About 500 young men and women in the early hours of Wednesday converged at the premises of Atinka Media village at Avenor Junction to take part in the YIEDIE Awareness Creation and Registration Fair.
The Youth Inclusive Entrepreneurial Development Initiative for Employment (YIEDIE), is a five year project designed to create economic opportunities in Ghana's construction sector for economically disadvantaged youth.
It is implemented by Global Communities, an international non-profit organisation that works closely with communities worldwide to bring about sustainable changes that improve the lives and livelihoods of the vulnerable in partnership with MasterCard Foundation.
The project, which seeks to directly reach 23,700 youth with training in technical and entrepreneurial skills, leading to employment has trained 13,000 youth in the last four years.
YIEDIE's second awareness creation and registration was in collaboration with Atinka Media Village to promote and communicate the project to the public and screen interested youth between the ages of 17-24 who are unemployed.
The project which is being executed in Kumasi, secondi, Takoradi, Ashaiman and other parts of Accra is being implemented in collaboration with Opportunities Industrialisation Centre Ghana (OICG), African Aurora Business Network LLC (AABN), Republic Boafo Ltd and Artisans Association of Ghana (AAG).
Speaking at the event, the Project Coordinator for YIEDIE, Ms Kafui Mills-Odoi made it known that the training for all beneficiaries was free of charge.
For the women beneficiaries, she said the foundation have allocated some incentives for them so that in case there is pregnancy, they can go and come back in a nanny care, or child care, in addition to health insurance or transportation.
“For those who are into heavy machine operations, we fully pay for their license at DVLA, while we provide NVTI certification Proficiency I. For those into business development, we provide for their food for the whole training period," she added.
Ms. Mills-Odoi encouraged the youth to take advantage of the Project in order to acquire skills.
A mentor, who is also a Construction Contractor, Mrs. Gizella Tetteh-Agbotui encouraged women to venture into construction although it is a male dominated industry.
A beneficiary of YIEDIE, Doris Deku, who is now a tiler and has employed four men, also encouraged the incoming beneficiaries to take advantage of the programme, take what they learn seriously and respect their trainers at all times.
Ghana | Atinkaonline.com | Porcia Oforiwaa Ofori