Ministry of Youth Launches $70,000 Community Business Lab Programme to Support Small Business Owners

The Ministry of Youth is spending in excess of $70 000 to help multiple small business owners develop the skills needed to make their ventures successful and sustainable.

During the launch of the Community Business Lab programme held at the Speightstown Resource Centre on Tuesday, youth enterprise officer Claire Inniss explained that the ministry wanted to decentralise the Youth Entrepreneurship Scheme (YES) to reach more young people in the community. She said the island was put into three zones – northern, southern and central – and the participants will engage in a series of workshops structured around business development and entrepreneurship. Unlike the YES three-month programme, the community labs will run for nine days, commencing in the northern zone with 25 people.

Minister of Youth Charles Griffith said the initiative was a proactive move by the government to ensure young people have access to resources to build something of their own.

“This is government being proactive as it relates to the needs of the young people . . . . It is important to note that the government cannot provide employment for all of our young people, and whatever we can do as a government, whatever we can do as a ministry to ensure that we can have young people become self-employed and chart their own course, then we are prepared to do that,” he said.

MP for St Peter Colin Jordan told the participants that owning a business was rewarding and something to take pride in. However, he warned that success did not come without challenges and it was not a linear journey.

This is why, he said, entrepreneurs must develop a positive attitude to ride out the ups and downs of business.