Perhaps, the most striking feature of the Kwara State capital, Ilorin, is its cleanliness. However, behind this highly successful sanitation programme was an inspiration to create jobs. Killing two birds with one stone has a classic illustration in the Kwara State Clean & Green programme.  Since inauguration in 2003, this scheme has provided employment for over 3000 people who were hitherto without any productive means of livelihood. They now earn a minimum monthly wage of N5, 000.

Another interesting aspect of the Clean & Green scheme is that because of the limited number of hours they have to work, the women, especially easily return home to other trades, relying on their savings or voluntary thrift from their monthly wages as start off capital for trading.

This scheme has also provided useful lessons for some of the State’s Local Governments who have also launched their own equivalent of the Clean and Green programme thereby creating more jobs down the line.