On July 10, 2026, CPI President Maazu Bayuoni stood before an audience of over 500 people at the Blue Hill Hotel in Wa and did something unusual for a summit welcome address. He did not start with gratitude. He did not start with a programme update. He started with a number: 25 years.
Why 25 Years
Most programmes that work with young entrepreneurs in underserved communities operate on three- to five-year funding cycles. They recruit, train, support, and report. When the cycle ends, the strongest leave behind something useful. But many leave behind very little.
The problem is not always quality. It is a time frame. Building an entrepreneurial ecosystem, the networks, capital flows, mentorship culture, and community of founders who support each other, takes longer than any grant cycle can contain.
CPI has worked in Northern Ghana since 2019. In seven years, the organisation has trained and funded over 70 entrepreneurs, created more than 500 jobs, and reached over 10,000 young people across the five northern regions. Meaningful numbers and relative to the scale of the challenge, a beginning.
The five northern regions consistently record the highest rates of multidimensional poverty in Ghana. The Savannah Region leads at 49.5 percent, followed by the North East at 48.1 percent, Upper East at 43.0 percent, Northern at 38.4 percent, and Upper West at 37.4 percent. A May 2026 GSS report confirmed that the six poorest districts in Ghana are all within the North East Region alone.
Youth unemployment across the five regions sits at 25.7 percent. In the Northern Region, the rate rose from 9.5 percent in Q1 2024 to 11.8 percent by Q4 — moving against the national trend. Households in agriculture face poverty rates more than five times higher than those in services.
These are not statistics that respond to three-year interventions. They require a generational response.
Vision 2050 is that response, made public.
What Vision 2050 Actually Means
Vision 2050 is not a slogan. It is a directional commitment that positions CPI as a catalyst for economic transformation across the northern regions. A strategic document is forthcoming, giving stakeholders and partners a concrete framework for partnership conversations with CPI.
The vision is rooted in Northern Ghana. While the language speaks to African entrepreneurs broadly, the work begins and remains anchored in the five northern regions, where CPI was founded, where Igniting Dreams operates, and where the pioneer gap is widest.
The pathway runs through the Igniting Dreams programme. Every cohort is a building block. The Niibala Alliance connects fellows across years. The annual Summit keeps the ecosystem visible and accountable.
In 2026, CPI doubled the fellowship to 20 fellows and grew its prize funding by more than ten times. GH₵440,000 in seed capital was disbursed to prize-winning entrepreneurs at the Summit. These are the early signs of a programme scaling deliberately, its ambition growing alongside its capacity.
The Honest Distance
“Despite every barrier, youth-led businesses are emerging across agriculture, technology, fashion, and manufacturing. Northern Ghana sits on extraordinary endowments, shea, groundnuts, livestock, minerals, and now gold. It has a young population that is hungry for opportunity.”
— Maazu Bayuoni, CPI President, Igniting Dreams Summit 2026
25-year plan that pretends its early chapters are further along than they are is not a plan. It is a press release. CPI is clear-eyed about the distance between 70 entrepreneurs funded and one million empowered. That honesty is the foundation the vision stands on.
What CPI can say with confidence is that the model works. Fellows build stronger businesses. Businesses create jobs. Jobs change households. Households change communities. That chain of causality is what the Igniting Dreams model has demonstrated, edition by edition, since 2019. Vision 2050 is the commitment that it holds at scale, with the right partners behind it, made public so that CPI is held to it.
What Partnerships Make Possible
No single organisation can close the pioneer gap alone. The coalition behind the programme, Noni Hub, Fido, the Sangu Delle Foundation, the Anwelle Foundation, and mNotify, alongside the Mastercard Foundation, reflects a growing recognition that Northern Ghana’s entrepreneurial ecosystem requires coordinated, multi-partner support. Vision 2050 is an open invitation to partners who think in decades. The strategic document, when released, will provide the concrete basis for those conversations.
What You Can Do With This
If you are a young entrepreneur in Northern Ghana: applications for Igniting Dreams 2027 open in early 2027. Bring a running business and a willingness to do the work.
If you are an investor or development partner: the conversation is not about a transaction. It is about what we build together.
If you are a policymaker: the founders in the 2026 cohort are already building. What they need is the environment to build faster.
“We are not asking for pity. We are not asking for charity. We are asking for partnership.”
— Maazu Bayuoni, CPI President
Vision 2050 is a 25-year plan. It starts now.
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