Story By: Rahamatu-Lahi Zakaria || Sanatu Zambang
Ivalley Ghana held its first consultative stakeholder meeting in Damango on the 10th of June 2021 to discuss the entrepreneurial ecosystem in the newly created Savannah Region. The event was in partnership with Perfect Run, Business Resource Centre (BRC) Damango, Ghana News Agency, Tiyumba Hope Foundation, and Sanatu Zambang.
The event which was under the theme; ‘’fostering a healthy entrepreneurial ecosystem through technology and strategic partnership’’ brought together entrepreneurs, government agencies, philanthropists, educationists, civil society groups, and other factions whose interest lies in the growth of entrepreneurs and creating opportunities for the youth.
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The maiden edition of Ivalley Ghana stakeholder consultative meeting created a platform where people with like minds came together to brainstorm strategies on how the youth can use technology as a catalyst to bolster entrepreneurship in eradicating youth unemployment and building sustainable businesses and strategic partnerships for an enhanced ecosystem
The chairperson for the event was Mrs. Alijata Haruna, the gender officer for West Gonja Municipal Assembly commended Ivalley Ghana for their initiative and encourage more women to take up any opportunity available to them to better their lives while pledging her support to the organization.
For the panel discussion, they had Mrs. Suhuyini Lansah, a philanthropist, Alhassan Zakaria, Finance and Administrative Manager at BRC, and Dr. Fatahi Abdulai Kambala, a business development consultant. The discussion was moderated by Fadila Fuseini.
Mrs. Suhuyini in her presentation advised the youth to be cautious of what they post on social media while also reminding of who to follow so as to unlearn and relearn some of their perspective on issues regarding entrepreneurship and businesses.
Dr. Fatahi Kambala talked about the failures of our education system in modeling the next generation of thinkers and doers. He lamented that the system is based more on book knowledge rather than industrialized knowledge. He also made a point of students not taking internships with industries of their field to get skills of how they operate.
Mr Alhassan Zakaria of BRC also talked about the centre duties to help young enterprises to work in terms of providing them with information and also linking them to government agencies to help them acquire the necessary documents for the operation of their business.
The managing director for Founder Institute and guest speaker of the event, Simon Turner also mentioned record keeping and complete ownership of startups and businesses of the originator of the business idea constitute some of the shortfalls of Ghanaians. According to him, most entrepreneurs do not keep records of their businesses and these phenomena deny them the opportunity to get investors to help them or even get loans from the banks. With the ownership, he explained that entrepreneurs want to be the only person that owns a company when he could have just floated the shares or call in people with the cash to help him grow the business.
Ivalley is a business development, innovation, and technology hub in Damongo, in the Savannah Region. They provide business advisory, skills trainings, technical support in technology and entrepreneurship, and incubation for Start-up and MSMEs.
