Building The Human And Social Capital Of Ghana’s Youth—Agro Mindset’s Take

At the point where the pursuit of University education appears to lose lustre down the path of despondency, the agro-focused entrepreneurship group, Agro Mindset Organisation, which works with a primary vision of assisting young people to further develop their school knowledge and skills both within and beyond the academic environment, providing them with a platform that fosters the enhancement of transferable skills and equipping them to match career requirements and industry expectations, sees the need to focus on the Human and Social Capitals.

There is the idea that is usually floated that the problem of graduate unemployment stems from the lack of adequate entrepreneurship training for the students who pass through the educational system since government cannot employ every graduate. But that is just a minute angle to the challenge. The bigger picture has to do with the general failure of the educational system to holistically develop those who go through it, into critical thinking and problem solving graduates to be able to face the future.

Most tertiary students are under great amount of stress and anxiety and have no idea what the future holds for them as the competition in the 21st century is keen. The way to break through is their ability to identify, exploit and manage disguised-opportunities within the broader concept of sustainable development.

Motivated by the above mentioned issues, the Agromindset Organisation, in collaboration with Invest in Africa and the Centre for Business Development (CBD), KNUST, presents the 3rd Surviving After School Conference, with the theme: “SURVIVING AFTER SCHOOL; THE HUMAN AND SOCIAL CAPITAL NEEDED”. Coming off on 15th March 2014 on KNUST Campus, the Conference is aimed at equipping students to develop their business acumen and to mature their enterprise skills.

The award winning organisation wants to attract the youth to business, and start an innovation marketplace to launch new ideas and support entrepreneurs with advisory services and mentoring. Young people will then begin to think innovatively about how they can create jobs for themselves, instead of seeking non existing jobs. This will further the employment opportunities that we need and help spark innovation in Ghana.

The “SURVIVNG AFTER SCHOOL” will awaken the youth and stir up urgency; poise them about the impact being enterprising, its self-employment role and wealth creation and will not only benefit the youth attending the program but also the organisations, co-operate bodies involved in making this conference successful and in fulfilling national interest.

The conference adopts the sustainable livelihood framework proposed by the Department for International Development (DfID) which presents the main factors that affect people's livelihoods, and the typical relationships between Human Capital, Social Capital, Natural Capital, Physical Capital and Financial Capital.

For the focus of the conference, Human Capital and Social Capital are adopted to provide an accurate and realistic understanding of people's strengths (assets or capital endowments) and how they endeavour to convert these into positive livelihood outcomes. The approach is premised on a belief that young people require a range of assets to achieve positive livelihood outcomes; no single category of assets on its own is sufficient to yield all the many and varied livelihood outcomes that people seek. This is particularly true for young people whose access to any given category of assets tends to be very limited.

Human Capital signifies the skills, knowledge and ability to labour with a right attitude that together enables people to pursue different livelihood strategies and achieve their livelihood objectives. Human capital appears generically as a livelihood asset, that is, as a building block or means of achieving livelihood outcomes.

Its accumulation can also be an end in itself. The importance of Human Capital being of intrinsic value is required in order to make use of any of Financial Capital, Social Capital, Physical capital and Natural Capital. It is therefore necessary, though not on its own sufficient and in effect it is the starting point to achieving any desired livelihood.

Social Capital in the context of the conference refers to the social resources upon which young people draw in pursuit of their livelihood objectives. These are developed through: networks and connectedness, either vertical (patron/client) or horizontal (between individuals with shared interests) that increase people's trust and ability to work together and expand their access to wider institutions, membership of more formalised groups which often entails adherence to mutually-agreed or commonly accepted rules, norms and sanctions; and relationships of trust, reciprocity and exchanges that facilitate co-operation, reduce transaction costs and may provide the basis for informal safety nets.

In the 21st century as the how to survive after school remains a mystery to many, essence of social capital is that a mutual trust and reciprocity lowers the costs of working together. This means that social capital has a direct impact upon other types of capital also by facilitating innovation, the development of knowledge and sharing of that knowledge. There is, therefore, a close relationship between social and human capital.

Agro Mindset Organisation operates with a very capable team, with specialisation in the areas of agriculture advocacy and training; project planning and management (including baseline studies and impact studies); as well as farming.

David Asare Asiamah
Executive Director,
Agro Mindset Organisation