Catalytical funding to improve African youth employability

Intervention

Social or environmental challenge

By 2050, demographic shifts and improved graduation rates at lower education tiers will lead to a significant upswing in the count of post-secondary education including TVET (Technical and Vocational Education and Training) students. 450 million young women and men will enter the African job market by 2050. The African demographic dividend represents an unprecedented challenge, calling for a massive mobilization to educate, train and prepare young people, especially girls, for as many skilled and relevant jobs as possible. Nonetheless, these initiatives continue to face challenges. These issues have the potential to impede the efficacy of these programs and their capacity to effectively transition students into the workforce. As such, linking payment to results will help create incentives for TVET centers to design their programs in a way that meets the demands of the market and supports students' entry into employment and sustaining jobs.

Description of the intervention

Investisseurs & Partenaires (I&P) an impact investment fund, launched an innovative education initiative in 2021. I&P Education to Employment (IP2E) is a $12-million facility aiming at improving African youth employability, through better access to quality and relevant education and training. The program supports post-secondary education institutions through grants and technical assistance in 5 African countries: Burkina-Faso, Ivory Coast, Ghana, Senegal and Togo.

This concept has been successfully tested over the past 2 years while supporting 30 companies and reaching over 200,000 beneficiaries o/w 57% of women learners, and about 3,500 jobs created/maintained. The program track record has highlighted a high market potential in terms of funding tools. Indeed, the current program's tools and thematic are addressing impact objectives that are not fully tailored to the companies' priority needs.
To achieve greater social and economic impacts, the program is seeking to expand its range of funding tools (outcome grand funding, Technical assistance) to impact-linked loan and expanding the geographical scope (adding Cameroon, Benin, Togo, and Sahel region); while addressing 3 key pillars: Employability of African Youth through access to quality education, Social Inclusion of vulnerable youth: BoP, women, disabled people, Financial Sustainability of SMEs with tailored funding tools.

Last data update

Data for this pipeline project was last updated in August 2023