The Foundation for Security and Development in Africa (FOSDA) in partnership with the National Network of Youth Groups (NNYOG) has paid a courtesy call on the Commission on Technical Vocational and Education Training (TVET). The meeting was to present FOSDA’s research work on TVET Financing in Ghana.
The meeting discussed the policy brief ‘Policy Paths for Sustainable Financing of Technical and Vocational Education and Training (TVET) in Ghana’ and the proposals to increase funding for the sector. The discussions noted that in the education sector, between 2011-2018, the TVET sub sector spending averaged 2.86% of the total education spending.
FOSDA reiterated its proposal that 2014 estimates indicates that “averagely young people spend GH¢1.3 per day on digital services either for calls, texts or data. Assuming all young people were spending along the GH¢1.3 line and considering the 5% Communication Service Tax (CST) rate, government will rake in GH¢182,500,000 from this age category alone in a space of a year.
This represents 84% of the total GH¢217 million CST in the year 2014. A greater chunk of the CST revenue is contributed by young people considering that they constitute over 33% of the population.
Therefore, it is fair that their money is used to build their capacity to contribute to national development. This can be done through increasing investment in TVET Education. A second option is to use 5% of the oil revenue for capital expenditure under the education priority area under the Annual Budget Funding Amount (ABFA).
The representative of the Commission, Kenneth Thompson urged FOSDA to conduct another research with a focus on TVET, scoping all 19 ministries. He also noted the changes that has taken place in terms of the Education Regulatory Bodies Act 2020 (Act 1023), and the Pre-Tertiary Education Act which mergers the NAPTEX and COTVET and consolidation of the various TVET institutions under the Education Ministry respectively. He expressed satisfaction that a research from a civil society organization like FOSDA is advocating for more funding for the sector.
The meeting also discussed issues related to competency based training, TVET programmes that are currently running i.e My TVET campaign, the Voucher program, Skills Competition and the challenges in the sector, the needs (Consumables, good Workshops and well-trained instructors, and working with industry) for the various skill areas, Accreditations and traditional learning methods.
