BizTech: Meet the banker who swapped his high paying job for bamboo crafting

After several years in banking, Kenneth Okine could have functioned perfectly in any financial investment role.

In his early thirties, Kenneth worked with a blue-chip investment banking firm in Ghana and had opportunities to travel around the world.

That is a great career path that persons with knowledge in banking will not be glad to trade for anything.

But after years of such great opportunities, he was headhunted. Not by another bank, but by his side hustle.

Leaving the security of such a job, to start a company from scratch is hard, but that is exactly what Kenneth did.

His inspiration to become an entrepreneur was born out of a challenge thrown to him while in graduate school in the UK.

He told GhanaWeb that “I was in class and there was this Asian boy who led a presentation. People in the class started mocking his delivery and I joined. He turned to look at me and said, you don’t need to join them in laughing at me. You are from Africa and what do you produce?”

That question got Kenneth thinking even years after graduate school and he challenged himself to entrepreneurship.

He was clueless as to what exactly wanted to do. However, he felt bamboo crafting was just it after realising that Ghana could boast of having abundant bamboo yet imported basic items such as toothpicks.

Knowing the potential of the bamboo industry in Ghana, the ex-banker decided to get crafty with his hands.

In 2016, Kenneth Okine founded the CEO of Pamplo Ghana to produce artefacts from bamboo for the local market.

A switch in career path would normally require some sort of retraining, but not for Kenneth who learned on the job.

He started production from his backyard and gradually moved to a production site which employs some able hands.

In the maiden edition of BizTech, GhanaWeb sits with Kenneth Okine to find out why he quit his high-paying finance job to focus on his side hustle; making products with bamboo.

Watch the premiere below: