(Money Morning) The Dangote group has its vision clear – It is leading the continent’s headlong charge into infrastructure building and resource exploration and creating jobs in Africa.Thanks to Dangote, Thousands of Africans now have the chance to develop a career in Africa.

Since the Dangote Group keeps an intensely local focus, targeting local markets with needed value-added products these investment are almost 100% confined to Africa. Increased African consumer demand and spending has made Africa an attractive market. More consumers mean more vacancies in Africa across various roles and sectors in the economy.

Dangote multi business presence means its products and services form the backbone of the Sub-Saharan African economic explosion and give the African youth a chance to build careers in Africa. While Dangote gets good returns on its investment in sub-Saharan Africa – Africans get jobs in Africa.

According to Business Insider and the World Bank, eleven of the twenty fastest-growing economies in the world are in Africa. Will Africa be able to overcome its many obstacles? Will economic development also mean employment for its people?

(Forbes) At the World Economic Forum on Africa in Cape Town, South Africa, The Rockefeller Foundation has announced that it will pledge $97 million to create vacancies in Africa in the digital field.

At least one million youths from different parts of the continent will benefit from programme. The arrangement known as Digital Jobs Africa (DJA) initiative, aims to generate jobs in Africa for unemployed youths in the Information Communication Technology (ICT) sector. Many parts of the continent have dynamic and growing services sectors and offer the potential for continued ICT development.

These funds would be used to training high-potential but disadvantaged, unemployed youths and help them develop a career in Africa in digital fields such as service centre support, online research and Web design.

The Foundation along with private sector companies, development organizations and government agencies will identify the opportunities and ways to create sustainable jobs in Africa.

(BBC News) A World Bank reports that Africa’s economic growth will outpace average- a result of higher commodities, increasing investment and a general pick-up in the world economy.

More jobs in Africa can be created if African governments do more to ensure that this growth reduced poverty.

The report said strong economic growth has meant vacancies in Africa and significantly reduced the extent of poverty in Africa over the past decade or so.

Yet, African countries need to do much more too properly harness and unleash their full potential for more growth, much less poverty, and a chance to the youth to build their careers in Africa.

Problem areas

The Bank said that infrastructure development was critical to ensure the strong pace of economic growth – for success of the oil and gas sectors in East Africa, the exploitation of the huge coal deposits in Mozambique, and minerals in West Africa.

Political unrest in Africa and also any sharp unforeseen downturn in demand for commodities from China can be a risk which can dent economic progress, hamper creation of jobs in Africa, increase unemployment and create social unrest.

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China and Africa have an excellent trade relationship which is is stronger than ever before. It’s participation in the African economy has created jobs in Africa. China now plans to intensify investment in Africa and moving some of its businesses abroad to reduce labour costs while creating vacancies in Africa.

Both Africa and China look forward to mutual cooperation and hope there will be a surge of cooperation in not only quantity but also quality. Chinese investment in Africa is at $20 billion today and further investment is good news for the educated African youth looking to develop a career in Africa.

New Delhi, April 6 (IANS) Africa’s demographic dividend presents great investment potential and returns for Indian business and for the Africans: vacancies in Africa.

The continents median age is only 18. This means millions for customers for the mobile industry, for internet and broadband in particular. Millions of customers in Africa use phones as mobile ATMs.

The fact  that Africa is projected to grow to 2 billion by the end of the decade from the current 1.1 billion has prompted a leading Indian telecom operator to invest billions in Africa, while providing jobs in Africa for the local youth.

Africa needs to focus on providing vocational education to much larger numbers of locals. Local talent can be tapped and given a chance to develop a career in Africa, instead of having to employ expatriates.

Initiatives such as Indiafrica are social media projects to where the young from both regions to engage with each other and unleash their creative energies, and to increase awareness about each other.

India’s trade with the African continent is now $60 billion and increase trade can only mean many more jobs in Africa.

(CAPITALFMBLOGS) Africa today has two sides. While there has been unexpected economic growth, the continent still has to make extreme efforts towards its Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) for 2015. Poverty needs to be reduced. There is need for creation of jobs in Africa. The structural transformation of African economies is the need of the hour.

True, the MDGs have put African governments on the path to poverty reduction but progress though remains slow. Infant mortality and childbirth deaths remain high.There is progress though. Africa has almost achieved MDG 1- halving the number of people living below $1.25 a day from 1990 to 2015.

A major problem is lack of suitable vacancies in Africa and opportunity for the educated to make careers in Africa. African governments and the private sector need to be prepared to absorb the growing working age youth population. The continents population is estimated to double in 40 years. In 40 years, Africa will have more working age people than any other country, but will there be enough employment?

How will these jobs get created?

There is need to create productive job vacancies in Africa. Many African counties are on the right path with about 7 percent growth threshold for economic takeoff. But economic growth has not created enough jobs in Africa. So growth is not sufficient. How you grow matters. Growth is more equitable, sustainable, and job-creating when it happens through structural transformation.

Transformation, as we champion it at the African Centre for Economic Transformation (ACET), is growth through making the structural shifts from farming to manufacturing and services, through expanding the technical capabilities of people and institutions, through upgrading the technologies that people use on farms, in firms, and in government offices, growth through becoming internationally competitive and latching onto global chains. All these channels are mutually reinforcing.

Africa needs a transforming economy-more than just a growing economy to create stable, wage-paying jobs in Africa and for real social and economic progress.

What are the three factors whose transformation is critical towards filling Africa’s urgent need to create stable jobs?

• Transformation should begin from farming and its modernization – most African economies are based on Agriculture and most of the extremely poor rely on it for subsistence. Modernisation will mean higher productivity, increased income and more jobs in Africa across the value chain, in manufacturing and services, particularly through agro processing.

• Second, develop market relevant skills. While millions of university graduates struggle to find vacancies in Africa, companies struggle to search for the candidate with the right skills.The result is that such jobs go to expatriates or are never created for want of skills. There should be renewed focus on technical and vocational education and training (TVET) for students and public campaigns to raise awareness about the importance of TVET.

• Third, invest in infrastructure. Good infrastructure means steadier manufacturing to more reliable services, especially those in export-oriented industries. Infrastructure investments also create construction jobs in Africa.

Several key interventions drive transformation, but these three are critical towards filling Africa’s urgent need to create stable jobs.

Transformation is difficult work and it takes time.  As 90 percent of jobs are created by the private sector, African leaders need to encourage the private sector to invest in these areas to create jobs, to build skills and to build infrastructure.

The time to positively tackle the urgency of creating jobs in Africa is now.

(allafrica.com) Angola now becomes the seventh African country with major private investments and the 25th in amount of investments out of a total of 208 nations of the world.

Angola has attracted several local and foreign investors; a good sign that these investments will create vacancies in Angola.

Angola has oil jobs in Africa but there is also growing focus on such industries as those of transformation, civil construction and agriculture.

Angola’s plan to promote the development of private sector for economic growth, modernization of the country and  creating careers in Africa.

(BUSINESS DAILY) The UN says that the East Africa region is expected to grow at six per cent this year – the second highest for the continent this year.

Growth and creation of jobs in Africa have been aided by new natural resource discoveries, improved agricultural performance, and economic diversification.

Oil discoveries in Kenya is creating  jobs in Kenya and has triggered a rush of international oil and gas companies to take up what remained of Kenya’s 46 exploration licences.

Discoveries of valuable minerals such as gold, niobium and rare earth and Improved output of agricultural export commodities such horticulture, tea and coffee are expected to earn the country foreign income and create career opportunities in Africa.

These earnings will help the region to improve spending on programmes such as infrastructure which are key to spurring economic growth and creating vacancies in Africa.

(Howwemadeitinafrica) Construction in Africa is booming and creating jobs in Africa. Rapid urbanization  strong current and projected economic growth, a rising middle class, regional integration and strengthened democracy, transparency, accountability and governance in many of Africa’s 54 nations are all driving opportunities on the continent.

What are the opportunities and what are their drivers?

Urbanization and housing: People searching for jobs in Africa are moving to cities. Increasing urbanization is creating pressure for more housing and infrastructure. Entire new cities are already being developed to relieve the highly congested metropolises.

Strong growth and resultant shortages of office space: As more businesses access African opportunities and set up local operations, there is acute shortage of high quality, well priced office space. Rentals in Luanda and Lagos are the highest in the world.

A rising middle class and increased consumer spending power: The rise of the African middle class has opening up whole new consumer business and a rise in the demand for formal retail infrastructure. More infrastructure projects mean more development and more jobs in Africa.

Regional integration and cross-border infrastructure projects: New policies in this direction are creating opportunities for large infrastructure projects and careers in Africa across inter-Africa borders.

Risks and challenges

There are opportunities but also risks in construction projects on the African continent

• Shortage of funds.
• For cross border construction projects there is a lack of alignment between national and regional priorities and legislative frameworks.
• Construction costs (and professional fees) on the continent are high due to the non-availability of specialist building materials. Furthermore, land costs are high. Employing highly paid foreign experts means lack of vacancies in Africa for locals.
• While there is a rising middle class in Africa, Africa remains a cash society and the mortgage market is underdeveloped or non-existent in the majority of the continent. Buying a house is still difficult for most Africans.

(CNN) ZAMBIAN economist Dambisa Moyo feels that International aid is harming Africa – it slows development, perpetuates corruption and hinders the continent’s growth.

What China means to Africa

Africa’s top priorities are trade, foreign direct investment, poverty reduction and jobs in Africa.

The perception that China wants to colonize Africa is not true. The Chinese are welcome because they have a lot to offer to Africa in terms of development and Africans need the investment, and jobs in Africa.

The three key drivers which will help spur economic growth and create vacancies in Africa : capital, labor  and productivity. The labor story is very positive – 60-70% of Africans are under the age of 25. The youth need to get skills and education to utilize their potential and help them compete for jobs in Africa.

Africa is about development, potential and fast growing economies not just war, disease, corruption and poverty.