Ghana must put the private sector at the centre of Youth Employment Agenda

Youth unemployment has become one of Ghana’s most serious economic and social challenges, yet our national conversation about employment too often begins with the question, “How many jobs has the government created?” That question is understandable, but it also reflects a fundamental misunderstanding of how sustainable employment is created in a modern economy.

Successive governments have announced employment programmes and initiatives, and the public sector has continued to recruit teachers, nurses, security personnel, administrators and other essential workers. However, Ghana has still not succeeded in building an economic system capable of generating enough sustainable employment for its growing youth population.

This failure is not the exclusive responsibility of the NPP or the NDC. It is a structural problem that has persisted under governments formed by both major political parties.

For decades, Ghanaians have heard employment slogans, programme names, campaign promises and impressive figures announced from political platforms. Governments change, programmes are renamed, new initiatives are launched and employment promises return during another political cycle, yet large numbers of young people continue searching for work.

This should tell us that the problem cannot be solved merely by changing slogans or replacing one government employment programme with another. Ghana needs to change the philosophy behind its employment policy.

Government Is Not a Businessman

Government is not a businessman, and government should not attempt to become the principal employer of the population. Its most important economic responsibility is to create the conditions under which businesses can be established, survive, expand, innovate and employ people.

Of course, government must employ people. A functioning state needs teachers, doctors, nurses, police officers, engineers, judges, administrators and many other professionals. But there is a limit to how many people the public payroll can sustainably absorb.

The employment of millions of Ghanaians must ultimately depend upon a productive economy driven substantially by private enterprise. This is where our political discussion has repeatedly gone wrong. Instead of asking only, “How many jobs has the government created?,” Ghanaians should increasingly ask: “How many businesses has government policy enabled to expand and employ additional workers?”

That is a much more meaningful measure of an employment policy.

Stop Turning Employment Into a Political Slogan

Youth employment is too important to be reduced to competition between the NPP and NDC. When in opposition, political parties understandably criticise unemployment and promise jobs. When they enter government, they introduce programmes with new names and announce employment figures. The opposing party disputes those figures and promises something different.

Then another election comes. The cycle continues while the fundamental structure of the economy remains largely unchanged. We therefore need to move beyond what many Ghanaians understandably perceive as a cycle of political slogans and unfulfilled expectations. This criticism should apply equally to NPP and

NDC administrations. Neither party should be allowed to reduce such an important national challenge to campaign messaging.

The question is not which political party can invent the most attractive employment slogan.

The question is:

How do we build a Ghanaian economy capable of creating jobs continuously, regardless of which political party is in power?

Call Ghana's Businesspeople to the Table

I propose that the government convene a National Business, SME and Youth Employment Forum. This should not be another conference dominated by politicians delivering speeches. The President and relevant ministers should invite Ghana's established businesspeople, SME owners, young entrepreneurs, prospective entrepreneurs, banks, investors, universities, technical institutions, business associations, organised labour and representatives of the Ghanaian diaspora.

Government should sit down and listen. Every participating business should be asked a straightforward question:

“What is preventing your company from expanding and employing more Ghanaians?”

One manufacturer may say electricity costs are preventing expansion. Another may need machinery. A farmer may need irrigation, storage or guaranteed market access. A small business may have customers but lack affordable working capital. A young graduate may have a commercially viable idea but cannot obtain financing because the bank requires collateral that he or she does not possess.

Another company may be willing to employ 50 additional workers but cannot expand because of regulatory delays, taxation, access to land, infrastructure or import costs. These are the problems government should be solving.

Ask Businesses How Many Jobs They Can Create

The forum should go beyond identifying problems. Government should ask businesses to make measurable proposals. For example: “If government helps remove this particular obstacle, how much will you invest and how many

additional people can you employ?”

Imagine identifying 10,000 viable Ghanaian SMEs capable of employing only five additional workers each after receiving appropriate support. That would potentially create 50,000 jobs.

If 1,000 growing businesses could each employ another 20 people, that would potentially create another 20,000 jobs. These figures are illustrations, but the principle is important. Instead of one government trying to employ 70,000 people directly, imagine government creating the economic conditions that allow 11,000 independent businesses to employ those 70,000 people.

Then imagine those businesses continuing to expand. That is how employment becomes sustainable.

SMEs Must Become Employment Engines

Ghana must therefore treat SMEs not simply as small businesses requiring occasional assistance but as potential employment engines. A young Ghanaian who wants to establish a food-processing company, engineering workshop, software business, transport company, commercial farm, construction enterprise or

manufacturing operation should be regarded as a potential employer.

If that entrepreneur eventually employs 20 people, government has indirectly helped create 20 jobs without adding 20 salaries to the public payroll.

If the company grows to employ 200 people, the impact becomes even greater.

Government policy should therefore make it easier for viable SMEs to move from employing two people to ten, from ten to fifty, and eventually from fifty to hundreds.

Connect Universities and Technical Schools Directly to Industry

The employment problem cannot be solved by businesses and government alone. Universities, technical universities and vocational institutions must become part of the system.

Businesses should tell educational institutions what skills they expect to need over the next five or ten years. If Ghana wants to expand agro-processing, manufacturing, mining services, renewable energy, construction, tourism, logistics, healthcare and digital industries, our universities and technical

institutions must understand the skills those sectors require. That is what is done in developed countries.

We should stop producing graduates first and asking where they can work afterwards. Education, industrial policy and employment policy must be connected.

Students should also have greater access to internships and apprenticeships before graduation so that the transition from education to employment becomes smoother.

Bring the Banks Into the Room

Ghana cannot discuss entrepreneurship seriously without discussing finance.

We cannot continuously tell unemployed young people to “become entrepreneurs” while a promising young entrepreneur cannot obtain the capital required to purchase equipment or expand production.

Banks and other financial institutions must therefore participate in the national employment discussion.

Government does not necessarily have to provide every entrepreneur with money. It can create credit guarantees, risk-sharing arrangements and other mechanisms that encourage financial institutions to lend responsibly to viable SMEs.

Support should not become political patronage. Businesses receiving public support should meet transparent criteria, maintain proper accounts and demonstrate measurable results.

Bring the Diaspora Into Productive Investment

Ghana should also invite its diaspora into this national employment strategy.

Ghanaians living in Japan, Germany, Britain, Canada, the United States and elsewhere have accumulated knowledge, technology, professional networks, capital and international business experience.

For decades, Ghana has benefited enormously from diaspora remittances, but the next stage should be to convert more diaspora resources into productive investment.

Government should ask:

What prevents a Ghanaian abroad from establishing a factory, technology company, agro￾processing business or joint venture in Ghana? Actually, this is what many Ghanaians abroad want to do, but the biggest problem they face is mindset issues. You leave your business behind in the care of the local people and they'll collapse it in your absence because they rather want to benefit from the business.

Identify those obstacles and address them.

A diaspora investment that establishes a business employing 100 people is ultimately more transformative than repeatedly sending money to support the consumption of 100 relatives.

Create a National Employment and Enterprise Compact

The outcome of the proposed forum should therefore be a National Employment and Enterprise Compact involving government, businesses, SMEs, financial institutions, universities, technical institutions, labour organisations, young people and the diaspora.

Businesses could indicate how many workers they are capable of employing over one, three and five years and identify the obstacles preventing them from reaching those targets.

Government could then determine which obstacles can reasonably be addressed through infrastructure, regulatory reform, financing mechanisms, taxation policy, skills development, technology support or market access.

In return, businesses benefiting from substantial public incentives should make measurable commitments concerning investment, employment and training.

This would allow Ghana to move from employment promises to employment targets that can actually be monitored.

Make Employment Policy Survive Political Parties

Perhaps most importantly, Ghana needs an employment strategy that survives changes of government. Youth unemployment belongs neither to the NPP nor the NDC.

If the NPP introduces an effective programme that genuinely helps businesses expand and employ people, an NDC government should improve it rather than abolish it simply because it originated under another administration. The same principle should apply when the political positions are reversed.

Ghana cannot continue rebuilding national development policy every four or eight years. Businesses make long-term investments. Universities train students over several years. Factories require years of planning and capital investment.

Employment policy must therefore extend

beyond electoral cycles. Let Businesses Say, “We Need More Workers”

Ultimately, Ghana will not solve youth unemployment by putting every young person on the government payroll. We will not solve it through slogans.

We will not solve it by renaming employment programmes whenever governments change. And we certainly will not solve it by allowing NPP and NDC to turn unemployment into another endless political argument.

Government has a much more powerful role to play.

Create stability. Build infrastructure. Make electricity reliable and competitive. Reduce unnecessary bureaucracy. Improve access to finance. Support SMEs. Connect education to industry. Encourage investment. Open markets. Reward businesses that expand productive capacity.

Then allow Ghanaian entrepreneurs to do what entrepreneurs do best: create businesses, produce goods and services, innovate, compete, expand and employ people.

The ultimate evidence of a successful youth employment policy should not be a politician standing on a platform announcing how many jobs government claims to have created. It should be thousands of Ghanaian businesses across the country saying: “Our businesses are growing. We need more workers.”

When that begins to happen on a large scale, Ghana will no longer need employment slogans. The jobs themselves will speak.