The Accra Archdiocesan Catholic Laity Council, together with the Catholic Professionals Guilds (CPG) organised a business fair at Our Lady Star of the Sea Catholic Church at Dansoman, Accra, on the 5th and 6th March, 2022.

The fair sought to create a platform to consciously and actively promote Catholic owned businesses and provide Catholic Entrepreneurs and Professionals, the opportunity to showcase their products and services to the larger Catholic family.

In a keynote address, Honourable Fritz Baffour, a Communications Consultant and a former Member of Parliament for the Ablekuma South Constituency of the Greater Accra Region, noted that over 80% of the Ghanaian population is under 45 years. He said that it was imperative that this young population is gainfully employed so that they can look after the older members of the population.

Mr Baffour, who formally declared the fair opened, said that the fair was an important venture to help grow businesses and asked the exhibitors to use all media available to them, to their advantage.

The Chairman of the Accra Archdiocesan Laity Council, Mr Timothy Sowah, said that such exhibitions had the potential to grow and give employment to Catholics.  He called on the exhibitors to pay particular attention to customer care and take inspiration from Catholic businesses like Domod and Tropical Cables. He urged catholics to patronise goods and services of fellow catholics to help their businesses grow, so they can also help the church grow.

The Accra Laity Council and the CPG, organisers of the programme, said that as part of helping these businesses grow, there would also be Business Development Clinics where businesses, especially start-ups, would be offered professional help by business development experts to put them on a better pedestal. They said that the fairs and clinics would be a continuous process for as long as they are required to achieve the goals.

They also announced that there would be a mega fair alongside games, on Monday 2nd May, 2022 at the El-Wak Stadium in Accra, where various groups and societies in the Church, would engage one another in games to commemorate the feast of St. Joseph the Worker, the Patron Saint of workers.

The Star of the East fair was sponsored by Dalex Finance, Rychex Designs, Quality Life Assurance Company Limited, Quality Insurance Company and the Infosec Lab Consult.