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Kumasi: No Business As Usual passes out over 500 trainees

By Usman Ibrahim Khalilulahi
Regional News Kumasi: No Business As Usual passes out over 500 trainees
DEC 14, 2020 LISTEN

Under a white tent were seated 200 young persons who six months ago were not certain what direction to fly to like a stranded bird. But here, today, they have dressed up confidently to fulfill their full potential.

This comes after going through a six month of free and intensive practical employability and entrepreneurship training under the European-Union sponsored No Business as Usual (NBU) project, they are graduating with joy and zeal for excellence.

The employability and entrepreneurship training, spearheaded by seasoned trainers, are well structured to meet the present and future workforce needs of the economy.

The project begun in 2017, with two objectives; to stimulate youth employment and inclusive socio-economic growth through joint stakeholder collaboration in the Asokore Mampong Municipality.

The consortium partners are SOS Children’s Villages Netherlands (SOS-CV/NL), Asokore Mampong Municipal Assembly (AMMA), and SOS Children’s Villages Ghana (SOS-CV/Ghana).

The European Union (EU) is the lead donor of the project.

Speaking at the graduation, Acting Project Coordinator, Roberta Aryeetey explained, the project has exceeded its target.

"Our main objective is to Improve sustainable local economic growth and expand job creation by enhanced collaboration with relevant stakeholders (targeting 500 youth), we've exceeded pass that"

In total, 600 young persons were trained in hard & soft skills. Among them, jobless graduates, vulnerable women, senior high school leavers, and Kayayes.

Out of the total, 195 have secured jobs, 95 have begun their businesses, and 180 acquired hard skills in the areas of fashion, graphic design, cosmetology, et al.

Mr. Benard Amoako, Director SOS Children’s Villages who was instrumental in birthing the project noted, the Municipality has been marred by high rate unemployment which had led to high rate crimes; a situation he said has been reduced. Since the inception of the project,

"We have improved sustainable local economic growth, and expand job creation," he said.

A beneficiary of the project, Zachariah Abubakar, B.Ed Accounting, now into mushroom farming, shares his experience

“Actually, I started in 2018 while on campus and I was only growing for my local community until I met NBU”.

He further explained that “NBU has given me six months of entrepreneurship training and they have helped me in drafting and understanding my business model canvas, my competitive environment, how to out-compete my competitors, draft a good value proposition, understanding and meeting customer needs, bookkeeping and how to set financial goals and cash flow, and they also introduced me to available funding sources.”

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