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Labour Minister urges private sector to give apprenticeships to youth trained by Ministry
Some of the participants of the Learning Business by Doing Business (LBDB) initiative with Labour Minister Joseph Hamilton and other officials.
Kaieteur News – Minister of Labour, Joseph Hamilton, on Wednesday, urged Guyana’s private sector to supplement the government’s efforts to increase the employability of the nation’s youth. The comments came while the Minister was delivering his remarks at the launch of the Guyana Ignite Project.
The project is a Learning Business by Doing Business (LBDB) initiative by the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) Youth Resilience, Inclusion, and Empowerment (Y-RIE) program.
Its goal is to provide training and mentorship, and subsequently facilitate employment or investment, for youth 16-25 years of age from the Sophia, Werk-en-Rust, Albouystown, and New Amsterdam areas.
This initiative, which is a partnership with Male Empowerment Network (M.E.N.), will directly benefit Guyana’s workforce and the target communities by improving the employability and entrepreneurial skill of its young participants.
Minister Hamilton took the opportunity to urge the private sector to invest in apprenticeship programs in order to develop long-term employees for the benefit of their respective companies and the workforce.
“I’m saying to the private sector, while we’re here, these people we train is for you! So you have to give us support. Apprenticeship programs, where you can develop monthly employees, you have to spend some money there,” he said.
He proceeded to highlight the disconnect between the private sector’s desire for skilled labour and its contribution to the development of the workforce.
“The data from our National Apprenticeship showed limited private sector involvement… the private sector is on me: ‘We need so many of this [profession], we need some…’ Where you think they coming from, heaven?!”
Finally, he implored that they offer their assistance and resources to the Guyana Ignite Project in ways that would directly benefit the young participants.
“So I call out on the private sector to open their businesses to ensure the success and expansion of this initiative, I call upon our private sector partners to open their businesses for the exposure tours, volunteer their time as mentors, and engage more deeply with our programs,” Hamilton said.
Meanwhile, Richard Collymore, Coordinator of the Ignite Project and founder of the Male Empowerment Network, urged the youth to take a chance on both themselves and the Ignite initiative, and put their all into the next several weeks of training.
Other speakers at the launch included Tiffany Daniels, Guyana’s Y-RIE Country Director who explained the role that USAID and its Y-RIE program intend to play in the life of Guyana’s youth.
Adrienne Galanek, Charge d’Affaires of the US Embassy to Guyana, and Marlon Joseph, President of the Together We Win Business Network, also attended the event and gave brief remarks.
Additionally, a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) was signed by representatives of the USAID Y-RIE program and the Ministry of Labour’s Board of Industrial Training.
The participants of the program expressed a readiness and willingness to improve themselves via the program, which will run for a total of 10 weeks.
“I hope to gain the skills to become a welder. So I will come every day and take in everything that they teach so that I can get my degree and become a welder,” 18-year-old Samuel Allen told Kaieteur News.
Another Ignite Project participant, 21-year-old Annalisa James, told this publication, “I see myself doing electrician, carpentry, and plumbing work mostly. I will try my best to bring as much as I can to the project, but other than that I will just learn as much as I can. I need to do this because I see myself doing something more in the future, and that’s what I’m looking for, for myself in the future.”
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