High rate of unemployed and its associated lack of job opportunities in the country is said to be the reason of incidents of social vices such as armed robbery, drug addiction and easy access to richness among the youth.
The minister in charge of the Agape Evangelical Church, Rev. Isaac Gyamfi who made this known in an interview with this reporter in Agona Swedru said the absence of job opportunities should be seen by all as the major contributory factor to the problem and addressed properly to help curb the problem.
According to him, agriculture could be a panacea to the problem but that should be made attractive to the youth by giving them financial and logistical support to go into it. Though he applauded the government’s Planting for Food policy, he however questioned the modalities used in selecting beneficiaries of the policy.
He expressed concern that people who benefits under the policy may be people affiliated to the political party that the government belongs to, sidelining majority of the people. He therefore advised that more people, especially the energetic youth should be made to go into agriculture by making the venture attractive to them.
Rev. Gyamfi also called for much emphasis to be given to technical and vocational education and training so as to equip more youth with ready skills, rather than placing emphasis on academic education where the students find no work to do after completion. He said until this is done, the country will continue to observe even much higher rate of social vices in the future.
By: Robert Ayanful