Most African countries, developing countries, have great difficulty in ensuring their emergence, especially on the economic level. This is due to the galloping unemployment rate and the poverty in which people live on a daily basis. Thus, when he took power on 19 January at the head of ECCAS, President Felix Tshisekedi set himself the task of promoting human capital during his one-year term.
According to the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD), less than half of African countries have experienced inclusive growth over the past two decades. These low figures explain the fact that 34% of households on the continent live below the poverty line ($1.9 a day).
“While growth in Central Africa over the past three decades has been commendable to say the least, well-being in Central Africa remains significantly lower than in all other regions,” said the President of ECCAS’s most populous country, at the end of the 20th Ordinary Session of the Heads of State and Government of the organization. Indeed, the poverty rate will increase by 2.7% in 2020 due to the Coronavirus pandemic. Indeed, the poverty rate will increase by 2.7% in 2020 due to the Coronavirus pandemic. In addition, the UN agency reports that about 40% of Africa’s total wealth is held by a small number of the wealthiest people, who represent approximately 0.0001% of the population.
Thus the gap between rich and poor has widened in most of the countries of Africa, the second most unequal continent. According to the President, “the overall poverty rates in our sub-region are still around 43%, or nearly half of our population… More than half of the youth in our region are looking for jobs, either underemployed or simply inactive.” Moreover, the structural causes tell us more about the phenomenon of unemployment. The number of young people coming out of universities each year and looking for work is much higher than the number of people of retirement age.
On the one hand, there is the inadequacy of technical and vocational education, the predominance of general education, the multiplicity of natural disasters and armed conflicts. On the other hand, there is an increase in population, which does not take into account the living conditions of the population. According to UNCTAD, the poverty rate is highest in the Economic Community of Central African States (ECCAS) and lowest in the Arab Maghreb Union. Therefore, the President of the Republic of Congo (DRC), Felix Tshisekedi, current President-in-Office of ECCAS, intends to work in this area in order to promote human capital particularly in this region of Africa.
