The World Bank has said it will invest 15 billion dollars into human capital projects in Africa by the year 2023.
Hafez Ghanem, World Bank Vice President for Africa said this in a statement issued in Nairobi.
“The projects are part of World Bank’s new plan to help promote skills development for African youth and enhance their competitiveness in a digitalising global economy.
According to the World Bank’s Africa Human Capital Plan, the programme aims at a reduction in child mortality to save 4 million lives and averting stunting among 11 million children.
Others are increasing learning outcomes for girls and boys in school by 20 per cent by 2023.
By doing so, it will increase African workers’ productivity by 13 per cent.
“Preventing a child from fulfilling his or her potential is not only fundamentally unjust, but it also limits the growth of economies whose future workers are held back,” Ghanem said.
“GDP per worker in Sub-Saharan Africa could be 2.5 times higher if everyone were healthy and enjoyed a good education from pre-school to secondary school,” he added.
According to the World Bank, Sub-Saharan African region scores the lowest on the World Bank’s Human Capital Index which gauges whether countries have adequately invested in the next generation of workers.