Equity Group chief executive Officer Dr James Mwangi has been appointed to join the newly formed World Bank Group High-Level Advisory Council on Jobs.
Dr Mwangi joins fourteen other world leaders to the council which is being co-chaired by President of Singapore Tharman Shanmugaratnam and Former President of Chile Michelle Bachelet for a period of two years.
The council is expected to offer thought leadership and actionable, scalable policy and program recommendations for the World Bank to explore, test and scale in order to support its
“The panel brings together the experience and knowledge of fourteen leading policymakers, business leaders, academics, and civil society pioneers,” noted Mr. Ajay Banga, President, World Bank Group
The Council will focus on youth and female employment opportunities in emerging and developing economies to help nations turn the challenge into an opportunity that powers the future.
“Over the next decade the world is expected to experience significant demographic shift with one in four people on the planet being African, and more than a third of the world’s young people residing in Africa” said Dr Mwangi.
According to the World Bank projection, within the next 10 years, an estimated 1.2 billion people in the Global South will become working age adults with only 420 million jobs available thus locking out some 800 million people without income sources.
The Council will focus on youth and female employment opportunities in emerging and developing economies to help nations turn the challenge into an opportunity that powers the future.
“These global demographic shifts are the result of progress on the African continent including life expectancy, per capita income, health, education and improving nutritional levels. An outcome of these developments has been rapid population growth. Effectively leveraging the demographic dividend in Africa could account for up to 15% of GDP growth and a 17% reduction in poverty by 2030,” he added.
The Council will meet every two months for an initial period of up to two years and will interact directly with senior management of the World Bank Group, ensuring that the Council’s ideas are taken forward.
Dr Mwangi further plans to leverage learnings of the council to maximize its Africa Recovery and Resilience Plan where Equity Group targets to create 50 million jobs in the region by 2030.
