As an impact designer who works a lot with youths, I’m very invested in the subject of digital transformation and technology because of the scalability it brings to ideas. One of the programmes targeting Africa’s Digital Strategy specifically is the World Bank’s Digital Economy Initiative for Africa.
With WeForGood’s Sustainable Solutions Africa Project, we’re always pushing youths to see how to solve Africa’s wicked problems in environmentally sustainable, economically viable and socially equitable ways using the help of technology for scale and reach.
However, I have also realized that there’s an automatic lid on the ideas you can conceive at all in certain contexts. Looking at the issues surrounding climate change even as COP26 progresses, it is obvious that technology and digital access have the potential to transform how humans relate with the environment and by inference reduce our negative footprints. I know one could argue that there are already a number of solutions that Africans can borrow for their use but rather than copying and pasting, I am of the opinion that Africans, having gone through or currently going through their community specific challenges, are better positioned to initiate well thought out, applicable, human-centered solutions with real impact.
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Nevertheless, it is only natural that as Africans try to come up with these ideas, their thoughts are consciously and unconsciously limited by issues around digital connectivity because, think about it: what’s the essence of creating an app that people in urban areas won’t touch because of high cost of data or those in rural areas won’t be able to access because of the digital divide? For example, broadband penetration in Nigeria as at April 2021 stood at 40.66% according to the Nigerian Telecommunications Commission and we all know in practical terms, the high cost of good data which is often still unreliable.
Just thinking of it, I’m in so much awe of how much broadband penetration will transform the continent across various sectors that it feels almost spiritual. Can you imagine the kind of access it will bring to education, healthcare, market access for rural small holder farmers, transforming agriculture, logistics etc! Just name it! Now don’t even get me thinking about the new industries and market opportunities that will emerge. Some ideas have come to some of us but have been ‘trashed’ in the impossible bin because of the digital limitations that currently exist in our clime. Fact.
So as African leaders think about Africa’s sustainable development, technology, digital access, broadband penetration should be prioritized. With the kind of numbers (in terms of people) we need to reach, and with the limited resources at our disposal, digital technology is the way to go. The sharing economy for example, which is largely powered by technology, holds huge benefits for both the environment and the economy as it is billed to grow to $335 billion by 2025.
Not only that, if you take a good look at the 60 biggest market “hot spots”, which according to the 2017 Better Business Better World report of the Business & Sustainable Development Commission, are worth up to US$12 trillion a year in business savings and revenue by 2030, you will find that they are technology powered and largely environmentally driven opportunities. This is instructive around the need for Africa to pay important attention to digital technology’s ability to disrupt its current trajectory while unlocking unprecedented pathways for accelerated economic growth.
Advantageously, we have smart young people with the experience of the challenges in their pockets to drive this change, if only they can be provided with the right enabling environment to thrive.
About TEA (The Impactnista)
Temitayo Ade-Peters is an award winning impact designer focused on co-creating sustainable solutions that help the planet, people and economies thrive. She’s the CEO of WeForGood International, a sustainable impact and innovation design firm based in Lagos, Nigeria, which works with people, institutions and governments to design human-centered solutions to Africa’s most pressing challenges.
TEA writes and speaks passionately about impact-driven entrepreneurship and technology as the next big drivers of Africa’s sustainable development and believes strongly that young people must not only lead, but also be at the center of this opportunity and responsibility, with the SDGs as sure blueprint for the Africa we want.