About two thousand female head porters, popularly known as kayayei, will be trained by government.
The move, according to the Minister of Business Development, Dr Ibrahim Mohammed Awal, is to build their capacity and give them an alternative source of livelihood.
Speaking on Asempa FM’s Ekosii Sen programme, Tuesday, he noted that, government intends to equip these young ladies to abandon their deplorable conditions in the urban centres and relocate back to their hometowns in the northern regions for better lives.
Dr Awal said the head porters, who moved to the urban centres for greener pastures, are exposed to a lot of social vices and are also exploited by those who serve as intermediaries to find them jobs.
Such vulnerable women, he noted, need to be supported by improving their business skills.
As an immediate measure, the Business Development Minister said the kayayei would be given vocational and technical skills that would empower them to resettle or possibly go back to the north to work.
Dr Awal added that those who want to still ply the trade will be trained on good bookkeeping to enable them to transition into good businesswomen.
