Green businesses to champion sustainability
THE Project Lead for Young Green Entrepreneurs, Maxwell Beganim, is calling for a youth chamber specifically focused on bringing together all green business entrepreneurs to champion environmental sustainability while promoting socio-economic growth.
This comes at a time when Small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) or companies are being encouraged to collectively join the race to adopt ecologically friendly ways of doing business.
“Most of these young people see themselves working in silos, but I believe it is time that they come together to form a chamber to support each other and contribute to sustainability and economic growth.
Collaboration is very important when it comes to green businesses but this can be done through this network,” he said.
Mr Begamin was speaking at a workshop organised by the Strategic Youth Network for Development (SYND) to enhance the capacity of some selected young green entrepreneurs.
It was on the theme: “Building a Resilient and Adaptable Green business in line with Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 7, UN Sustainable Energy for All (SE4ALL), Renewable Energy Master Plan (REMP) & Ghana’s Nationally Determined Contribution (NDCs).”
Mr Begamin said it was important for young entrepreneurs to have proper understanding of how to run a green business to return profits and contribute to the fight against climate change.
“If you look at the way of doing traditional business and the way of doing green business, the fundamentals are the same, however, there are other elements that needs to be added to the green entrepreneurship business and also to align with government interventions in terms of climate change,” he said.
He said it is against this backdrop that, SYND brought together facilitators and specialists in business consulting in the green space to build the capacity young green entrepreneurs on how write business proposals that are aligned with government’s interventions in terms of climate change.
Opportunities in green business
The Project Manager for the Challengers Group, Prince kelly Anyomitse, said “it is important that young people pay attention to that because the opportunity and the value Green Business give us which other SMEs do not do is that they pay attention to profits, but also more importantly positive impact.
Given the space that we are creating, we can generate employment by also ensuring that we positively affect the environment which is a very good win win for all of us.”
Building green businesses
A representative from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), Isaac Danso, said building a green business was no small feat as it required moving at unprecedented speed, setting ambitious growth targets and planning multiple steps ahead.
“The green business building should have a mindset close to that of the digital leaders of our time.
This mindset, combined with a few key principles, could help propel green business building on the global journey to net zero,” he said.