Entrepreneurship Empowerment Program with

Kojo. B. Otoo

Theword ‘entrepreneur’ is often used to describe a business owner. While operating a business is key to the definition of entrepreneur, the term also encapsulates the need to take higher-than-average risks.

For those in the Black community, these risks are further magnified when entrepreneurial endeavors come up against discriminatory practices designed to diminish or exclude minority populations. When speaking of systemic discrimination, anecdotal evidence has always existed. We have heard the stories or experienced the disappointment directly. In 2019, the world witnessed such discrimination in the recorded death of George Floyd. This tragedy highlighted the inequity experienced when minorities engage with law enforcement. This event was also the catalyst for some significant initiatives that sought to create balance in economic system, particularly for Black communities. Canada’s federal government held a mirror to herself and decided that the change must start here. Streams of funding poured into the Canadian economy to support Black economic growth and to begin dismantling systemic barriers.

This funding brought to life the Entrepreneurship Empowerment Program. Kojo Otoo is the Senior Manager of the program and joined the team in August of 2021, just a few months after the program caught traction. Otoo describes his mandate succinctly.

“To drive this program across Alberta and Winnipeg, Manitoba.” He noted that they have done considerable work with this requirement, having established a presence in Edmonton and Calgary and as far as Winnipeg, with over 200 program participants and counting

“[Africa Center is] trying to position ourselves as a center of excellence for Black economic empowerment,” shared Otoo.

A program of this magnitude isn’t without its share of hurdles. Otoo reflected on an early discovery, “One of the biggest challenges was the lack of data on Black entrepreneurship in Western Canada. From an academic lens, Canada, in general, has less data than our friends in the south (USA).” Through additional

The core elements of the program include:

Building capacity of Black entrepreneurs through financial literacy, enable financial access, and mentorship, among others;

Providing streamlined processes to accessing resources for the Black community;

Stakeholder engagement and networking to help build capacity;

Fostering Black entrepreneurship across Alberta;

Driving economic equity, fairness, and justice for Black Entrepreneurs.