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Politicians, parliamentarians, young entrepreneurs, and, indeed, taxpayers in Ghana have been debating the proposed introduction of an ‘Electronic Transaction Levy’ or ‘E-levy’ in recent days, following the presentation of the 2022 Budget Statement to Parliament by Minister of Finance Mr. Ken Ofori-Atta, on November 17, 2021. The debate on the E-levy’s justification, fairness, and utility is at an impasse, and positions have become polarised. The 2022 budget, coming under the theme ‘Building a Sustainable Entrepreneurial Nation: Fiscal Consolidation and Job Creation,’ seeks to introduce several bold policy initiatives designed to restore macroeconomic stability, focusing on fiscal and debt sustainability in a callous economic environment. In a Twitter Space organized by the Ghana Chamber of Young Entrepreneurs to solicit the opinions of Young Entrepreneurs on E-levy, opinions were divided. According to some of the participants, the introduction of e-Levy isn’t a bad idea given the economy’s current stage and since it will serve as a means for the Government to raise funds for developmental projects, especially youth entrepreneurship development. However, they did not support the 1.5% rate and have since asked that the Government reduce it to 1%. Also, they propose an increase from 100 to 500 daily threshold. According to them, many small businesses were still recovering from the impact of COVID and hence, slapping a 1.5% e-levy sound hash. Some also believed that systematic failure brought about by the Government’s inability to widen the tax net to capture the informal sector is enough grounds for the Government to focus on finding better solutions to capture more people within the tax net than introducing this e-levy. The lead discussants were Mr. Richard Addison of Kent Investments and Agriprenuer Enyonam Manye of the Ghanaian Farmer. Rep from the Mobile Money Venders Association and a host of other key Young Entrepreneurs joined the discussion. The #YouthForum was hosted by the Ghana Chamber of Young Entrepreneurs CEO, Mr.Sherif Ghali.

The newly appointed President of the Ghana Chamber of Young Entrepreneurs, Mr. Richard E. Addison, has called on government to decentralize all youth entrepreneurship policies initiatives. He said this in his new year message to members of the Chamber and young Ghanaian entrepreneurs. 2022 is a year for young entrepreneurs as the Government roll out many youth entrepreneurship policy initiatives. According to the Young Entrepreneur, these interventions are laudable. However, Government should ensure they get to discerning young entrepreneurs in all corners of the country. “Let us make sure these good initiatives like the YouStart, Ghana CAREs Obaatanpa, etc., are not centered in only Accra and Ashanti but the whole of Ghana. Let’s make sure those in the hinterlands get the support as well,” he stated. Mr. Richard E. Addison also used the opportunity to call on Government to ensure that all the youth entrepreneurs’ policies interventions are spread across the country for all entrepreneurs to benefit. “I call on Government to ensure that all interventions for young entrepreneurs and startups to be distributed fairly. We want transparency so that all young entrepreneurs and startups across Ghana will be able to know these interventions, know how to access them and where to go and sign up to access them. I will also appeal to the Government to keep things transparent and show us which districts have benefited from these interventions. “Let us make sure these good initiatives like the YouStart, Ghana CAREs Obaatanpa, etc., are not centered in only Accra and Ashanti but the whole of Ghana. Let’s make sure those in the hinterlands get the support as well,” he added. Read full statement below: A Happy New Year. Today, My and My team at GCYE would like to extend our New Year’s greeting to every young entrepreneur in Ghana and across the world. As we begin the year, I hope to look back at 2021 before talking about the prospects of 2022. The year 2021 was another year that saw the world greatly affected by COVID-19. Lockdowns and declarations of a state of emergency in many countries and regions placed restrictions on economic activities and our daily lives. Amidst this, The Ghana Chamber of Young Entrepreneurs, through partnerships, we were able to implement several projects that support the businesses of Ghanaian young people in diverse ways. As the new President of the Chamber, I am very encouraged by the steady progress, and I wish to express my sincere appreciation to everyone for putting in your best. Looking at the prospects of the new year 2022, I call on young people to come together to develop homegrown ideas that can solve our problems so we won’t continue to rely solely on the central Government. This year, the Chamber will be embarking on projects that will provide financial support to young entrepreneurs, build their capacity, and help youth transition to green and agriculture. We’ve already initiated a funding project dubbed; Young Entrepreneurs and Support Fund (YESS Fund), which seeks to be a sustainable funding pool for young entrepreneurs. Our flagship Youth Agriculture project (Brafie Youth Agric Project) will follow soon. Brafie will be one of the biggest agricultural revolutions of the year. Through Brafie, young people will return to their communities and have land to invest in farming. Also, the Young Entrepreneurs Summit and Expo is coming back bigger and better. The Summit, now renamed to Youth Entrepreneurship and Innovation Summit and Expo (YEIS), will showcase the products and innovations by young Ghanaian entrepreneurs and create an avenue for emerging and established businesses to meet under one umbrella to network and form lasting partnerships. I use this opportunity to call on Government to ensure that all the excellent youth entrepreneurs’ policies interventions are spread across the country so all decerning entrepreneurs can benefit. Let us make sure these good initiatives like the YouStart, Ghana CAREs Obaatanpa, etc., are not centered in only Accra and Ashanti but the whole of Ghana. Let’s make sure those in the hinterlands get the support as well. To our development partners and all stakeholders, we anticipate stronger partnership and collaboration as we continue to promote youth entrepreneurs in the country. We, as a chamber, have declared this year to be a year of financial support for youth businesses. With the government funding projects and our initiatives and partners, access to finance should not be a bigger problem for youth businesses in 2022 Thank you. Richard Addison President

The National Entrepreneurship and Innovations Programme-NEIP has announced an application for young Ghanaians to apply for the first phase of “YOUTH IN INNOVATIVE AGRICULTURE SUPPORT” under the GHANA CARES “OBAATAN PA” PROGRAMME. The programme seeks to enlist young people between the ages of eighteen (18) to forty (40) Years who are into Agriculture to be trained and funded. Beneficiaries of the programme will receive an amount ranging from Ten Thousand (10,000) to One Hundred Thousand (100,000) Ghana Cedis. An application portal has been launched on the website (www.neip.gov.gh)and the social media platforms (@NEIPGHANA) of the National Entrepreneurship and Innovation Programme-NEIP. The application is open from the 11th of January to the 5th of February 2022 for prospective applicants to apply. The applicants will be taken through training for one month, shortlisted applicants will be funded after the training. This phase will solicit application from the following sectors under Agric Business. · Vegetable Farming · Maize Farming · Poultry/Livestock · Yam/cassava · Agro Processing The Ghana CARES (Obaatan pa) programme is an unprecedented, bold and audacious GHȻ100 billion post COVID programme to stabilise, revitalise and transform Ghana’s economy to create jobs and prosperity for Ghanaians over a three-year period. It is sequenced in two phases: a Stabilisation Phase that is running from July to the end of the year (2020); and a medium-term Revitalization Phase from 2021-2023. The first phase of the programme builds on the actions already taken by the Government under the Coronavirus Alleviation Programme, including stabilisation of the economy, ensuring food security, supporting businesses and workers, strengthening the health system and passage of legislation to facilitate quick economic recovery. The second phase aims at revitalising and transforming the economy from 2021-2023 will focus on supporting commercial farming and attracting educated youth into agriculture, building Ghana’s light manufacturing sector, developing engineering/machine tools and ICT/digital economy, developing Ghana’s housing and construction industry, reviewing and optimising the implementation of Government flagships and key programmes among others. To apply for the support, click on https://bit.ly/3qhEGcT  

The Ghana Chamber of young entrepreneurs and GIZ AgriBiz project signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) to embark on projects that will position the chamber to serve the interest of its members better and improve revenue to efficiently and sustainably manage the affairs of the association. As part of the agreement, there will be capacity building for leaders and members and logistical support. The Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the Ghana Chamber of Young Entrepreneurs, Sherif Ghali, signed on behalf of the chamber, while the Project Manager for the Sustainable Employment through Agribusiness (AgriBiz), Miss Marie Von Schlieben, signed for the AgriBiz Project in Accra.

At the just ended Annual General Meeting of the leadership of the Chamber, Mr Richard E Addison was appointed Acting President of the Chamber. Mr Addison, until his appointment, has been an ardent member of the Chamber since 2018 and have contributed immensely to the development and growth of the Chamber extolled as Ghana’s premium network on young entrepreneurs. For the next year, Richard Addison will work closely with both the Executive arm and Secretariat of the Chamber to achieve the set goals and objectives. He will be supported by the current CEO of the Chamber, Mr Sherif Ghali, in delivering his mandate.  It will be recalled that Mr Sherif Ghali, for the past years, has played both the role of CEO and President of the Chamber. He will now focus on the administration and operationalization of the Chamber, whiles Mr Richard Addison focuses on the functionality and provides leadership to the Chamber for the following year. Profile of Richard Addison Mr Richard Addison is a farmer who cares a lot about youth and community development.  His 50-acre rice farm, which started as a 30 acre in the Sharma District in 2014, employs over 100 locals from land preparation, planting, harvesting, and milling to transporting produce to the market.  Farming and agricultural ventures are not just business for Richard Addison; they are ways to impact people’s livelihood positively.  When not on the farm, Mr Addison and his team at Kent Systems specialize in revenue mobilization for district assemblies, finding solutions to increasing revenues through internally generated funds (IGF). Richard has been managing The Richard Addison Foundation (TRAF) for the past decade. This non-profit organization focuses on projects ranging from farming, provision of water to the renovation of schools in deprived communities.  Mr Addison’s goal as a farmer is to produce Ghanaian staples in large quantities to reduce the importation of food crops into the country.  Apart from pushing the youth into venturing into the agricultural, his focus is finishing his rice mill in the Shama District to help localize the processing and branding of rice harvested from Kent Farms as Koaba Rice; for everyday life use.

Chief Executive Officer of the Ghana Chamber of Young Entrepreneurs (GCYE), Sherif Ghali, has welcomed the government’s 2022 budget proposal to allocate GHS1bn yearly towards advancing the interest of youth entrepreneurs in the country, calling for its effective implementation. “That’s one key thing if we want to solve our unemployment issue in Ghana; the government will need to promote youth entrepreneurs by setting up a support framework for them to be able to have access to finance,” he told Single African Market on the sidelines of the chamber’s three-day summit in Accra. He added: “It’s good that the government has finally come to understand and will be deliberate about supporting youth entrepreneurship in Ghana. We believe that setting up GHS 1bn annually for the next few years will be helpful to youth entrepreneurship.” Mr. Ghali however bemoaned the poor implementation of such interventions as several youth-centered policies and programs have not achieved their intended purpose because they were not led by the private sector. “With this very good initiative, the government should work with organized groups and academia to identify viable young businesses that must be needed the training and funding,” Mr. Ghali said. He also called on the government should also go beyond financial support and make deliberate efforts to help young entrepreneurs sustain their enterprises. “We need to have a database, and identify the various markets outside Ghana that we can produce and supply to as a means of boosting industrial capacity. If we are not deliberate about the AfCFTA, we can push in money alright but others will come in and reap the benefits,” he added.

Ghana Chamber of Young Entrepreneurs (GCYE) has organized a workshop for young entrepreneurs in the country to identify and explore existing opportunities in the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA). The three-day summit was also to educate and encourage participants to play an active role, in the single continental market. This year’s summit was on the theme “Supporting the implementation of the AfCFTA; the role of youth and green business” “With the commencement of trade in the AfCFTA and Ghana’s target to promote industrialization, the summit brought together various stakeholders including young entrepreneurs, policymakers, the private sector, and researchers to examine ways and means that the youth and green businesses could effectively participate and contribute to the implementation of the single market,” CEO of the chamber, Sherif Ghali, said of the summit. A panel discussion saw the young entrepreneurs briefed and how to prepare themselves to take advantage of AfCFTA.

The Ghana Chamber of Young Entrepreneurs, Private Enterprise Federation, National Entrepreneurship and Innovation Plan, National Youth Authority, Youth Employment Agency, and GIZ Ghana have announced the Young Entrepreneurs Summit & Expo 2021(YES2021) comes off Next month from 18th to 20th November 2018 in Accra. The YES2021 will run with the theme: “Supporting the Implementation of AfCFTA; the Role of the Youth and Green Businesses.” The three-day event will bring together over 500 young entrepreneurs from across the nation to conduct analysis, provide policy recommendations on supporting the youth to leverage the AfCFTA, and dialogue on safeguarding the environment by adopting green business principles. YES2021 will also provide a platform to deepen the discussions on how Ghana can address its perennial youth unemployment issues by investing in youth entrepreneurship. New to this year’s edition is the addition of an expo, time with selected captains of the industry, which is all geared towards connecting young entrepreneurs to opportunities such as mentorships, investment, and partnership. It will be recalled that in 2018 the National Youth Authority Collaborated with the Commonwealth Alliance of Young entrepreneurs- Ghana chapter to organize the maiden edition. The Vice President of the Republic of Ghana, H. E Dr.Mahamudu Bawumia, and other dignitaries graced the occasion. Young entrepreneurs who want to participate or exhibit their products/ services will have to register for free at the GCYE website. The CEO of the Chamber, Mr. Sherif Ghali, indicated that they would provide accommodation and feeding to selected participants. “This is the largest gathering of young entrepreneurs in Ghana and so we invite all young entrepreneurs across the country register to participate. We will be providing accommodation and feeding to selected participants.” He spoke

According to him, the Trade Ministry taking over the office of the Business Development Ministry, following President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo abolishing of seven ministries in his new government and the merging of others with similar roles, “is not a good feeling”. Calling for the retention of programmes under NEIP, Mr. Ghali further petitioned the President to allow the defunct Business and Development Ministry to operate under the presidency as the Trade Ministry is already saddled with its own itinerary and programmes.    “One would always want that we have a ministry that is focused on the business community; the development of entrepreneurs. But like the President said, the Ministry for Business Development was created for a purpose of which it has achieved the purpose, so it needs to be taken out.  “However, we believe that some of the initiatives the Ministry of Business Development were embarking on, we want them to be retained. We want to see how the Trade Ministry will find a way of ensuring that those things are still going on, and one thing as a business leader your business community wants is that, the national entrepreneurship and innovation plan, that is NEIP, we want it to actually not go directly under the ministry of trade; I have a reason for that. We want it to go directly under the office of the President; if that is done, we believe that, the Trade [Ministry] is having a lot of agencies under them implementing one or two programs. If NEIP should be added to it, I think that NEIP will not be able to function as it’s supposed to be. “So, the initiatives that were embarked by NEIP under the ministry of business development, we are praying that if NEIP stands under the Presidency they will be able to carry on those project. But, as it stands now, it doesn’t change anything; we still believe that the Trade Ministry will do its best, we only hope the Trade Ministry will work with the private sector players to make sure we are able to gel well to dialogue on policies before they come out. We hope that the Trade Ministry will be more engaging and consulting so far as the private sector is concerned”. Sherif Ghali Commenting on the outstanding challenges of access to credit financing, taxation among others facing entrepreneurs with the commencement of AfCFTA in the host country Ghana, Mr. Ghali stated that, businesses are struggling as there isn’t proper understanding of AfCFTA to leverage its opportunities. “One thing we need to understand is that, aside all these, we are looking at a country that should have a strategy for AfCFTA. No matter the issues we are facing internally, when it comes to our entrepreneurs not being able to access funding; what is the strategy of Ghana as far as AfCFTA is concerned? What is our program lineup going into AfCFTA? That is the one thing that is lacking. I know African countries that have issues with access to credit and all that but the fact is that, they all have a strategy… what is Ghana hoping to sell out? “Even if today our government is able to provide access to funding…at the end of the day, what is our strategy? How are we helping these businesses to go beyond the borders of Ghana?” Private sector key to AfCFTA success and Africa’s recovery from COVID-19

The Ghana Chamber of Young Entrepreneurs and partners today launched the AfCFTA Ghana Youth Bureau which is aimed at advocating, providing information, business support services, mobilization of investment and building the capacity of young entrepreneurs to ensure they benefit fully from the AfCFTA agreement. Speaking at a brief launching ceremony held at the head office of the Chamber, the CEO Mr. Sherif Ghali indicated that, the Chamber will set up desk for AfCFTA Ghana Youth Bureau at the head office and this desk will be led by dedicated officers Mr. Delali Anyigbah, (Director of Programs) and Mr. Stephen Opoku-Dankwa, (Director of Research, Policy, Monitoring and Evaluation). The Chamber believes that the best way to mobilize the youth to capitalize on the AfCFTA is to guide, support and prepare them. They must understand what AfCFTA is, its benefits to them and their businesses, and where to successfully start from. With AfCFTA Ghana Youth Bureau, many youth businesses and/or young entrepreneurs will have a one-stop shop to access information and support. He also added that, the Chamber and its partners will setup a multipurpose portal that will help profile Ghanaian youth businesses for investment and business matchmaking with other youth businesses across the continent and that the chamber will also roll out regional sanitization workshops to educate, empower and engage the young entrepreneurs on AfCFTA. “We have a dedicated team and we are going to have a desk setup here in our office to provide all the necessary information and support to our members as far as AfCFTA is concerned. We shall also launch a multipurpose portal that will profile Ghanaian youth businesses for investment and business matchmaking with other youth businesses across the continent.” It is evident that, young people make a large number of small business owners in Ghana and Africa. They predominate economic activities and their enterprises drive economic and social transformation. There is no doubt they are the engine to drive the success of the AfCFTA and together we achieve the Africa We Want – an integrated, prosperous and peaceful Africa. Ghana Chamber of Young Entrepreneurs (GCYE) – is the official network of young Ghanaian business owners with interest covering every private enterprise sector with the primary objective to unite, engage, and promote initiatives and innovations of young entrepreneurs to facilitate support in their pursuit of economic prosperity. Media Contacts Mr. Scofray Nana Yaw Yeboah | Director of Communication| AfCFTA Ghana Youth Bureau | Ghana Chamber of Young Entrepreneurs | E-mail: scofray@gmail.com Mr. Sherif Ghali | Chief Executive Officer | Ghana Chamber of Young Entrepreneurs | E-mail: shefghali@gmail.com