Thirty young people, drawn from six districts in the northern parts of the country, have been trained in poultry production to empower them with self-employable skills to earn decent incomes. The beneficiaries, who underwent the six week-long training as first session of six months training, were drawn from Bongo, Bawku West, Chereponi, Gushegu, Tatali-Sangule and Karaga Districts. They were exposed to various components of poultry production including housing, health, nutrition, marketing to enable them to start their own poultry production in their communities. They constituted the third cohort of the beneficiaries under the project to strengthen social cohesion in strategic cross-border areas (PARCS), which is funded by the French Development Agency and implemented by Acting for Life, a French organisation, and its local partner, the Ghana Developing Communities Association (GDCA) and Changing Lives in Innovative Partnerships (CLIP). PARCS is a three-year project, which began in December 2022 with the objective to strengthen social cohesion in strategic cross-border territories and to support inclusive socio-economic development of the territories. The project is facilitating the training of 240 youth in organic poultry production, agro processing, organic vegetable production, tiling, plastic paneling, and plumbing works within the stipulated period of implementation. Alhaji Osman Abdel-Rahman, Executive Director of GDCA, speaking during the graduation of the trainees at Dalun in the Kumbungu District of the Northern Region, said the project was being carried out in batches. Alhaji Abdel-Rahman said the first two batches had already undergone the training and were now contributing positively to creating jobs in their communities. He said the training was tailored to provide employable skills for the youth in the cross-border communities to ensure that they were not recruited into extremist groups from the neighbouring countries. He said it was also to help promote social cohesion and ensure that comm unities, especially the youth, were meaningfully engaged in productive economic activities. He said the beneficiaries would be linked to the Ghana Technical and Vocational Education and Training (TVET) Service to enable them to acquire necessary certification. Alhaji Roland Mahamudu Yahaya, a former Manager, Dalun Simli Centre and resource person, who facilitated life skills component of the training, said the beneficiaries were properly equipped not only in poultry production but also basic socio-economic skills and customer service. Miss Rukaya Yakubu, a beneficiary of the training from the Chereponi District said it had exposed her to the importance of rural poultry production, which was not common amongst young women in her community. She said, 'Bringing us together from different regions and communities with diverse backgrounds has taught me how to live and bond with other tribes and ethnic groups.' Source: Ghana News Agency