AfCFTA could generate 18 million new jobs – World Bank report
The World Bank’s October 2023 Africa Pulse report underscores that the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) holds significant potential for job creation, potentially yielding approximately 18 million new jobs.
The report emphasizes that infrastructure acts as a critical barrier for new businesses, hindering job growth through impediments to firm entry, high operational costs, and limited export competitiveness.
These challenges have particularly impacted the energy, digital infrastructure, and transportation sectors across Sub-Saharan Africa, the report notes.
While labor demand is projected to rise, the report highlights the need to create pathways to employment, especially for the most vulnerable segments of the population, in order to realize the job growth promised by the demographic transition.
To address the challenge of providing better job opportunities to a broader population, the report suggests the development of an ecosystem that fosters firm establishment, stability, and growth, while aligning skill development with business demand.
The proposed strategy for enabling firm growth and facilitating the creation of high-quality jobs rests on three key pillars: (1) fiscal stabilization and debt reduction, (2) political stability and strengthening institutional frameworks to support markets, and (3) demand-driven skills enhancement and improved organizational transformation of work.
