By Frederick Philander WINDHOEK THE manager of corporate communications of FNB Namibia on Saturday evening generously praised efforts by the National Youth Council for organising the launch and award ceremony of the 10th Youth Expo 2007. Cassius Moetie congratulated the youth for presenting the event, which aims to assemble Namibian young and dynamic youth entrepreneurs to showcase their artwork and create a market for their products. According to him, during the Youth Expo of 2005, FNB was the anchor sponsor, committing N$75 000. “Last year through the FNB Foundation the bank decided to align itself much closer to the youth and create a strategic long-term relationship, not only to grow our business, but also to play a critical and pivotal role in educating the youth, simultaneously exposing them through our anchor sponsorship to the dynamics of entrepreneurship and (for them) to understand the fundamentals of business and the economy in general,” he said at the launch of Expo 2007. The same bank has this year contributed N$100 00 towards the total costs of hosting the event this year in the capital. “The FNB Foundation made a commitment and undertook to remain the anchor sponsor for Youth Expo 2007. We have no doubt that Namibia will sooner or later reap the benefits of our investment. We, at FNB Namibia Holdings, also know that continuous support and assistance of youth activities and programmes will divert the focus and attention of the youth from being job-seekers to job-creators,” he said encouragingly. He emphasized that the small size of the country’s economy and the labour market pose a serious challenge to the youth as it cannot absorb the entire youth in public and private sector companies. “Promoting and investing funds in youth entrepreneurs have a strong potential to stimulate growth and jump-start the economy. We are cognisant of the fact that the youth may not have the requisite business skills to manage a start-up business venture. To help set them up for success, the FNB Foundation has gone a step further and contracted a company called SMEs Compete, which organises training workshops across the country to transfer various business skills and the dynamics of book-keeping to SMEs across Namibia,” he concluded.