Information and Communication Technology (ICT) and youth unemployment in Africa

The research taken by Ogbonna, Adediran, Oloko, and Isah investigated “the effect of ICT on youth unemployment in Africa using a sample of 41 African countries between 2003 and 2018. The study employs a dynamic Generalised Method of Moment (GMM) approach and constructs a composite ICT index to combine key indicators of ICT, using the principal component approach.” Additionally, the ICT youth unemployment nexus of education which is an interactive role was also accounted for in the study. The theoretical model, Phillip curve, showed the effect of inflation, physical capital accumulation, economic growth, and a  level of corruption. Further, in having a higher ICT deployment and usage aids for youth unemployment to be reduced in Africa. This statement leads to the hypothesis of the study. Moreover, there is evidence shown by reducing the unemployment rate of the ICT sector linked with the ICT usage that is exacerbated by education. The Phillip curve hypothesis shows that there is a negative effect on youth employment when there is an inflation rate. In many African countries there is economic recession and a declining economic growth, hence, the ICT education curriculum needs to be revised in order to reduce youth unemployment in the long-run. 

In the developing countries, technology or specifically the ICT sector is hardly explored but in the other countries and sectors involving ICT, there is a rapid rate. There is research that backs up this statement, for instance, “Yakovleva and Goltsova (2016), Rodrguez-Rodrguez and Gonzalez (2020), and Warshawski (2020) identified the use of ICT in the education sector; Abolhassani et al. (2018), Fernandaz et al. (2020) and Parsons et al. (2020) noted the use of ICT in the health sector; whereas, Choudhary et al. (2020) examined the use of ICT in the defence and crime management sector. Other studies such as Zhang and Danish (2019) and Stute et al. (2020) noted the use of ICT in the environmental and disaster management sector, while Alkhowaiter (2020), Del Guadio et  al. (2020) and Yin et al. (2020) expressed the use of ICT in the banking sector. In another strand of studies (Alimi and Adediran 2020; Arvin et al. 2021; Pradhan et al. 2021; among others).” It is also noted that economic growth and ICT are quite closely linked.

According to World Development Indicator data between 2000 and 2018 the African countries hardly adapted to the ICT sector even though 8% of the population was using the internet. Moreover, ICT intensive industries in Africa have rising employment opportunities and through knowledge sharing and the practice of ICT would be able to reduce the unemployment rate amongst the Youth in Africa.The aim of the research “addresses the problem of youth unemployment in Africa and seeks the deployment of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) as a panacea”. The study also looked into three objectives regarding youth unemployment in Africa:

1) “First, Africa is a “youthful” continent with youths making up more than 65% of its population, about one in five of which (about 20.7%) are not in employment, education, or training”

2) “Second, the youth unemployment problem is at the centre of socio-economic challenges in the continent including the increase in cybercrime, militancy, kidnapping, prostitution, drug addiction, and xenophobic attacks.”

3) “Third, in Africa where the problem is endemic, youth unemployment is largely structural and attributed to various demand-side and supply-side inefficiencies”.

Further, this study aims to look at ways that technology can reduce the youth unemployment rate in Africa. 

The results of the study showed that Botswana, South Africa and Southern Africa are the best performers on the continent when it comes to the ICT sector. The countries which have a downgraded performance are Niger, Malawi and Burundi. Moreover, the agriculture sector out of the industry and services sector has the highest employment rates. The country with the most number of people using the internet is Morocco and the country with the most mobile cellular subscriptions is South Africa.

The aim of the study is to investigate how the impact of the ICT sector influences youth unemployment in Africa. Further, the study looked in the 41 countries in Africa and their ICT index and the nexus is examined between youth unemployment and ICT deployment. The results showed that the push for the ICT sector in Africa is very low and is leading to a high unemployment rate. The solution to get more people involved in the ICT sector is for them to be educated in this field as those who are unemployed are linked to high criminal activities.