24-Hour Economy needs total workforce transformation – NLC

Dr. Bernice Welbeck, acting Executive Secretary of the National Labour Commission (NLC), has called for a complete workforce transformation to ensure the sustainable success of Ghana’s 24-hour economy.

Workforce transformation, she said, required new strategies to modernize workforce with upskilling, redefine roles and organizational structures for sustainable decent jobs, integrate new technologies, and drive cultural shifts to meet evolving business needs and challenges.

“We must reimagine how we train, deploy, support workers, and how we perform as workers, in a 24-hour economic framework. That’s the only way to succeed,” she stressed.

Speaking on the topic, “Workforce transformation: Building a skilled, agile, and motivated Labour Force for the 24-Hour Economy,” at a Dialogue on the 24-hour economy, organized by Berkha Africa and the Institute of Directors in Accra, she urged stakeholders in the labour environment to strategise to engage in the new economy.

“The 24-hour economy is a call for workforce transformation,” she stressed, and called on all stakeholders, particularly employers and labour unions to cooperatively enhance work performance and remuneration structures for adherence to global decent work frameworks.

The Dialogue Meeting, which had theme, “Innovating for Growth: Adapting Business Models to Ghana’s 24-Hour Economy,” brought together over 100 leaders from stakeholder institutions and businesses from key sectors including finance, manufacturing, mining, hospitality, and agriculture. It served as a critical platform to translate policy vision into actionable insights and public-private collaboration.

The participants urged government and institutional actors to move beyond rhetoric and initiate intentional and measurable steps toward rolling out the execution phase, cautioning that the ambitious national agenda risks becoming ineffective if there are no concrete measurable benchmarks to guide the implementation.

Dr. Alfred Braimah, CEO, Institute of Directors, in his remarks called for practical steps for the sustainable implementation of the policy, cautioning against lip-service.

He indicated that the Institute was committed in supporting stakeholders to build strategic processes for quality outcomes from a 24hour operational regime.

Prof. Michael Kpessa-Whyte, Director-General of the State Interests and Governance Authority (SIGA), reaffirmed the government’s readiness and strategic preparedness to operationalise the initiative, adding the various interventions were underway to enhance the governance of public institutions to enable them to competitively operate in the new economy.

“Good corporate governance is the engine for a sustainable 24hour economy,” he said, adding that SIGA was retooling various investments to enhance their viability and participation in the new economy, and stressed SIGA’s commitment to transforming Specified Entities through robust governance frameworks, investment discipline, and strategic oversight.

“SIGA’s mandate is not just to supervise SEs but to build governance systems that inspire transparency, investment readiness, and accountability. We are deploying integrated risk and compliance dashboards, enforcing ESG standards, and partnering with industry leaders to ensure that Ghana’s 24-hour productivity vision becomes a sustainable economic reality,” he added.

To ensure effective alignment in the implementation process, he called for cross-sector collaboration to align tax incentives, energy policy, labour standards, and digital infrastructure in support of the initiative.

Abdul Nasser Alidu, Head of Strategy and Programmes at the 24-Hour Economy Secretariat, giving an overview on the policy implementation, explained that initiative was strategically being positioned to draw in active private sector participation.

He said feasibility studies were underway to determine a number of projects that would be conducive for private sector investment and participation.

“We are not only ready to implement; we are developing real-time sectoral engagement models to ensure inclusive rollout,” he noted.

Mr. Austin Gamey, renowned labour consultant and CEO of Gamey and Gamey Group, called for strong commitment of all stakeholders, particularly employers and unions, “to the economic transformation agenda,” adding that the country’s labour law has adequate provisions to accommodate a 24-hour labour system.

Such commitment, he said was needed to enable employers and workers to collectively and cooperatively engage to overcome labour challenges that may emerge in the implementation phase of the 24-hour policy.

For his part, a leadership coach, Scofray Nana Yaw Yeboah, President of the International Coaching Federation-Ghana, reminded stakeholders that the new economic policy could only flourish if it is people and productivity-driven.

That, he said was because systems alone would not produce the desire results, unless the people who drive the produce are well conscientized on the objectives of the new economy through quality leadership and change management.

Mrs Lizzy- Ann Kwagbedzi, Country Lead of Berkha Africa, for her part, noted that although embracing a 24hour economy holds significant potential for job creation, industrial growth, service expansion, and stronger global competitiveness, it requires bold leadership, innovative thinking, and collaborative action across sectors.

The organisation of the Dialogue by Berkha Africa, she said, demonstrates their contribution to create a platform to bring together leaders from business, trade unions, and public service to exchange ideas, confront realities, and inspire actionable change.

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