Global Communities, AMA Signs MOU On Employment And Entrepreneurship For The Youth

Global Communities and the Accra Metropolitan Assembly (AMA) have signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) towards creating and sustaining a business environment that would be conducive for youth employment and entrepreneurship.

AMA, as part of the agreement will facilitate apprenticeships, coaching and mentoring opportunities for young entrepreneurs within the jurisdictional boundaries of the Assembly.

Speaking at the ceremony, the Country Director of Global Communities, Alberto Wilde said relatively strong economic growth performances within the past two decades have not translated into increasing economic opportunities for the country’s growing youth population.

He noted that with the African Development Bank projecting that over the next 10 years, only one in every four youth will find a wage job of which 80% will be in the informal sector, the challenge for us therefore, is to work together to increase the productivity of the informal sector where a majority of employment generation firms are located.

Mr Wilde indicated that it will create jobs for the increasing youth population to offset negatives of high youth unemployment and its impact on national security and cohesion.

“This will require young people to develop skills relevant to industries particularly those within the construction sector where concerns over limited application of standards in terms of skills and competence continue to bedevil the sector,” he stated.

The Country Director added that while government in its plans for the next 4 years has outlined a number of youth related initiatives that would most likely go a long way to address some of the bottlenecks to youth employment in the country, a lot more needs to be done to improve and sustain youth employment over time.

According to him, in partnership with Mastercard Foundation, Global Communities is implementing a 5-year project aimed at creating economic opportunities for Ghanaian youth within the construction sector.

He emphasised that the Youth Inclusive Entrepreneurial Development Initiative for Employment (YIEDIE) is designed to apply an integrated youth-led market-systems model to improve the capacity of youth and service providers across the construction value chain in five of Ghana’s six largest cities—Accra, Kumasi, Sekondi-Takoradi, Ashaiman and Tema.

Mr Wilde posited that the project is expected to reach at least 23,700 disadvantaged youth between the ages of 17 and 24 year in these cities who have dropped out of school with training in technical, life and/or entrepreneurship skills leading to employment and increased income and savings.

He added that then Sector stakeholders such as private sector firms, financial service providers, training institutions and government are expected to benefit from improved coordination and capacity.

“YIEDIE wants to engage stakeholders to address bottlenecks in the business registration and permitting processes, procurement policies to encourage subcontracting to enterprises set-up and run by youth in line with the government’s commitment to allocating 30% of contracts awarded to local construction firms to enterprises run by young people and women and enforcing the mandates for municipal construction contracts,” Mr Wilde intimated.

He said this at the 3rd YIEDIE Policy Action Workshop to collaborate collaboration with both private and public sector actors to stimulate discussions and advocate for policy changes to support the construction sector.

The purpose of this Policy Action Workshop is thus to bring together city authorities, sector associations and business leaders to collaboratively define concrete steps to improve the business environment for young entrepreneurs and construction firms within their jurisdictional boundaries as part of the efforts to address youth unemployment.

The Major of Accra, Mr Mohammed Adjei Sowah has indicated the support of government and his outfit to ensure that the dreams of this project are achieved to the benefit of the country.

YIEDIE is designed to create economic opportunities in Ghana’s construction sector for disadvantaged youth with demonstrated interest in learning a skills in one of the 16 selected trade areas. In addition, provides integrated life skills and entrepreneurship training to these youth.