Takoradi, Jan. 06, GNA-Mr. Kwabena Okyere Darko-Mensah, Western Regional Minister has described the proposed “YouSTART” initiative as a more sustainable and fundamental way of dealing with youth unemployment in the country.
He therefore admonished the youth in the Region to prepare adequately and take advantage of the initiative to create sustainable businesses to create employment for themselves and others.
The Government in the 2022 budget proposed the “YouSTART” initiative as a means to creating about one million jobs and also as an alternative to supporting young entrepreneurs to gain access to capital and technical support to start and grow their own businesses.
Speaking to the media on how he would deal with the unemployment situation in 2022, Mr Darko-Mensah said the YouSTART had a huge potential to multiply the investment given to the youth.
According to him, the initiative was one of the surest ways to increase the economic activities of the Western Region.
“Not until the people of the Western Region own the productive assets of the Region, profits will not stay here. And if the profits do not stay here, the Region does not grow”, the Regional Minster said and expressed the resolve of the Region to make YouSTART a major focus in 2022.
Comparatively, Mr. Darko-Mensah said the YouSTART initiative was a better alternative to other government initiatives aimed at addressing the unemployment situation in the country.
“Take something like NABCO. When salaries of NABCO personnel are paid, it cost the government GHS1.3 billion. That whole big project called Planting for Food and Jobs cost the government GHS1.6 billion, which of them is more sustainable”, he argued
Initiatives such as NABCO, he said were not multipliers in terms of revenue or generation of wealth, though they made some impact in specific areas of government departments.
He encouraged the youth in the Region to start preparing their business plans, saying their business plan would determine how much money they would receive.
“Get your business plans ready, in March the initiative will start” he stated and cautioned the youth against spending the money on unnecessary things.
Mr. Darko-Mensah was hopeful that given the money, young people would be able to turn them around to create wealth for themselves and families.
“Those who have bigger projects, nothing should stop you from coming together. Three or four people who can come together as a group and take the money”.
He advised the youth with bigger projects to come together to access bigger funds to undertake their projects and equally advised them to undertake businesses that were more profitable and could employ more people to solve the unemployment situation.
He encouraged the youth to take advantage to use their minds to create, innovate and create more employment for themselves and their colleagues.
GNA