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Capacity building in entrepreneurship is key to tackling youth unemployment in Africa


Youth unemployment has scourged the African continent, with rates for Sub-Saharan and North Africa as of 2016 being 13 percent and 30.5 percent, respectively. While North Africa has the highest rate of unemployed youths in the world, Sub-Saharan Africa continues to have the highest youth working poverty rate globally at 70 percent.  Youth unemployment on the continent has been exacerbated by the continuing youth bulge with 12 million new people estimated to be joining the labor force each year between 2015 and 2030. This twofold trend of rapid population growth and rising youth unemployment presents a major challenge of harnessing Africa’s demographic dividend. The growing number of unemployed youth poses a challenge to sustainable development, and could prove socially or politically destabilizing as well.


Country
Regional
Language
French, English
Region
Africa
Resource type
Notes


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