Economists are demanding details on government’s plan to reduce the unemployment rate in Ghana.
They have cited this as the basis to measure the efficiency of government’s job creation agenda for 2018.
Economist, Adu Owusu Sarkodie’s argues that the move will be appreciated if accurate information on the unemployment levels is provided.
The comment follows the budget presentation by the Finance Minister, Ken Ofori Atta’s in Parliament outlining projects that would be implemented in 2018 to create jobs.
In his presentation, Mr. Ofori-Atta indicated that a major program to be rolled out in this regard is the Nation Builders Corps (NBC).
The NBC will focus on solving public service delivery in health, education, agriculture, sanitation and drive revenue mobilization and collection.
But reacting to this assertion, Mr. Sarkodie told Citi Business News the value will be appreciated with an understanding of the current unemployment situation.
“If you are able to tell us how many people are unemployed and therefore you are creating 100,000 jobs to absorb them and that the remaining will be determined after, then we can appreciate that. But if you haven’t told us how many people are unemployed, whether you create 800,000 or 1,000,000 jobs, we do not know whether you are performing better or performing worse. So these figures must be shown to us before any concrete conclusions could be drawn,” he argued.
Official statistics from the Institute of Statistical, Social and Economic Research (ISSER) indicate that only 10 percent of graduates find employment after completing their national service.
According to ISSER, it could take as much as ten years for a large number of graduates to secure employment.
–
By: Pius Amihere Eduku/citibusinessnews.com/Ghana
