Youth urged to embrace agribusiness opportunities

The youth in the country have been urged to explore the vast opportunities in the agribusiness sector to better their lives. 

The National President of the Graduate Students Association of Ghana (GRASAG), Emmanuel Owusu, who gave the advice at a programme at the University of Professional Studies, Accra (UPSA), said they should explore opportunities in agribusiness.

He was speaking at the Young Agripreneurs Conference last Wednesday on the theme : ”Empowering Agrofuture Entrepreneurs.

It was organised by GRASAG in collaboration with Agri-Impact and MasterCard Foundation under a project dubbed “Harnessing Agricultural Productivity and Prosperity for Youth” (HAPPY).

The conference is the first of three scheduled to take place in two other universities in Accra. The initiative primarily targets graduate students between the ages of 18 and 35 years.

Mr Owusu expressed the belief that agribusiness was one of the ways the youth could generate sustainable income for themselves and become their own bosses.

Speaking to the media later, he stated that GRASAG as a student's association undertook the initiative to help raise awareness of opportunities for graduate students in the agribusiness sector.

"Agric is one of the things that we should encourage a lot of our young people, especially graduate students to get into to explore the opportunities within the agric value chain," he added. 

Perception

For her part, the Deputy Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Agri-Impact, Juliana Asante Dartey, advised the youth to change their perception about agriculture as a low-paying sector.

Some participants seated in the Agripreneur conference. 
Pictures: ERNEST KODZI

She said that mindset contributed to the youth's inability to take advantage of the sector.

"It's a perception that is not true. There's so much to be made in agriculture because we all eat, so it's such a basic need for all of us. And when you go to developed economies, the people who are in agriculture are some of the most well-to-do citizens of those countries," she asserted.

The Chief Farmer of Agrokings, Nana Owusu-Achau, who also spoke at the conference, admonished the youth to explore the agribusiness sector, embrace value addition and seize the opportunities that were available.

He said there were diverse career paths available within agribusiness, extending beyond production.  

Nana Owusu-Achau mentioned input supply, processing, value addition, service provision and even technology-related fields as aspects of agribusiness that graduate students could explore to reduce unemployment.

The conference will continue at the Ghana Institute of Management and Public Administration and conclude at the University of Ghana on Saturday, September 30.