Article Type: Expert comment

With a booming youth population and rapid urbanization, Africa is undergoing extraordinary demographic changes. By 2030, Africans will make up roughly 50% of new workers globally. Yet these shifts are coupled with a distressing lack of economic growth. Digital technology, when responsibly harnessed, leveraged, and governed, can play an outsized role in bridging key development gaps. Read this expert comment to learn more.

In 2035, there will be more young Africans entering the workforce each year than in the rest of the world combined. Millions of new job opportunities are urgently needed for people like Abigail, her peers, and her family to thrive. At the same time, countries across Africa – and around the world – are rapidly investing in and expanding digital public infrastructure (DPI). In this expert comment, we examine how to maximize DPI investments for economic growth and new job opportunities. 

In this expert comment, explore the opportunities and considerations around how ODR could be harnessed for public value, specifically looking at how ODR could be integrated into the design of good digital public infrastructure (DPI). Building on the insights from our consultative research, we share our recommendations for how actors within the DPI ecosystem could overcome barriers and adopt ODR. 

With 2025 on the horizon, we stand at a pivotal crossroads, with power to shape the future of digitalization. The decisions we make today will have extraordinary impact on whether data and technology benefit people and society in the future, or exacerbate inequality, fuel jobless growth, and undermine trust in institutions.