The trend of
heavy food importation into the country needs to be reversed by making
agriculture as lucrative and attractive to young people as other professions
and vocations.
Africa Lead
is focused on building the capacity of young Ghanaians as champions of change to
lead and manage structures for agricultural transformation and food security.
The program
delivers the Champions for Change leadership course for university students to
strengthen their leadership and management skills to be able to influence the
development path of agriculture and food security.
At one of
such training sessions at the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and
Technology (KNUST) in Kumasi, Africa Lead’s Victor Adom told 3news.com that the
government’s flagship economic and agricultural policies, especially the Planting
for Food and the One-District-One-Factory initiatives, offer opportunities of
the youth to be profitably engaged.
“We think
that the youth of Ghana are ready for change,” he noted, observing that the youth
are scattered in communities where food production and other agricultural
activities are thriving.
“The
government’s initiatives which are going to happen at the district and constituency
level offer an opportunity for the youth to be engaged and if we can motivate
them and challenge them to open their eyes to see that the opportunities are
there in the communities, they will rise up to it,” he stated.
The Africa
Lead program works to help realize the US government’s Feed the Future initiative
as well as the African Union’s Comprehensive Africa Agriculture Development
Program (CAADP) goals of reduced hunger and poverty.
In Ghana,
Africa Lead works with the Ministry of Food and Agriculture and other non-state
actors to build leadership capacities to influence change for poverty
eradication and food security.
“We believe that
if we all pull resources together, we will be able to make it,” said Mr. Adom.
The champions
of change leadership training has the objective to inspire, energize and
mobilize innovative leaders, champions and thinkers in African countries, who
are committed to creative new approaches to achieving food security.
Trainees are
challenged to appreciate their roles in food security initiatives, including
active roles in CAADP and country investment.
They also explore
and analyze major opportunities in implementing major agricultural initiatives
and identify innovative actions that they can take to help overcome these
opportunities.
Manuela
Tobil, a beneficiary of the Champions of Change leadership short course at the
KNUST, feels empowered to be a change agent.
“As a leader
you have to be the embodiment of the change you want to see in your community
and many people have attempted to solve the issue of food security but have
failed as result of leadership capacity,” she said. “I’ve had a lot of ideas
from the training and I hope to implement them”.
Provost of
the College of Science, KNUST, Prof. Ibok Oduro, says developing critical
thinking, collaboration and teamwork will help build a crop of leaders for
change.
By Kofi Adu
Domfeh
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