ABSTRACT

The Government of Kenya, in an attempt to address the problem of unemployment amongst the youth, has come up with various interventions. One of these is the Youth Enterprise Development Fund, which was formed in 2006 to increase economic opportunities for Kenyan Youth. This is through provision of cheap credit, enterprise development and through strategic partnerships. However, despite these interventions, employment rate amongst the youth in Kenya remain high and performance of Youth Enterprise Development Fund has been brought into focus in addressing the same. The main focus of this study was to investigate the effect of organizational resources on performance of Youth Enterprise Development Fund in Nyeri County, Kenya. The most crucial mandate of the Fund is to offer cheap credit to youth startups and for expansion of businesses. Performance of the Fund was therefore measured by the amount of loans disbursed to the youth and how much has been paid back, in terms of repayments or recoveries. The specific objectiveswere to find out how various resources namely, tangible, human, financial, and physical affect the performance of Youth Fund in Nyeri County. The study adopted a descriptive survey design to determine the availability and utilization of resources in Youth Fund Nyeri County and how they affected performance in terms of amount of loans disbursed and the repayment rate. The target population was 843 funded groups and individual beneficiaries from Nyeri County. Stratified random sampling techniquewas applied to select a sample size of 279 groups and individual beneficiaries including a census of 22 constituency and regional officers, who were interviewed. This, in total accounted to 30% of the total population. A questionnaire and a data collection sheetwas used to collect data. The study employed both bivariate and multivariate analysis procedures. The analysis procedure produced both descriptive as well as inferential statistics which were presented using tables and charts. The main inferential statistics included the Pearson Correlation Analysis and the Regression Analysis. As explained by R square which is the Coefficient of Determination, 74.10% of the variation in the Performance of Youth Enterprise Development Fund in Nyeri County (the dependent variable) was explained by variability in the independent variables included in the model i.e. Physical Resources, Financial Resources, Human Resources and Intangible Resources. It was established from the regression analysis output that organisational resources were key determinants of performance. To that effect, intangible resources, human resources, financial resources and physical resources were all found to be statistically significant predictors of performance of Youth Enterprise Development Fund. The Pearson Correlation Analysis established strong, positive associations between all the organisational resources under examination and performance. The study recommended more input towards the improvement of the organisational resources condition at Youth Enterprise Development Fund for improved performance.