GH100 Million from Government to Support Young Entrepreneurs is Spurious – Peter Bismark
To piquant economic growth and job creation through the implementation of entrepreneurship and innovation programmes has been a common central idea in government policies.
The Ghana’s Business Development Ministry has disclosed that, more than 200 jobs have been made with subsidies given to youthful business people somewhere in the range of 18 and 35 years with splendid business ideas and 20 youthful business people were helped a year ago with financing, going from GHS25,000.00 to GHS50,000.00.
In another vein,10 people were supported with funding between GHS25,000 to GHS60,000. In sum, the ministry stated to have spearheaded about 4,750 jobs created under the ‘Capacity-Building for Young Entrepreneurs and Start-ups’ programme. Is this not a good news? Oh Yes!
In 2014, Ex-President John Dramani Mahama launched a GH10 Million Youth Enterprise Support (YES) Programme.
A seed fund aimed at assisting young Ghanaians who have innovative business plans to achieve their full potential of which monies will be paid back with interest.
Did YES achieve its intent? Where are the businesses and the individuals?
Entrepreneurship is absolutely a private sector activity.
An individual or a small group of like minded individuals decide to set up a business and raise some capital.
If things go well, sales grow and they can hire more people.
What does any of this have to do with the government?
When the overall environment for business is bad, many entrepreneurs will fail.
Loans cannot be recouped and jobs would be lost. It is not about supporting private men with funds because not all individuals with entrepreneurial ideas have entrepreneurial behavior but by developing economic entrepreneurial turf and improving the ease of doing business for local businesses. Government is responsible for the overall economic infrastructures in a country, and these includes access to education, cheap transport, accessible roads, electricity, affordable housing units and offices and fewer regulation.
A bad business regulatory environment would lead to a stunted economic investment and growth. Government has a key impact on how many new businesses are created and sustained.
Entrepreneurial growth can be accelerated by creating more conducive conditions that support business.
That government ought to be the catalyst – providing adequate regulatory and capital flows while assessing and monitoring success and failure and not to select the few and give them monies that do not have any measurable outcome. It would best, perhaps, if government would put a stop to the direct entrepreneurship intervention and concentrate on its primary role of less taxation and less regulation.
Peter Bismark
Institute for Liberty & Policy Innovation (ILAPI)
Tema
