stands to get up to N10m as well as Intensive training, Seminars, Mentorship, Networking, and On-going Advisory Support.”
- YouWiN Ad, 2011

What is YouWin! ?

The YouWin! Competition was launched in late 2011 by then President of Nigeria, President Goodluck Jonathan. It is a business plan competition for young entrepreneurs in Nigeria with the objective to encourage innovation and job creation through the starting of new businesses and the expansion of existing ones.

The program provided a 4-day training course on preparing a business plan to applicants who make it through the first stage. After the training, applicants prepared and submitted a business plan.

Applications were scored by the Enterprise Development Center (EDC) of the Pan-African University, a sister institution of the Lagos Business School. Names and other identifying information were removed to increase fairness.

Grants were offered to the winning 1,200 submissions, with each winner eligible for up to 10 million Naira (approx. $64,000), based on the funding needs identified in their business plan and the assessment by independent consultants.

Winners also receive regular monitoring (as the grant is paid in four tranches), mentoring, and an additional two-day group training event.

In the first year it attracted almost 24,000 applications. The top 6,000 applications were selected for a 4-day business plan training course, and then 1,200 winners were selected to receive awards averaging US$50,000 each.

YouWin! was the brainchild of the former Nigerian minister of Finance, and current DG WTO, Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala. It was a collaboration between the Ministries of Finance, Communication Technology, Women’s Affair, and Youth Development with support from DFID, World Bank and The Nigerian Organized Private Sector.

The Impact of YouWin!

The results are staggering.

According to a World Bank Report, winning the competition had a large positive impact on both applicants starting new firms and those expanding existing firms. The 1200 winners created 7000 new jobs with an average wage of $143/month.

That is 7000 people earning $143/month they might not have earned otherwise — that is something. This ignores the multiplier: the increase in suppliers, the people offering services to that 7000 people, taxes collected etc.

Considering those starting new firms, 54% of the semi-finalists have a firm after 3 years, compared to 93% of those who got the grant. 11% of the semi-finalist have firm with at least 10 employees, compared to 34% for those who got the grant. Existing firm winners were 20% more likely to have survived, and 21% more likely to have a firm with at least 10 employees.

“The result showed that there is a group of constrained entrepreneurs with the ability to grow their businesses beyond a small scale and that the business plan competition was successful in both attracting such individuals, and in helping them to overcome their constraints.”

Cost- Effectiveness of Job Creation

The entire program cost $60m which comes to a cost of $8,500 per job created. The job impact over the three years in Nigeria, results in a cost of $,3606 per job — year, compared with the average cost of $92,136 — $145,351 per job per year in the United States.

NPR Podcast

The 2016 NPR episode (updated in 2021) opens with Lariat Alhassan a tiny paint business owner in Abuja Nigeria who was selling paint out of the trunk of her car. She had no office, and no means to expand and fulfill large orders.

One night, she heard an ad on the radio for the YouWin! program, with much reluctance she applied.

Guess what? She won. She received $65,000(N10m) with which she hired some people and rented a proper showroom.

Fast forward to 2021.

Lariat’s paint business is growing. She has over 10 full time staff, 100 part time staff, and has acquired land to setup a factory. She is looking forward to becoming the biggest paint manufacturer in Nigeria and Africa.

Success Story 1

Binta Shuaibu, Kano, Nigeria.

Fashion Designer.

Total grant received: $18,200(N2.8m)

Impact: Her business is growing and has created 7 jobs and she hopes to create 5 more. Since winning YouWin! She has invented and patented the ‘Nigerian Size Guide’.

“The YouWin! Program has provided me with a crash curricular for the training of a business school that has set me steps ahead off my counterparts”.
“Thank you for this award, I hope it wouldn’t stop and it would continue in the next tenure. I hope there will be more youths to apply for this award and actually sit up and change this country for the better. I hope more jobs will be created. This is an initiative that no government has done before and I am so glad and proud to be one who has received such an award and I would forever be grateful and thankful for”
— Binta Shuaibu

Success Story 2

Ekenechukwu Ofojetu, Adamawa, Nigeria.

Books Salesman

Total grant received: $36,400(N5.6m)

Impact: Opened 1st bookstore at the University of Adamawa and grew to 4 stores. Currently has 8 employees and turnover of about $13,000(N2m) monthly.

“When I think about this story history is being made. Young people are giving the opportunity to become millionaires through hard work and not through lottery.”
“YouWin! program is an exception I didn’t know anybody, I am from the South East and got this win in the North East. Shows that it’s free and fair”
— Ekenechukwu Ofojetu

Success Story 3

Bimlak Jimon, Taraba, Nigeria.

Palm Oil Farmer and Processor

Total grant received: $65,000(N10m)

Impact: Had previously been farming on a small scale for 10 years. After YouWin! has created 6 full time jobs and 10 part time jobs, and increased rural employment. Has setup an oil palm plantation with 15,000 seedlings. Earning a turnover of N2.4m/month on 100hectares, which should grow to N70m/month.

“I must appreciate the president for this great mind he has . It is not easy to entrust N10 to anybody but here he is entrusting millions of naira to young entrepreneurs so that they can create job opportunities and add to the GDP of this country. I think it is a plus”.

“We didn’t know anybody everything was online, we kept applying and it happened. It was transparent.”

“It has helped me actualize my dream of owning a palm oil estate and having my own company”.

-Bimlak Jimon

Current State of YouWin!

Nigeria kept the program going for 3 more years, and then the new president, in 2015, President Buhari, discontinued the program and started his own. Kenya and Senegal have since launched their own version of YouWin!

Potential

The YouWin! Program was a resounding success. A success story that provides a template to fund SMEs, scale business training, and spur innovation. By supporting SMEs we increase their likelihood of growing to 10 employees and succeeding. This can combat the issue of high graduate unemployment.

Imagine this program is driven by the private sector, and a wider range of business funding is provided (N50k — N10m), taking YouWin! to each of the 774 local government areas (LGAs) of Nigeria.

An emphasize on Digital Skills, Agriculture, and Solar Energy will have a multiplier effect: create jobs, ensure low food prices, and sustainable electricity.

If 10 businesses create 10 new jobs across the 774 LGAs/month, that is equivalent to 1m jobs created/year.

If this compounds for 10 years, the result would be simply remarkable!

Just Imagine!

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