Participants at the 2021 African Economic Conference have urged countries to implement crucial governance and economic reforms to see the continent through a historic crisis brought on by the Covid-19 pandemic.
The conference brought together leading thinkers, development specialists and policymakers virtually and in Sal, Carbo Verde, to present their latest research on the challenges facing the continent, including mounting debt and an unrelenting health crisis.
“The next few years are critical for our continent…The richness that Africa has and the capacity it has doesn’t deserve to have people living in such poverty. We need to make the right decisions to fight extreme poverty,” said Cabo Verde Deputy Prime Minister, Olavo Correia, at the closing ceremony of the three-day hybrid event on Saturday.
Researchers at the conference identified three critical areas that need attention: human capital, institutions, and infrastructure, highlighting the critical role of the private sector role in each. Meanwhile, they shared their latest findings on the continent’s financial systems and called for reforms and greater capital market and monetary integration.
2021 AEC: Reforms, debt initiatives come under the spotlight as Africa enters ‘critical’ phase
Governments should rescind travel bans and follow WHO advice – IATA
The International Air Transport Association (IATA) called for governments to follow World Health Organization (WHO) advice and immediately rescind travel bans that were introduced in response to the Omicron variant of the coronavirus.
Public health organizations, including the WHO, have advised against travel curbs to contain the spread of Omicron. WHO advice for international traffic in relation to the SARS-CoV-2 Omicron variant states that:
“Blanket travel bans will not prevent the international spread, and they place a heavy burden on lives and livelihoods. In addition, they can adversely impact global health efforts during a pandemic by disincentivizing countries to report and share epidemiological and sequencing data. All countries should ensure that the measures are regularly reviewed and updated when new evidence becomes available on the epidemiological and clinical characteristics of Omicron or any other variants of concern.”
Millions could fall deeper into hunger
The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) is facing a major funding shortfall over the next six months threatening its ability to meet the critical food and nutrition needs of millions of food insecure Ethiopians and refugees.
WFP has a funding gap of US$579 million to delivering life-saving food assistance and livelihood support activities to 12 million people in Ethiopia over the next six months. This includes US$316 million that is urgently needed to deliver emergency food and nutrition assistance to 3.7 million people in northern Ethiopia over the next six months.
The Government of Ethiopia, WFP, and other partners are struggling to alleviate the country’s hunger crisis. The extended combined effects of conflict, drought, flooding, desert locust invasions, market disruptions and high food prices, and the COVID-19 pandemic have left an estimated 13.6 million people food insecure.
“Timely and complete food and nutrition support is critical to alleviating the suffering of millions across Ethiopia. In addition to the severe challenges facing conflict-impacted populations in many regions, we are deeply concerned about climate-related vulnerability and food insecurity in dry lowland areas,” says WFP Representative and Country Director, Dr. Steven Were Omamo.
Network set to provide the human capital for Africa’s transformational economic development
Africa’s future will be shaped by the young minds of the ECA Young Economists Network (ECA-YEN) who will be nurtured to take charge of the economic direction in which the continent goes. This was the conclusion drawn by the eminent panelists who were at the virtual launch of the ECA-YEN on 7 December 2021. The High-Level Webinar was attended by more than 200 young students across the continent, many of whom are members of the network.
The High-Level webinar reflected on the implication of stability-oriented macroeconomic policies and practices for building resilient economies to shocks at national and sub-regional levels.
The ECA-YEN’s mechanism to support macroeconomic stability, through nowcasting and forecasting at national, sub-regional levels, was presented.
