The initiative is part of Newmont Africa’s COVID-19 pandemic support programme meant to support local female businesses to improve their economic resilience and enhance their business skills.    

Funded by Newmont Africa and implemented by PYXERA Global, the programme would target 25 women-owned micro, small, medium and informal businesses who would be empowered and their businesses sustained through technical and business management trainings in the company’s Ahafo South, North and Akyem host communities.

The women would be provided with industrial sewing skills and business development practices towards creating decent and sustainable employment for them.

Speaking at the launch, the Vice President for Sustainability and External Relations of Newmont Africa, Adiki Ayitevie, said the company was aware of the long-lasting disruptions to trade and livelihood brought to the country and the world at large by COVID-19 pandemic.

He added that women in the country, “specifically within our stakeholder communities, were not exempted from the negative effects of the COVID-19 pandemic.”

He said the WERP provided a unique platform to provide the women with livelihood restoration opportunities to equip the women with industrial garment-making skills and sustainable revenue generation option, adding it would help alleviate poverty.

For his part, the Senior Manager for Sustainability and External Relations at Newmont, Mr Derek Boateng, reiterated the need to invest and empower women and the youth in their host communities since they were an integral part of operations and sustainability in their mines.

He said women all over the world, especially those in resource-rich communities, should be given the requisite tools to increase their access to wealth creation and decent employment in order to thrive and promote their socio-economic well-being in the company, adding inclusive growth was the way.

He said for that and many other reasons, Newmont partnered with PYXERA Global to implement the programme as Newmont continued to contribute to equitable and economic empowerment of women and youth in host communities.

“The WERP will support women in our host communities to enhance their skills in casual, industrial and domestic garment making, and this we believe will boost the financial well-being and provide them with the needed business and technical knowhow to make them competitive in the garment value chain,” he said.

He said by providing jobs for the women in local communities, the company would be able to stimulate the local economy in the Birim North District and by extension Eastern region to achieve sustainable development.  

For her part, the Country Director for PYXERA Global, Barbara Gbologah-Quaye, said the objective of the programme was to create sustainable jobs and improve the living conditions of the beneficiaries.

She said through the initiative, direct jobs would be created to enable women cater for themselves and their families.

He said the programme was organised previously for 30 women in host communities, adding that the successful implementation led to the launch for the 25 women, adding that PYXERA would continue to partner Newmont to implement such worthy initiatives.