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The 3-days festival is planned to take place in July,2022 at the Jubilee park and the Prempeh Assembly Hall in Kumasi.
In attendance will be major stakeholders in the agribusiness sector, development partners, public and private organizations, students, the media, academia and research institutions and youth groups.
Speaking at the official launch of the Jak Foundation Maiden Youth In Agribusiness Festival, the CEO of Jak Foundation, Prof. Baffour Agyemang Duah, said the festival also anticipates bringing together major stakeholders and youth agribusiness practitioners along on one platform to share experiences, learn lessons, network and forge strategic partnership along the agricultural value chain, the festival will create an investment and business opportunities for the development of the agribusiness sector that will be attractive to young Ghanaians.
“It is envisaged that, this initiative will serve as a motivation to whip up the interest of the teeming young people to venture into agribusiness”he stressed.
In his remarks, the CEO of National Entrepreneurship and Innovation Programme, Mr.Kofi Ofosu Nkansah, reiterated to the fact that is excited to be part of the maiden Youth in Agribusiness Festival held under the auspices of the John Agyekum Kufuor Foundation
This Festival seeks to showcase the outstanding developments of young people within the Agribusiness sector of our Country to demonstrate to the youth the endless opportunities in the sector to encourage more young people to go into Agribusiness.
According to him, NEIP as the Government Programme office responsible for supporting Youth enterprises which includes Agribusiness, sees this Festival as a good platform for partnership to help in the attainment of our objectives.
He said over the last 5 years, we have supported many Agric start-ups and SMEs by providing them with Training, Business Advisory Services, Technical Support and funding.
The Government through NEIP and other youth agencies is rolling out programmes like Youth in Innovative Agric, YouStart and others under the Ghana Cares Obaatanpa Programme to provide support for the Youth in Agribusiness and other businesses.
Mr Nkansah was optimistic that these programmes have been designed as the vehicle to create sustainable job opportunities for the growing and increasingly educated youth of our Country.
The YouStart alone is expected to create 1 million jobs in the next 3 years. We are calling on the youth here to take advantage of these opportunities when the time comes.
From the NEIP’s recent call for Applications under the Youth in Innovative Agriculture Programme, over 22,000 young people between the ages of 18 and 40 who are into Vegetable, Maize, Poultry/Livestock, Yam/Cassava farming and Agro processing applied for training and funding support.
This shows the huge appetite for Agribusiness among the youth and the need to continue to provide more support for them to undertake Smart Agribusiness projects.
According to him, this, when done, will help create alternative employment opportunities in Agric, for the hundreds of 1000s of graduates who come out of our Second Cycle Institutions and universities each year who cannot be absorbed unto Government payroll.
Assure the Foundation that the NEIP will always be available to partner the John Agyekum Kufuor Foundation in programmes like this to help create jobs and wealth for the young people of Ghana. We wish all participants the best of deliberations for the day.
By Joseph Nana Yaw Cobbina
