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Experts tap into ICTs to boost employment in Africa
2007-05-03 09:20:51
By Anaclet Rwegayura, PST, Addis Ababa
Africa stands to lose its highly skilled workforce to countries that are advanced in knowledge industries and always looking for more skilled labour at a cheaper cost through brain drain, a senior official of the United Nations warned here Tuesday.
Abdoulie Janneh, Executive Secretary of the UN Economic Commission for Africa (ECA), said African countries need to create the means to utilize their skilled workers and address the re-skilling of the existing workforce to meet new challenges in knowledge-based industries.
Opening the fifth session of the African Committee on Development Information (CODI-V), Janneh said that in today’s global, information driven-society; economic success was increasingly based on the effective use of intangible assets such as knowledge, skills and innovative potential as key resources for competitive advantage.
``“The global knowledge economy is characterized by knowledge-intensive industries, producing goods and services for each and every sector.
``Since knowledge investments are characterized by increasing, rather than decreasing returns, they are the key to long-term economic growth. Africa cannot ignore this basic fact,`` he said.
The ECA is hosting the weeklong meeting aimed at using advances in information and communications technology to boost employment in Africa.
According to the ECA chief, already there was a critical mass of African knowledge workers in the diaspora while the continent continued to suffer from brain drain.
Labour market preferences for workers with general competencies in handling codified knowledge were also having negative effects on the demand for less-skilled workers.
Discussions at meeting will focus on the theme `Employment and the Knowledge Economy in Africa`, in line with the outcomes of the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS).
While the challenge of job creation in Africa is receiving a high profile, it becomes widely accepted that an economy based on knowledge is a major factor of growth.
Information and communication technologies (ICTs) allow researchers in different locations to work together, enhancing productivity and often resulting in rapid advances in research and development.
In return, connectivity generates new knowledge and technologies, fuelling development further and, consequently, employment.
But, experts caution that there is also a downside. The knowledge economy, with its rising skills and technological intensity, is widening the divide between the ``knowledge haves`` and the ``knowledge have-nots``. This potentially means limited opportunities in the labour market and in society.
CODI-V is analyzing the contribution of information, knowledge and technology to job creation, and come up with options to close the gap.
Alongside the meeting, ECA in conjunction with the Canadian government will present awards for government and institutional innovation in the use of ICTs aimed at reaching the Millennium Development Goals.
The Technology in Government in Africa (TIGA) awards are the first of their kind, sponsored by the Finnish and Italian governments, Ethiopian Airlines, Microsoft and Nokia Siemens Network.
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