The government has hinted that the Centre to collate the findings conducted by scientists and researchers in the country is set to commence operation in September this year.

The facility, known as the Ghana Innovation and Research Commercialization Centre, seeks to facilitate the translation of research findings and other innovations into products and service for commercialization purposes.

Special Advisor to the Minister of Environment Science Technology and Innovation, Oliver Boakye said, “Right now we are developing the frameworks for the various components like the partnerships between government, industry, academia and research institutions, its sustainability. The plan is to have these frameworks completely developed at the end of August this year and starting from September, we are going to start the operation.”

Mr Boakye spoke to JoyBusiness at a one-day creativity and innovation workshop held in Accra in partnership with the Embassy of Israel.

Workshop

In the bid to mark the 2019 World Creativity and Innovation Day in the country, the Embassy of Israel has partnered with the government to host workshops for budding entrepreneurs. 

This seeks to contribute to the knowledge transfer of Israel’s innovative and entrepreneurial drive in Ghana. 

Guest speaker for the workshop, Oren Simanian, an Israeli Entrepreneur, has challenged startups to expand their horizon in their quest for assistance.
“If you are looking at your market as the only solution, you are in a way limiting yourself; you need to fly like a bird, go out and build yourself there.”

Meanwhile, Israel’s Ambassador to Ghana, Shani Cooper expresses confidence in Ghanaian entrepreneurs. She shared the success story of Israel emerging number 3 on the 2018 Global Competitiveness Index.

“Israel became innovative because of scarcity, because of a need; we didn’t have water when we had to do agriculture so we had to come up with an idea to save water and had good crops,” she said.

H.E Shani Cooper added, “So I think that Ghana like every other country should decide for itself; what the main challenges are and try to solve them and this should be done in cooperation between the government, the private sector and the academy.”

The workshop was on the theme, “Israel-Ghana Innovation Ecosystem – How do we stimulate a strong innovation subculture in an emerging economy.”