Mr Ignatius Baffour-Awuah, examining packaged shea butter after the launch. With him are Dr Ibrahim Mohammed Awal (3rd left) and some invited guest

Ghana launches online mall to create jobs

Chris Nunoo Oct - 18 - 2018 , 08:57 2 minutes read

The Ministry of Business Development has launched a digital platform, Ghana Online Mall, to create jobs and also serve as a start up for micro, small and medium scale businesses in the country and to revamp marketing opportunities for the private sector.

An initiative under the ministry’s National Entrepreneurship and Innovation Plan (NEIP), the Ghana Online Mall will also serve as a directory for all businesses that will come up onto the platform and make it possible for local vendors to sell hard-to-find handmade Ghanaian products.

Under the main portal, Ghana Online Mall will be the Africa Online Mall, the NEIP Online mall and the NEIP marketplace, all of which would connect Ghana to the international market, create platforms for jobs and market authentic made-in-Ghana products, respectively.

The platform

Mr Ignatius Baffour-Awuah, Minister of Employment and Labour Relations who launched the platform in Accra, said the digitised platform would showcase local products and encourage trading among all businesses on the platform.

“It will also help investors identify potential businesses for investment and enhance trade relations among the diaspora community and Ghanaian businesses,” he indicated and said “about 500,000 businesses will be on the platform within a year.”

The first phase of the online project, he said, would support 10,000 businesses with full directory, product images as well as short videos.

He said the government was committed to empowering the private sector through the maintenance of macroeconomic stability in the long term while creating as many as 8,000 jobs within the first year of the implementation of the Ghana Online mall platform.

The country, Mr Baffour-Awuah pointed out, could not be left out in the digital marketing revolution and described the Ghana Online mall as a launch pad to accelerate the growth of businesses.

Business development

The Minister for Business Development, Dr Ibrahim Mohammed Awal, said one of the objectives of the government was to create a productive and knowledge-driven economy.

However, he said, that could only be done if the people were empowered strategically with skills and competencies to compete.

Mr Awal, therefore, called on young entrepreneurs to acquire the necessary attributes such as being disciplined, time conciousness and also add value to their products to make them competitive on the international market.