SNV Ghana, in partnership with the Youth Employment Agency (YEA), has organised a Job Fair for youth in the Western Region.
Pharmaceutical companies, security services, food and beverage industries, engineers, information and communication technology firms, and waste management companies as well as banks and academia mounted booths to engage and shortlist job seekers for employment opportunities.
The participants were taken through writing curriculum vitae (CV), preparation for interviews and other pre-employment services as well as provision of career advice.
Dorcas Hammond, Skills Development Advisor of SNV GrEEn, explained that: “The Job, Career and Entrepreneurship Fair is a single location that brings multiple employers with vacancies together with job seekers. For us, we see this as a saving effort – the time and money that job seekers would have used going round to look for employment; with this fair, they get an opportunity to interact with them”.
Also, she said, this is to enable job seekers get adequate information, build their confidence and get to know interview techniques among others. “We collaborated with YEA because they are already organising fairs nationwide, and we know partnering with sectors across the board brings about inclusiveness, innovation, sustainability and market responses,” she said.
The GrEEN project, she added, is implemented by SNV Ghana and the United Nations Capital for Development Fund (UNCDF) with funding from the European Union (EU), Emergency Trust Fund for Africa and Embassy of the Kingdom of Netherlands under the auspices of the Ministry of Local Government and Rural Development (MLGRD).
Agya Yaw Nsiah, Director for Research and Planning at YEA, said the YEA is helping to sharpen the skills of job seekers for excellent performances. “We have the job fair, career session (CV clinic) on how to put together a competitive CV, and an entrepreneurship pitching session,” he said.
Also, he mentioned that the job fair is to create awareness for businesses to know job seekers which are available and how government can assist young entrepreneurs to scale up their businesses. He expressed hope that this job fair will give opportunities for some of the youth to get sustainable jobs.
Kwabena Okyere Darko-Mensah, the Western Regional Minister said: “It is my expectation that youth of the region will take advantage of the Job Fair and exploit the opportunities presented to get into direct contact with business owners and private companies for employment avenues”.
