Primacy of Awareness Raising on Uptake of Access To Government Procurement Opportunities by The Youth A Study of Isiolo County

Abstract

One of the most fundamental initiatives by the Kenyan Government is to empower the Youth, Women and Persons With Disabilities (PWDs) to access, participate and benefit from at least thirty percent (30%) of Government Procurement Opportunities through preferential treatment while they try to seek Government Procurement Prospects. The major purpose of the initiative is to accelerate the growth of enterprises owned by Youth, Women and PWDs. However, taking cognizant of the myriad challenges encountered, the determinants of these strategic interventions and how they influence the uptake of this opportunity is not clear and hence this study while narrowing on the independent parameter of Awareness Raising pursued to correlate with the outcome variable which was the Uptake of Access to Government Procurement Opportunities (AGPO). The study employed the descriptive research design with inferential statistics as tools of analysis, and with a sample of 55 respondents drawn from the Three (3) Sub-Counties, namely; Isiolo, Garbatulla, and Merti, all in Isiolo County in Kenya. The researchers interconnected the independent variable with the dependent variable. The study found that Awareness Raising had statistically significant strong positive correlation with the Uptake of AGPO.The study concluded that Awareness Raising significantly influenced the Uptake of AGPO, as it emerged that access to information on AGPO was not an impediment and that there were sensitizations workshops on AGPO which had enabled them to seize opportunities in AGPO. From the findings, the study recommended that, there is need for Awareness Raising on AGPO by the County Government of Isiolo and other key players such as Development Partners, Management Development Agencies(MDAs), Faith Based organizations (FBOs) and Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs).