Four hundred students at the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology are receiving entrepreneurial training in sustainable business start-ups.

The fortnight programme is under the Health Entrepreneurship pillar of the Mastercard Foundation Africa Higher Education Health Collaborative. The Health Entrepreneurship pillar is one of the three pillars of the Africa Higher Education Health Collaborative.

The pillar aims to develop an entrepreneurial mindset and culture that supports entrepreneurs to create meaningful innovations and employment opportunities in the health sector. Through the interventions, promising entrepreneurs will be nurtured to build resilient health ventures.

“We want to ensure that we move away from the mindset that lets  become perpetual job seekers.

“Beyond getting the skillset to set up business, we are also looking at those who are not able to set up business are able to be more creative and innovative so that they are able to transform the society,” the Pillar lead, Prof. Wilberforce Owusu-Ansah is optimistic.

The Principal Investigator of the Africa Higher Education Health Collaborative, Prof. Ellis Owusu-Dabo urged the participants to explore local opportunities.

“There are greener pastures here than there are outside. If we don’t do it, who will do it for us,” he said.

The objectives of the Mastercard Foundation Africa Higher Education Health Collaborative are to Build and strengthen the capacity of healthcare students and professionals to meet the growing demand for Primary Health Care (PHC) in the health sector; enable students to acquire advanced skills in Africa across a broad range of disciplines critical for sustainable health sector growth and transformation; Optimize entrepreneurial ecosystems in and through universities in Africa to launch and scale health start-ups to create jobs; Develop a dynamic, sustainable, long-term network of leading African universities, alumni, government agencies, health care start-ups, and private sector partners working together to create dignified and fulfilling jobs across health ecosystems.

The project will further develop a dynamic, sustainable, long-term network of leading African universities, alumni and government agencies, healthcare start-ups, and private sector partners working together to create dignified and fulfilling jobs across health ecosystems in the next ten years.

KNUST is one of the eight partners of the Higher Education Collaborative in Health with the aim to contribute to all three pillars of the health strategy: Health Employment, Health Entrepreneurship, and Health Ecosystems.