Calculated Optimism: Africa's Growing Young Population, Demographic Dividends, and the African Renaissance Part 2.*

by Wilson Aiwuyor



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Africa’s demographic dividends could be enormous and transformative when the continent attains political stability and take due advantage of its booming young population. Africa’s population dynamic indicates that the continent, unlike other regions of the world, would neither face any shortage in domestic labor supply nor worry about the economic burden of an increasingly ageing population for the most part of the 21^st century. By 2050, Africa’s working-age population, which is currently 54% of the continent’s total population, will climb to 62%. In contrast, Europe’s working-age will shrinks from 63% in 2010 to 51% in 2050. European economy policy is already feeling the pinch of an ageing population. One analyst, Tim Colebatch, observes:

European governments have stared into the future, and they don't like it. They see a dwindling European workforce struggling to support a rapidly expanding number of retirees. They see their budget deficits swelling as millions of elderly people force up spending on pensions, health-care and nursing homes, while their populations fall and their tax base shrinks.

Africa will have more than enough workforce to sustain its economy. Europe (and other regions of the world where there is an ageing population) will increasingly need Africa’s surplus labor. In fact, the European Union has opened immigration job centers in parts of Africa.

Additionally, Africa’s population will serve as a vast market for domestic production and to support the global economy. The McKinsey Global Institute forecasts the spread of Africa’s potential demographic dividend beyond the continent in its publication titled Lions on the Move: The Progress and Potential of African Economies. The publication states: “By 2040, it (Africa’s labor force) is projected to reach 1.1 billion, overtaking China’s and India’s. If Africa can provide its young people with the education and skills they need, this large workforce could account for a significant share of both global consumption and production.” This is the Africa that is referred to in the vision for an African Renaissance as enshrined in the Vision of the African Union (AU); an Africa that would be “prosperous and peaceful, an Africa driven and managed by its own citizens and representing a dynamic force in the international arena.”

The Dividends and the Renaissance

The African Renaissance is an age-long vision that requires good governance to translate into reality. The concept of African Renaissance was first used by the Senegalese scholar Cheikh Anta Diop to refer to an Africa that can assert itself politically, economically, and culturally. In his collection of essays, Towards the African Renaissance: Essays in Culture and Development, Diop cited fundamental requirements to achieve the renaissance. Among these requirements were continental integration and economic viability. In another book, Black Africa: The Economic and Cultural Basis for a Federated State, published in 1974, Diop presented an elaborate blueprint for the achievement of the African renaissance.

 Similarly, Kwame Nkrumah, Ghana’s first independent president and champion of Africa’s decolonization movement, made a compelling case for Africa’s unity and economic integration geared toward continental transformation. Meanwhile, earlier in 1963, Dr. Kwame Nkrumah had proposed in his book, Africa Must Unite, that a united Africa should integrate and pool its resources to put an end to economic dependency and conflicts.

In 1995, Nelson Mandela asserted that Africa was moving into a “new era of renaissance.” This statement marked the re-emergence of the vision that was articulated by Diop and Nkrumah decades earlier. After Mandela’s reference to the Renaissance in 1995, the concept gradually became the overarching term for the vision to bring about a united, stable, peaceful, and prosperous Africa; an Africa that can improve the quality of life of its citizens and give the continent a pride of place in the global community.

The vision of the African Renaissance and the paradox that Africa is the future of the world are no joke. In May 2010, French President Sarkozy said it point blank during the Africa-France Summit that, "Africa is our future." Former British Prime Minister Gordon Brown buttressed Sarkozy's statement.

--> "Future growth in the world economy, and future jobs in the developing world, will depend on harnessing both the productive potential and the pent-up consumer demand of this continent," asserted Brown. Advanced economies in the West and developing countries in the global south, including China, India, and Brazil are now seeking new ways to either assert or re-assert themselves in Africa - a development that some analysts refer to as a new scramble for Africa's resources. Despite the scramble for Africa's natural resources, the continent's greatest asset remains its human resources anchored on its booming youth population.

Indeed, the enthronement of good governance and investment in human resource across Africa would better position the continent to reap the demographic dividends and achieve the African Renaissance. Again, high population growth rate is not Africa’s fundamental problem. Africa is not overpopulated. African leaders should be made to govern well and implement adequate social policies to improve education, health care delivery, infrastructural development, human capital development, and the empowerment of African women.

* This is the second of a two-part article. Read part 1 here