Participants at the 57th Annual Near Year School, which ended at the week-end at the University Ghana, Legon have recommended to Government to declare this year, 2006, as a "Year for attitudinal changes at workplaces".
Government as a matter of urgency should also set up a National Productivity Unit to assess levels of productivity and periodically monitor, evaluate and make inputs into the productivity trends in the nation's economy.
The School also called for the recruitment and selection for the human resource needs of organisations and the nation to be based on merit.
Apart from lectures, symposia and open discussions, the over 500 participants which broke-up into 10 different groups discussed "Youth empowerment and national development", "Attitudinal change at the workplace for higher productivity," "Empowering women for national development" and "Adult literacy for sustainable development."
Other topics were "Environmental education and sustainable development", "Human resource development at the district level," "Strategies for developing a safe motorist culture", "Promoting healthy lifestyles", "Integrating people with disabilities and the educational factor in human resource development".
The recommendations, read by Mr Hayford Ben Kwashie, called for gender issues to be factored into budgets at the district level so that the specific needs of men and women were considered and suggested that to give recognition to the promotion of literacy, the Annual International Literacy Day should be celebrated in all districts with more commitment.
On disability, the School recommended the development of a building code that would recognise disability access, the passage of the Disability Bill, adding, that Government policies should cater for the needs of persons with disability in the design, construction and operation of all forms of transportation network.
Closing, the School, Mr Reuben Aggor, Acting Director of the IAE said this year's School had been most successful in terms of attendance, participation and media coverage.
He urged participants to go back to their various stations to share the knowledge acquired.
Mr Aggor appealed to organisations and agencies to sponsor participants to the New Year school as it had become increasingly difficult for many of them to pay their own fees.
The New Year School, an extracurricular learning programme of the IAE offers participants the opportunity to frankly discuss issues of national concern.
The 57th Annual New Year School, on the theme: "Developing the Human Resource for Accelerated National Development", threw the searchlight on developing and retaining the country's human resource for accelerated national growth.
Participants were of the view that the School had been very fruitful.
Mr Augustine K S Abotsivia, Immediate Past Chairman of the Catholic Youth Organisation said he had learnt a lot, which would help him to debate intelligently on issues concerning the development of the country.
He said each individual had a role to play to move Ghana forward rather then to leave everything on government.
Mrs Cynthia Opoku-Manu, Coordinating Secretary of the National Union of Ghana Students called for attitudinal change among leaders who must be able to abide by the rules they made in order to encourage others to follow suit.
Mr Ben Annang, Presiding Member of the Accra Metropolitan Assembly, said the discussion on road accident was most apt in view of the recent spate of motor accidents.