Accra, Dec. 3, - Some Persons
with Disability (PWDs) have received training into economic ventures to improve
their financial status in society as the world celebrates International Day of
PWD (IDPWD) on December 3.
The selected PWDs were trained to
acquire skills in the production of shoes, cosmetics and cleansing agents as
part of the Growing Economic Opportunities for Sustainable Development (GEOP)
project.
The GEOP project seek to promote
inclusive development and enhance economic opportunities with special emphasis
on young people (school dropouts), women with limited economic opportunities
and persons with disabilities.
Christian Aid, a non-governmental
organisation and its partners, which include; Ellembele District Assembly,
GRATIS Foundation, UCSOND and Ghanaian Institute of Welding, are implementing
the project with 700,000 euros funding from the European Union (EU).
Mr Ernest Okyere, the Acting
Country Manager of Christian Aid said the project, which started in the past
10months sought to reach 8,734 people with various interventions and to create
at least 1,500 jobs in waged and self-employment businesses and to increase
incomes by at least 40 per cent by end of the project in 2019.
At a graduation ceremony to
deploy the trainees into the market place, Mr Okyere said, the theme for the
2017 IDPWD was “Transformation towards sustainable and resilient society for
all” and that a resilient society for all meant that PWDs should have profitable
ventures.
He added that the equitable
venture should be able to enable the PWDs to have reasonable and predictable
share of the value of their labour and production, enabling them to meet their
basic needs.
He called on government to ensure
that PWDs had equitable access to economic opportunities to enable them have
resilient lives and urged families, friends and authorities to change
perceptions and note that PWDs were not burdens but assets to society who need
to be presented with same opportunities.
In an interview Mr Paolo Salvia,
the Acting Ambassador of the EU Delegation in Ghana said creating jobs, giving
competitive skills to people to enable them acquire better jobs and earn better
salaries were the priority of Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, the President of
Ghana, and that EU believed in that vision.
Mr Salvia said the EU was
passionate to invest in projects that could be sustained even after it had
elapsed, hence funding the GEOP project proposed by the Christian Aid last year
when it called for proposal on sustainable projects.
He indicated that Europe was
committed to ensuring that countries in Africa were capable of creating
enabling environment through job creation to reduce the tendency of Africans
desiring to travel to Europe in search for greener pastures.
“Nobody wants to travel just for
fun, but people travel because they do not see the possibility of getting
decent jobs and salary. So it is important for us to support the initiative… to
create jobs… to encourage more Ghanaians to work and stay here.”
Present at the graduation
ceremony was Mr Mohammed Adjei Sowah, the Metropolitan Chief Executive of Accra
Metropolitan Assembly (AMA), who congratulated the trainees and pledged his
support for the project to ensure that persons with disability were not left
behind.
He said the AMA would be willing
to support the standardisation of the economic activities of the PWDs.
GNA
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