President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo on Tuesday asked winners of the 2019, edition of the Presidential Pitch competition to leverage the program to create jobs for others to enter the world of work and business.
He told them that they ought to be instruments for job creation “because that is what at the end of the day, entrepreneurial ability should lead to”.
The President made the call when he presented cheques to the winners of the competition at the Jubilee House in Accra.
The Presidential Pitch, an initiative of the Business Development Ministry, which started in 2018, is a competition of business concepts in which young people below 35 years who have impactful, innovative, scalable and viable ideas present their business plans to vie for government support.
The initiative provides funds from GH¢20,000 to GH¢70,000 for 20 young entrepreneurs, whose applications were successful, to grow start-up businesses.
Two female entrepreneurs, Emily Otoo Quayeson and Matilda Asantewaa Sampong, both students of the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology emerged the ultimate winners of the 2019 edition of the Presidential Pitch, with their Flouya Bana Sanitary pads made from banana Fibre.
They were presented with a grand prize of GH¢60,000, with additional support of GH¢40, 000 from the President.
In all, entrepreneurs of 10 start-up businesses were awarded prizes.
President Akufo-Addo congratulated the winners, describing as ‘excellent’ the high sense of enterprise, initiative, innovation and ingenuity that they showed during the contest.
Pointing out that the winners of last year’s edition of the competition created over 200 jobs, he charged them to create much more employment avenues than their predecessors.
“We are expecting a lot from you; not just next year, but in the years down the road because already you’ve shown the talents, the ability, the creativity and that’s how we are going to build our country; more and more and more of you emerge, the stronger the prospects of Ghana for growth, for development, for prosperity will be.”
Emily Otoo Quayson on behalf of the winners expressed appreciation to the President for the support and assured that they would contribute their quota to Ghana’s development.
