Africa Education Watch (Eduwatch) has called for the legalisation of the National Apprenticeship Programme to ensure its continuity and prevent future governments from abandoning it.
This call was made during a young people’s forum on Thursday, May 22, which seeks to address youth unemployment and close the skills gap.
EDUWATCH believes legal backing will help ensure proper funding, monitoring, and results.
In an interview with the Executive Director of EDUWATCH, Kofi Asare, he underscored the failure of numerous apprenticeship programmes in the past due to a lack of support and strong policy to influence their sustainability.
“One challenge has to do with sustainability. It’s always been a struggle. We’ve seen a tendency to do a legal and policy framework. If they remain in conventions, they will not be sustainable. But if we put them into law and then also develop different budgets to finance them consistently, then we have a structured model as well.
“We must institutionalise apprenticeship programmes. And we must do so at the law, policy, and also at the budget level, so that consistently we have funding, we can monitor progress, and also we have knowledge to guide competition”.
Organised by Eduwatch with support from Oxfam and FOSDA, the forum focused on making apprenticeships more inclusive, environmentally sustainable, and digitally forward.
Kofi Asare, highlighted critical challenges within Ghana’s apprenticeship system.
“Youth unemployment stands at 14.7%, and our current apprenticeship models remain disconnected from the digital and green sectors,” he stated.
The forum highlighted that only 20% of TVET students feel digitally ready, and a mere 25.6% are aware of green skills despite growing labour market demands in sectors like solar energy, sustainable agriculture, and recycling.
In terms of inclusivity, statistics show that 74% of TVET enrolments are male, revealing a persistent gender gap. Participants discussed the need for disability-responsive training, gender-neutral campaigns, and accessibility improvements in training centres.
Young attendees also proposed forward-thinking solutions, such as integrating digital marketing, AI, and robotics into trade training.
The association also urged the youth to contribute ideas for a reimagined apprenticeship framework.
