25 young women are completing our 12-month project with Ghana partner, Street Girls Aid (SGA), to gain vocational and business skills. Learning tailoring and soap making, the women will complete the project with a nationally recognised qualification and the skills and confidence to build enterprises or find formal employment.
Street Girls Aid works with young women and girls living within the Accra city limits. These young women are often lured to the capital with promises of good jobs and a better life, only to find these jobs do not exist. Many are forced to work on the streets in order to survive.
Through our project, 25 young women are learning a trade they can use to earn a safe income, while being housed and supported with meals and childcare.
Beatrice and Deborah
On her recent visit to Ghana, CEO Sarah Ingleby had the opportunity to meet trainees Beatrice and Deborah. They were adding the finishing touches to their display books, important records of their work to date which count towards their assessment. Packed with small-scale versions of finished garments, examples of construction methods and fashion styles, these books are not only useful reference material for future projects; they also serve as portfolios to showcase the trainees’ skills to potential clients or employers.
Beatrice is from Ghana’s Eastern Region. After she finished secondary school, Beatrice moved to Accra and was able to earn a little money in a footwear shop, but here real interest was in fashion design and tailoring. With no access to a sewing machine, tailoring was nothing but a dream. When SGA staff told Beatrice about our tailoring project, she was thrilled. She came to live at the training centre with her 2-year old daughter, where she’s met people from a range of different backgrounds and become best friends with fellow trainee, Deborah.
Deborah completed primary school in Accra, but she couldn’t go on to secondary education as her parents couldn’t afford the fees. Like Beatrice, she was delighted to be offered the chance to train as a tailor with SGA. At first, she was scared of the sewing machine, but now she is able to make money creating and mending clothes for people in her community when she goes home. She told Sarah she is very proud of all that she has achieved.
Mary with her sample book
Mary was able to finish Senior School and had found a job as a housekeeper, but she wanted to learn a skill that would enable her to earn better money and be independent. She found out about our project through the SGA Outreach Team, who visit local communities. Before joining the training, Mary already had some experience of sewing – but only with a needle and thread. She told Sarah that on her first day of training she was “so happy and excited” as she couldn’t wait to start using a sewing machine.
Alongside vocational training, the young women are learning essential business and customer service skills. Beatrice has learnt that it may be more profitable to buy her own material when making customers’ orders, rather than letting customers source fabric from elsewhere. Deborah has learnt the importance of maintaining good relations with customers, because even if they are in the wrong, they can damage her reputation by word of mouth. Mary has learnt how to manage her time efficiently and use her materials wisely. She has also learned about the importance of marketing her products and the need to keep a record of income and expenditure to keep track of business.
Liquid detergents
In addition to tailoring, our trainees are also being taught how to make soap. Beatrice explained how dye and fragrances are added to a base ingredient to make a 5 litre container of liquid detergent. She said,“We can sell this as one large container, but the plan is split it across smaller containers at a mark up to make more money overall.” Diversifying their product range will help the women attract more customers, provide a secondary source of earnings, and achieve more financial security and resilience.
As the project nears completion, our trainees are supported in showcasing their skills to the surrounding community, and also in giving back to the community where they have undertaken training. Street Girls Aid Life skills Coordinator, Ellen Addo explained: “We have a unique way of advertising our girls to the community in which they lived. We went to the various communities, met with elders, chiefs and queen mothers of the various communities, interacted with them and told them what the girls had done so far. This is to showcase the twelve-month period they had spent in the project. This activity is to prove that the trainee is capable and had qualified to get her own space to start her business and earn money for herself.”
“A major purpose of community work practice is for the trainees to give back to the society what they have learnt from the centre. Hence the communities participation is a key. [The trainees] sew a dress for any needy person in the community.”
Our trainees are excited about their futures and opportunities to earn an income. The girls will soon be undertaking work placements in nearby business where they will gain valuable experience making orders and meeting customers. Beatrice told Sarah that she’s very excited about her upcoming placement, it’s in a business that she often passes and has always thought is the sort of place she’d like to own one day. Beatrice wants to specialise in beaded gowns, sell handmade soaps, and take on apprentices of her own. In the future, she will send money back home to help support her family.
Deborah plans to go back home after graduation and establish her own shop on a plot of land that her family rents. She hopes the good location – right by a road – will help her to attract customers and passing trade.
Mary said “I have been able to realise my dream to be a tailor and am able to sew for myself and to earn an income. In one year I will have a shop of my own, with glass windows. In five years, I will be a big fashion designer with many shops and will be training others”.
We can’t wait to follow our trainees’ journeys with you. To sign up for all our latest project updates, please click here.
Visiting Street Girls Aid in July 2024
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August 2024
