Foreign Donors funding the Sustaining Competitive and Responsible Enterprise (SCORE), Training Programme under the International Labour Organization, ILO have pulled out their funding from the programme.
The move is to pave the way for Ghanaian companies to fund the programme domestically. Due to its maturity stage, the Donors believe the programme can stand on its own with the help of its Ghanaian sponsors.
The State Secretariat for Economic Affairs, SECO of Switzerland and the Norwegian Agency for Development Corporation, NORAD have been funding the SCORE Training Programme since 2011 to help achieve its objectives.
SCORE is an ILO global programme that seeks to improve productivity and working conditions in Small and Medium Enterprises, SME’s. In its quest to raise funds to finance the programme, ILO has partnered with new agencies to expand SMEs in Ghana.
Addressing Journalists at a forum in Accra, National Programs Coordinator, SCORE Samuel Aseidu said financial sustainability will help SCORE gain the resources to carry out its operations effectively.
Mr. Asiedu noted that the partners in the country are poised to own the project.
“The next phase is looking at ownership, nation or country ownership and we have implementing partners that are ready to take up the ownership. We have the MDPI, STSG we have the Sekondi Takoradi chamber of commerce and Industry we have SCORE Kweku consults and currently, we have FECTAG Federation of Professional Trade Association in Ghana.”
He intimated that transitioning ILO is strengthening the capacities of these implementing partners to be able to raise the necessary funding and mechanisms to implement score successfully.
“We are looking at three levels of sustainability, we are looking at an institutional sustainability, technical sustainability and financial sustainability and so far our implementing partners have shown that strength to be able to carry on in all these three parameters,” he added.
Head of Research and Consultancy at the Chartered Institute of Bankers Ghana, Prof. Samuel Lartey, said he is working assiduously to ensure that ILO secures zero commercial funding or funding with no interest from institutions to finance the SCORE Training Programme.
He said in order to acquire such funding, profit activities must be looked at and ensure that activities that do not yield profit are squashed.
“We should look at our last activities in the organisations and if it is too difficult to identify profit and loss activities. I just explained it by saying that whatever will feed your company is a profit activity, feed it to feed you. Whatever will eat your company is a lost activity stop it and make work go,” he explained.
Prof. Lartey said Institutions such as JICA Japan, GIZ USAID are willing to fund human capacity projects.
“We have for example institutions like JICA Japan. For the purpose of this particular gathering, I am interested in human capacity building and all the donor agencies. I have mentioned from the research I have done to those I have spoken to seek their permission to name them in this conference, they all offer human capacity funding zero interest. So we have Institutes like GIZ, USAID, JICA and have many others.”
Story by: Mabel Adorkor Annang.
