Ghana is underproducing engineers- Education Minister

The Minister of Education, Dr. Yaw Osei Adutwum, has bemoaned Ghana’s under-production of engineers despite its soaring population.

That, according to him, was sad and, therefore, urged that measures be put in place to up scale the production of engineers.

Speaking on day three (Wednesday, October 12, 2022,) of the 2022 National Education Week (2022 NEW), which opened on Monday, October 10, 2022, Dr. Adutwum stated the matter must be treated seriously.

The 2022 NEW is themed: “Re-Assessing Educational Policies for Effective Service Delivery and National Transformation” and it is being held at the Accra International Conference Centre (AICC).

According to him, Vietnam, upon coming out of war was producing 100,000 engineers a year out of 90,000 population.

However, he said Ghana whose population was soaring beyond 33 million was rather producing 6,500 a year, a matter he lamented.

He said it was not good enough for Ghana which has a great name and history, therefore, needed to do better than what was currently being done in the field.

“I feel the sense of urgency that better days of our nation are ahead and not behind us, but to do that we have to have an educational system that can truly transform the fortunes of this country. So when you hear me talk about education, I talk about it with a sense of urgency”, he said.

“We can’t sit here sixteen years and talk about education and don’t have a transformed economy because we did not innovate our education enough. That Is why when you hear some of us talk about pre-engineering by students who did Visual Arts being able to draw within minutes so why can’t such a student do engineering?” he quizzed.

According to Dr. Adutwum, the opportunity must be provided for such students to explore and improve the learning of mathematics.

He said once the student can prove himself, what stops them from becoming an innovative, imaginative capable engineer? “We have to remove barriers. We cannot remove barriers in the way of the youth and offer them the opportunity to prove themselves that they are capable, hold their hands, motivate them, encourage them, and create an education system that is second to none and I believe with the investment being made in the educational sector by the government, we can create that kind of educational system that is second to none,” he encouraged