UPSA Labour Law students honour YEA for job creation initiatives

Level 300 Labour Law students of the University of Professional Studies (UPSA), Accra, have presented a citation to the Youth Employment Agency (YEA) in recognition of the agency’s efforts in providing jobs for the youth.

The presentation also forms part of efforts by the students to congratulate the management of YEA ahead of the implementation of a new employment module by the agency specifically aimed at helping Small and Medium Scale Enterprises (SMEs) affected by the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic in the area of job cuts.

“We express our profound gratitude to the Youth Employment Agency for your contribution in providing job opportunities for the teeming youth of this country and the impact of knowledge… of the labour and employment sector,” the citation read.

Receiving the citation on behalf of the management of YEA during the visit by the Level 300 Labour Law students of UPSA, the Chief Executive Officer of YEA, Kofi Baah Agyepong, shared details about the Business and Employment Assistance Programme set to be launched by Vice President Dr Mahamudu Bawumia on December 11, 2023.

“This is the biggest-ever programme to be rolled out by the YEA; we are targeting 10,000 small and medium-scale companies. If they employ two persons, we are sure of getting 20,000. We have measures we are putting in place to ensure that no company employs more than two persons unless otherwise approved by us.

"But the target is 10,000 small and medium-scale companies in the country, and when we talk about the smaller companies, we mean the smaller companies; companies which laid off workers when COVID struck us.

“We are talking about hotels, chop bars; we are talking about restaurants and all these small companies with those who were laid off. We want them to be called back, and then YEA will help with the salary support,” he stated.

Thus, under the new module, SMEs will receive salary support of up to GHC 500 for an employee from the government through the agency, to reemploy workers laid off due to the onslaught of the COVID-19 pandemic.

The team from UPSA was made up of Madam Akosua Asa-Asante - Labour Law Lecturer, AK Gyasi who was the lead student and other students including Tweneboah Kodua, Marian Kwapong (Vice President, Law Student Union), and Jessica Arthur.

Mr. Baah noted that his outfit has conducted extensive stakeholder engagements across the country ahead of the programme launch and therefore appealed to SME owners to sign up and benefit from the module.

The Youth Employment Agency (YEA) was established under the Youth Employment Act 2015 (Act 887) to empower young people to contribute meaningfully to the socio-economic and sustainable development of the nation. Its objective is to support the youth of Ghana between the ages of 15 to 35 years through skills training and internship modules to transition from a situation of unemployment to that of employment.

After years of operating, YEA has grown into a fully-fledged state agency providing jobs for thousands of Ghanaian youths through various modules, including Youth in Community Service and Security, Youth in Community and Health Assistants, Youth in Sports, Youth in Entrepreneurship, Youth in Paid Internship, and Youth in Agriculture and Afforestation.

Other modules under YEA include Youth in Sanitation and Coastal Assistants, Community Teaching Assistants, Youth in Apparel and Textiles, Industrial Attachment, and Youth in Information Communication Technology.



GA/SARA

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