More Kenyan youth turn to agriculture for extra income

What you need to know:

The study says most of the millenials turned to agriculture, ICT, entertainment, online business and logistics for their side hustle.
The trend of side hustles is fairly new among young millennials with a majority still in school and a few probably in their first job.
The earnings for many who engage in side hustles is below Sh20,000 per month.

More youth are turning to agriculture for additional income, a survey by digital research firm GeoPoll shows.
According to the survey, Kenya was second at 40.8 per cent while Nigeria had the highest record of millenials with side hustles at 44 per cent.

The study says most of the millenials turned to agriculture, ICT, entertainment, online business and logistics for their side hustle. Youth in South Africa, Ghana and Nigeria were found to be into less conventional sectors.

“Out of those who indicated that they have side hustles, the main sources of their capital is in form of loans from banks, relatives, mobile money and micro-finances in that order. Despite their more friendly repayment terms, Savings Cooperatives or Saccos as they are locally known, are the least popular among the youth and rank lower than mobile money loans, micro-finance loans or even bank loans,” the report shows.

“The most popular sources of loans among millennials for their side hustles are commercial banks, relatives, micro-finance, mobile money and Saccos in that order.”

The survey said that the trend of side hustles is fairly new among young millennials with a majority still in school and a few probably in their first job. Over 73 per cent of respondents indicated that they had run the side hustle for less than two years.

The earnings for many who engage in side hustles is below Sh20,000 per month with over 30 per cent of the extra income going towards savings.