Some of the trainees at the centre
The Women’s Development Foundation (WDF), an NGO, in partnership with Anowah Afrique Limited, has embarked on a task of training 3,000 under privileged women recruited from the streets of Accra over the next five years.
The plan is to train the women free of charge in industrial sewing, leaving them with skills, employment and a sense of purpose and subsequently, employ them.
The programme is part of a five-year strategic plan designed to alleviate poverty and empower the women to be in the position to support others.
So far, 150 people have been trained and 60 have graduated.
In an interview, Ms. Catherine Noble Anowah Coffie, the CEO of Anowah Afrique, said the move was to give the vulnerable women hope and to help reduce the rural-urban migration while creating employment.
“The WDF, in collaboration with Anowah Afrique Limited is training 300 women with skills to take them off the street and employ them after. This is to give vulnerable women hope, reduce North and South migration while creating employment,” she said.
Ms. Coffie, who is also the founder of WDF said, “The WDF has been in existence for the past 10 years and undertakes projects to empower women and alleviate poverty.
On the matter of funding, she added “We need support, up until now we’ve been funding the programme ourselves and it hasn’t been easy. It costs GH¢3,000 to train one person, and at the moment, WDF plans to train and employ over 300 vulnerable women.”
Anowah Afrique Ltd. is a garment manufacturing company located at Free Zones enclave in Tema, with the capacity of over 2,500. In full swing, the company employs over 3,000 people.
It has a 30-day training programme, which goes from morning until evening, designed to equip economically disadvantaged women with requisite skills and to make them sustainable.