Huawei Ghana has revealed that their flagship Huawei ICT Training (HIT) program will boost Ghana’s digital economy when implemented.

The program which will train more than 10,000 Ghanaians in information and communications technology (ICT) within the next three years forms part of the company’s commitment to grow the capacity of the people in ICT through the Huawei ICT Training (HIT) Program and support Ghana's vision of becoming the digital hub of Africa.

Speaking on the relevance of the HIT initiative, the Public Relations Manager at Huawei Ghana, David Appiah, said that “ICT skill development is crucial for industry and economic growth, therefore for any country to fully achieve a thriving digital economy, the ICT Skill capacity of the citizenry must be developed as it serves as the bridge that connects a robust digital infrastructure and systems to the end-consumer.“

“As countries and industries transition to go fully digital, the need for skilled human resources to effectively manage the digital resources for enhanced delivery of services and to enable the citizenry and/or end-users to enjoy the maximum benefits remains equally important.

"More so for the end-user or the beneficiary to be able to enjoy digital services, basic ICT skills is required to enable them to navigate their way through the processes to enjoy these services, and that is why ICT Skill training cannot be done without in this regard.” Mr Appiah said.

Mr. Appiah made this known when the company organized the maiden edition of the “Huawei Day with Media” in Accra. According to him, the HIT program is in three segments namely the Hi-Class Program (Huawei Intelligent Ghana Hub Class), ICT Academy (University Talent Program) and the Technology-enabled Open Schools System (TOSS) which will benefit Public servants and Industry Professionals, Tertiary and TVET students and Basic Schools respectively.

As an industry leader, Huawei also offers professional ICT certification courses to bridge the ICT industry talent gap. Huawei will therefore offer training in the areas of trending technologies like AI, LTE, 5G, Quality of Service (QoS) and Digital Economy to relevant state officials and industry partners.

The company has also established a training facility in partnership with Mast Infrastructure Ghana to offer practical training in Equipment Installation, Fibre works, Height works, and equipment configurations to field Engineers and Riggers.

Through the University Talent program, the ICT Academy has signed on about 15 top Ghanaian Universities as authorized partners and currently working with the Ministry of Education to expand the program, which offers professional courses in the areas of Routing and Switching (Networking), DataComm, Cloud Computing, 5G among others to TVET institutions across the country.

This program aims to bridge the gap between Academia and Industry while also growing Ghana’s ICT Talent pool.

Finally, the TOSS project is being implemented in partnership with UNESCO as part of our TECH4ALL initiative to ensure that deprived (K12) or Basic School students get access to quality education through innovative technologies.

The Ministry of Education has thrown its weight behind this project which Huawei is funding with USD 1M for the next three years.

“At Huawei, we continue to work with government, industry partners, customers and academia to offer ICT Skill Training, Workshops and Seminars in relevant and trending industry courses and topics to contribute to Ghana’s ICT Talent pool.

In Ghana, our Huawei ICT Talent (HIT) Program has seen a lot investment from our end and we continue to invest in the nurturing of ICT talents through ICT skill training and has so far benefitted over 5000 Ghanaians.” Mr. Appiah said.

During the event the company revealed that they expect to sign a cooperation agreement with the Ministry of Communications and Ministry of Education to implement the HIT initiative.

The Huawei Day with the Media was organized by Huawei Ghana as part of efforts to engage the media, to strengthen relationship and share the company’s contributions toward building a digital economy, while giving the media the opportunity to better understand operations on Huawei in Ghana.