The National Entrepreneurship and Innovation Plan (NEIP) launched by President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo to provide integrated support for business start-ups and early stage businesses has, so far, provided financial support to 4,350 entrepreneurs throughout the country.
Additionally, the programme, which started with a seed capital of US$10 million, has trained businesses, provided business advisory services, technical support, as well as access to market to about 19,000 businesses.
President Akufo-Addo said this on Saturday when he addressed the Africa NetpreneurshipSummit, an initiative of Jack Ma, a business magnate and co-founder of the Alibaba Group.
The summit provided a platform for African and global entrepreneurs, investors, educators and leaders to discuss how best to enable entrepreneurship and digital economy across the continent.
The summit was attended by former Secretary General of the United Nations, Ban Ki Moon, renowned movie star, Jet Li, and other business entrepreneurs from China.
President Akufo-Addo spoke about a number of programmes his administration was pursuing to support entrepreneurship in the country, including the Presidential Pitch Competition which has provided support to 20 young, impactful, innovative and scalable business starts-up.
Last year, he said winners of the Presidential Pitch Competition, aged between 18 and 35, created about 200 jobs after receiving support from the government and indicated that winners of this year’s competition are expected to provide more jobs.
President Akufo-Addo touched on the Presidential Empowerment for Women in Disability Programme and indicated that the initiative has provided support of up to GH¢2 million to 1,000 beneficiaries
Additionally, he said the government has introduced an entrepreneurship programme to train young entrepreneurs in the Senior High Schools (SHSs) to support and nurture young entrepreneurs.
“Let’s rise to build Africa and leave a legacy behind,” he said and added that the continent cannot continue to lose young people through dangerous migration through the Mediterranean Sea and the Sahara Desert
According to President Akufo-Addo, the dream of a Ghana and an Africa beyond aid, a continent prosperous enough to engage competitively with the rest of the world is still a possibility.
He stressed the need for leaders to work towards achieving the goal by tackling youth unemployment by developing entrepreneurship on the continent.
The President said the continent has a unique opportunity to leverage technology and innovation
Mr. Jack Ma stressed the need for countries on the continent to commit to training young entrepreneurs and developing the right infrastructure for them to succeed.
He said young people must be taught how to do business, given the right education and support to enable them succeed in the field of entrepreneurship.
