Government Urged To Make Agriculture Youth-Centred

Youth Bridge Foundation (YBF), a youth focused organization, Monday said to ensure a sustainable future for agriculture in Ghana, government must make it more appealing to the youth.

It said there was the need for a well-coordinated branding campaign that would promote and present agriculture and its value-chain among the youth.

Mr Seth Oteng, the Executive Director of YBF, in an interview with Ghana News Agency in Accra on Monday, called on government to design and pursue educational programmes that would sensitize the youth on the competitiveness of employment in agriculture.

Acknowledging a slow start of the Akufo-Addo led administration in 2017 he noted that the 2018 Budget would offer diverse opportunities for the youth who would want to go into agric.

He also called for youth inclusiveness in governance.

According to him, the ‘Beyond Aid’ agenda of President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo is a realistic and commendable campaign, however, “As the global aid architecture shrinks, it has become obvious that governments in Africa and their citizens (corporate and individuals) must mobilize resources internally and from Diaspora for the transformation of their countries.

“The passion and commitment of the President to this agenda is clearly reflected in the 2018 Budget policy direction and specific programmes such as Voluntary Education Fund, invitation for private sector co-funding of the National Environmental Action Plan (NEAP), among others,” he said.

Mr Oteng said: “Taking cognizant of the fact that there is much talk about the need for African countries to own and localize development goals (including SDGs, the Agenda 2063) and now the ‘Beyond Aid’ agenda, YBF maintains that the youth should be at the centre in all of this, not only as beneficiaries, but as a critical interest group.”

He told the GNA that mobilizing the youth presented a great opportunity for creating an effective platform for participation in the political economy, building resilience of young people, and addressing the root causes of many of the key challenges facing them.

YBF is a youth focused organization set up to create supportive platforms to challenge the creativity of the youth, and to make available critical information and resources needed for total development of the youth.

Source: GNA