Kitwe District Commissioner Binwell Mpundu has urged women and youths to take advantage of the industrial clusters that government will establish through the citizens economic empowerment commission (CEEC) funded at a cost of US$30 million by the African Development Bank.
ZANIS reports that the district commissioner said this when he officiated at a stakeholder’s workshop for the skills development and entrepreneurship project that support women and youth held at Malik barrack.
Mr Mpundu said the project’s goal was to contribute to job creation, promotion of gender equality and poverty reduction in the county while supporting women and the youth through skills development and entrepreneurship.
Mr Mpundu said his office will support the project and ensure its successful implementation because once completed it will open doors to businesses that will require financial backing.
Mr Mpundu said the US$30 million project will facilitate the construction of 10 industrial clusters and provide support to cassava value chain development in target districts of Mansa, Kasama, Northwestern provinces with market development intentions to Lusaka and the Copperbelt.
And CEEC Gender specialist Charlotte Sampa said Zambia is in a hurry to be transformed and it can only do that if all stakeholders are involved.
Ms Sampa emphasized that they will work closely with cooperatives once the project takes off to empower them with skills development and entrepreneurship.
Why can’t we introduce skills development and entrepreneurship projects in secondary schools. Why do we wait for people to finish grade twelve and become poor citizens with no Jobs and then start to help them? That’s more like climbing the tree from the branches. If students graduated High School with entrepreneural skills, they’d go right ahead and accelerate value addition before wallowing in poverty. This Dead Aid like Dambisa Moyo calls it will never work for Africa.