YESDEC Trains 2,078 Youths In Upper East; Thankful Beneficiaries Appeal For Rapid Starter Pack

Ever since their once-bleak future finally arrived at a new look, thanks to a training programme offered by the Youth Enterprises and Skills Development Centre (YESDEC), two thousand seven hundred and seventy-eight (2,078) beneficiaries have been twisting with impatience for setting up. 

Beneficiaries Interact with Government Officials

They have been talking to newsmen in the Upper East Region, making their gratitude clear to YESDEC and Government, but at the same time appealing for rapid start-up funds and equipment. 

Going just one more step to provide them with their requests before the nearing December elections, many electioneering spectators say, could earn the ruling National Democratic Congress (NDC) Government a robust campaign bonus.    

The trainees, according to the Upper East Regional Coordinator of the YESDEC, Mr. Abakuri Issah Mohammed who spoke to newsmen in Bolgatanga in an interview, were taken through six modules including Dry-Season Farming, Specialty Beauty Care, Local Fashion and Garment, Soap Making, Guinea Fowl Rearing and Car Spraying. 

“We got 220 of the beneficiaries from the Bawku Municipality, another 220 from Bawku West, 200 from Bolgatanga, 220 from Bongo, 200 from Builsa, 220 from Garu-Tempane, 240 from Kassena-Nankana East, 260 from Kassena-Nankana West and 220 from Talensi-Nabdam,” disclosed Mr. Abakuri. “We initially trained 42 in Dry-Season Farming, 30 in Local Fashion and Garment and 6 in Car Spraying. These figures add up to 2,078 beneficiaries. It is expected that they [beneficiaries] will be self-dependant in the future,” he added.

Mr. Stephen Kampeh, one of the beneficiaries from the Kassena-Nankana East District, gladly described the training as an eye-opener that offered him a rare opportunity to learn new methods of dry-season farming. He already has a one-and-a-half acre of land where he has grown pepper. 

“Onion farming is the next thing I want to do, this time on two and a half acres,” he told this blogger. “I’m only waiting till they would provide us with equipment for the skills we have acquired,” he said.

Another beneficiary, Mr. David Atongo from the Talensi District, commended the YESDEC and the Government for coming up with the initiative to lift Ghanaians out of the quagmire of poverty. He also implored their benefactors to without delay assist the beneficiaries with equipment and capital, saying “Soap is a domestic companion. I was trained in soap-making. Government should equip us as early as possible. There can be no better time to make and sell your soap than the approaching harmattan.”

YESDEC, a subsidiary of Waste Management Giants, Zoomlion Ghana Limited, was established to facilitate the acquisition of entrepreneurial skills for the creation of sustainable businesses and as a solution to the unemployment situation in the country.

It is a multipurpose and high-technology training centre with a special focus to equip young people with income-generating skills and start-up funds as well as business advisory services. 

Story By Edward Adeti