YESDEC employment drive moves to Central Region
The Youth Enterprise and Skills Development Centre (YESDEC), a private sector initiative, is partnering the government of Ghana through the Ministry of Local Government and Rural Development, to provide a solution to the country’s unemployment situation.
With all regions of the country as its target, the programme has now been introduced in the Central Region.
YESDEC is aimed at providing employment opportunities for youth between the ages of 18 and 45 in skills acquisition, as well as the provision of equipment and machinery for beneficiaries who have acquired the necessary skills but lack the requisite machinery to kick-start their respective businesses.
It offers training in various trade modules, including agriculture, fisheries, agro-processing and packaging, mobile phone repairs, electronic revenue collection, and transportation.
Others are ICT, local foods and catering, mobile toilet operations, canoe fiber lining services, community water supply services, hair and beauty care among many others.
It is estimated that 1000 prospective beneficiaries will be registered for the programme by the close of 2011, with 788 persons already on the programme.
Already, 204 beneficiaries under the YESDEC progamme have undergone full training and can be considered as employed.
The YESDEC project is a special job creation initiative and its implementation process is being done in collaboration with the National Youth Employment Programme (NYEP) and National Youth Council.
The project will set up forty thousand (40,000) youth in sustainable micro, viable businesses through short training modules and provision of simple equipments to facilitate their operation.
Registered under the auspices of the Ministry of Local Government & Rural Development, the operations, training and general handling of the various specialised trainings in trade sectors are implemented in collaboration with the Ministry of Employment and Social Welfare and other agencies including NYC, ICCES, OIC and NBSSI.
Meanwhile, the company has successfully opened offices in all 170 Metropolitan, Municipal and District Assemblies (MMDAs) in Ghana.
In the Central Region, YESDEC has so far received support from the Chiefs, Elders and people of the Central region and is doing its best to bring trained district coordinators to take up various positions in the region.
By Edmund Smith-Asante