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On Tuesday 12^th March 2024, the Ghana Enterprise Agency in collaboration with Master Card Foundation organised a sensitization program for all businesses in the Denkyembour District on the Business in the Box (BizBox) project. The project’s main objective is to provide employment and income opportunities for about 250,000 youth between the ages of 18 and 35 years with 70% of beneficiaries being women and 10% being persons with disability.

The Head of Business Advisory Center for Kwaebibirem Municipality who also oversees BAC Activities in the Denkyembour District; Mr Obeng Sarkodie engaged all participants of the sensitization program as the key spokesperson. He welcomed all participants to the program and outlined the purpose of the gathering. He mentioned that the BizBox project was a scale up of the Young Africa Works project and had a time span of 4 years; ranging from 2023 to 2027.

In his presentation, he outlined the various pillars of the program. He mentioned that the program had five key pillars on which the program would be run. The first pillar was the Youth Skill Development which would equip about 75,000 unskilled youth with vocational and technical skills, train 125,000 unskilled youth in agriculture colleges and farm institutes and support 50,000 existing women-owned/led businesses with access to market. The second pillar which is Access to Market would also link 50,000 women entrepreneurs to market opportunities across the country through trade shows and exhibition, concept shops and e-commerce. The third pillar was Access to Start-up Kits which would equip 125,000 skilled youth with start-up kits. The forth pillar was Youth Social Network which would ensure Ensure youth, women, and persons with disabilities have a network to support their activities and build capacities of PWD associations. The fifth and final pillar was institutional strengthening, policy and regulatory support which would develop an implementation strategy for the National MSME and Entrepreneurship Policy and Enforce Local Economic Development Policy to bring economic empowerment, support disadvantaged communities and individuals and support the local economy and PWDs.

He encouraged all participants to spread the word and urge other people most importantly artisans to register. He added that registration can be done for both apprentices and masters craftsmen. After the registration, all registered apprentices would be matched with the registered master craftsmen where they will take their training. All master craftsmen engaged under the project will be contracted and paid at the end of the contract period. Also, all apprentices who successfully go through training would be provided with startup kits to commence their respective entrepreneurial journey.

He concluded the session with a question and answer session where participant sought clarity on the entire project and other pertinent issues. He informed participants to visit the BAC office at the district assembly to register.