Prime News Ghana

Government pledges to increase women entrepreneurs to 60% by 2020

By Sam Edem
Mr. Ibrahim Awal Mohammed
Mr. Ibrahim Awal Mohammed
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Despite the progress made by government and the private sector in providing opportunities for girl child education and general women professional development, gender equality remains one of the major concerns for debates across various nations, especially in the third world countries.

Building on the achievements of the previous administration which left Ghana’s female participation in the labour force at 50.5% according to Wiki’s gender report 2016, the President Nana Akufo-Addo led administration has pledged to increase not just the female labour participation in general but women entrepreneurs to 60% by the end of its tenure in office.

This commitment was made public by the Minister - designate for Business Development, Ibrahim Awal Mohammed.

He claimed that the plan is one of the government’s strategies to create a level playing ground for both genders in the labour market.

Responding to questions before the Parliament’s ministerial vetting committee, Mr. Mohammed stated that the administration intends to “start from the schools. We intend to roll out the school incubator program and talent hunting in various tertiary institution and we intend to make women form not less than 60% of those targets.”

Adding that government via his ministry will aid women in developing projects with potentials to become full-fledged business plans to incubate and “hopefully within 4/5 years, 60% of entrepreneurs in this country will be women”.

He further reasserted the government’s commitment to improve the regulatory framework for business registration in the country to facilitate quicker companies registration process.

Mr. Ibrahim expressed the fact that eliminating the ‘cut-throat bureaucracy’ in registering entities and enterprises in a bid to stimulate a higher level of economic activities in the country is one of the primary objectives of the President Nana Akufo-Addo led administration.

“One of the earliest things we will do is to look at the regulatory framework. The regulatory framework in the sense that, anything that affects business registration must be streamlined” He said.

There is no doubt that this move will be welcomed by all sections of the country, especially one that desperately seeks to be an example to sub – Saharan Africa on the controversial subject of gender equality.