Africa: Covid-19 and Future of Work

There is no room for conventional wisdom in a changing world.

Unless you have been living under the proverbial rock, we are all aware that some months ago the world was hit with Coronavirus — a first of its kind. Whilst the virus spread to every corner of the planet, organisations such as the World Food Programme began raising questions around the growing potential of famines to at-risk countries and the projected loss of employment globally. However, in the face of adversity African nations have performed exceeding well in containing the viruses’ spread — which leads to two questions:

1. How did the continent perform so well? And,
2. What can be done to prepare the African workforce for the post-Covid world?

What African nations understand that the rest of the world don’t

With a population of roughly 1.2 billion people across Africa, there have been just 100,000 cases and the misfortune of 3,082 deaths (Al Jazeera, 2020). Whilst noting that each death is a tragedy and the lockdown implementation measures aren’t without fault, the continent has performed increasingly well in comparison to its global counterparts. Brazil which sits on the equator has suffered 21,000 deaths, unlike countries like Gabon, Republic of the Congo, The Democratic Republic of the Congo, Uganda, Kenya and Somalia which also sit on the equator have only suffered 202 deaths. It is worth mentioning that there is a cumulative difference in roughly 20 million people and that these figures ought to be adjusted for city density and the like. Nonetheless, broadly this points to African nations handling Covid better with potentially fewer resources and why? Lessons from Ebola.

It is evident that Africans’ experience with the Ebola virus all but set nations ahead of the world in regards to pandemic response. I recently came across the story of Ingrid Gercama (An applied-research anthropologist with a special interest in epidemics) in The New Yorker, where she explained the strict measures she was met with by government health officials upon arrival to Juba, South Sudan in March; these included temperature checks, queries on travel and even if she had recently come into contact with a bat (Moore, 2020). Passing through Sweden on her return to Amsterdam, Gercama encountered nothing of the sort — not least advice to self-isolate.

Beyond airport health measures, localised testing approaches are also proving to be continuously innovative — noting that of Senegal and Ghana. “Senegal is developing a Covid-19 testing kit that would cost $1 per patient, which it is hoped will, in less than 10 minutes, detect both current or previous infection via antigens in saliva, or antibodies. Whereas, Ghana are utilising innovative techniques such as “pool testing”, in which multiple blood samples are tested and then followed up as individual tests only if a positive result is found.” Joel Mubiligi, the executive director of Partners in Health in Rwanda sums this portion up well by saying “I think one of the things Covid-19 is really teaching us right now is scientific humility.” So, assuming case and mortality numbers decrease — what needs assuring to support the future of work and trade for Africans?

Back to the future

As the world shifts from physical handshakes to hand waves over Zoom, Africa must prepare its people to compete with an increasingly globalised labour market — where firms can now potentially resource teams globally, as easily as they can locally. For this reason, it is of utmost importance that African governments heed countries like Kenya by investing in their ICT infrastructure. The nation has one of the highest internet penetration rates in the continent, with 72% of its population having access. Countries beyond Africa have identified the importance of the internet too, for example around half of people living in the China are not currently able to go online — officials had previously earmarked around two trillion yuan (£204 billion) to be spent on developing information infrastructure by 2020. To ensure competitiveness digital transformation for Africa will need to be prioritised across three areas: Entrepreneurship, employment and education.

Entrepreneurship is arguably the heartbeat of the continent. Entrepreneurs of all scales face the issues of disrupted supply chains and even lower purchasing power from both local customers and those residing in neighbouring countries as nations attempt to escape the increasing likelihood of recession. This means new customers are needed, which works to the benefit of globally facing enterprises — which needless to say, many grass-root entrepreneurs are not. Therefore, greater investment in internet penetration will be required to support capital exchanges, as well as, connect with customers globally. Digital innovations such as M-PESA have already allowed greater financial inclusion from the grass-roots, now entrepreneurs must look where possible to build a global brand and experiment with e-commerce to export their products or services.

This leads nicely into job opportunities both in and beyond the continent, which will rely on African citizens’ ability to get online. Andela is a great model as to how companies may begin to build globalised teams. Based out of Nigeria, Andela builds and manages distributed engineering teams for hundreds of companies globally. The firm allows companies to assess talent without needing to understand the local ecosystem whilst ensuring a good fit for both parties across countries and cultures. This opens up the idea of employing not only ‘highest skilled’ African talent but to a model which could still be replicated for roles such as Executive Assistants, Receptionists, Fashion Designers, etc— which Africans require the internet to be poised to compete for.

Finally, university campuses across the continent may remain closed or be forced to implement distance learning. Consequently, a new means of education will be required which is possibly best embodied by Fred Swaniker’s Africa Leadership Group. The institution aims to battle unemployment by producing three million leaders by 2035, each graduate tasked with creating at least 300 jobs. ALX, the group’s accelerator programme has been designed for recent graduates, offering shorter, cheaper, and more flexible “pathways” to employment. Candidates engage in an intensive 6 month program to develop skills for employment — 85% of the 120 graduates received jobs, normally takes 5 years on average. This is what Fred Swaniker coins as ‘learning for the 21st century.’ ALX isn’t alone in their approach, with Holberton School based in the US is a project-based alternative to college for software engineers. Both are executed using distance-learning, again reducing the opportunity for Coronavirus’ transmission but also again boosts Africans’ dependency on internet access.

Conclusion

In closing, it is clear that Ebola’s steep learning curve has helped the continent avoid the ramifications that the Coronavirus has deposited elsewhere. However, looking forward there is much to be desired by African nations — especially as it pertains to increased internet penetration. The key to continued access to opportunities both across the continent and globally in the post-covid world may be found in broadband connection. As a bi-product, Africans will undoubtedly force the world to redraft them into the conversation of global players.