Online Reporter
Sunday Mail Reporter
AFRICAN youths should take the lead in the continent’s industrialisation and economic transformation agenda by exploiting vast opportunities in mining, agriculture and information and communication technology (ICT), the Dean of African Diplomatic Corps accredited to Zimbabwe, Ambassador James Musoni, has said.
In an interview with The Sunday Mail ahead of tomorrow’s Africa Day commemorations, Amb Musoni said young people remain Africa’s greatest resource.
Africa Day, celebrated annually on May 25, serves as a call to action for both Africans and the global community to collaborate towards a prosperous and united Africa.
The day commemorates the founding of the Organisation of African Unity (OAU) — now the African Union — in 1963.
This year’s celebrations are running under the theme “Assuring Sustainable Water Availability and Safe Sanitation Systems to Achieve the Goals of Agenda 2063”.
He said Africa’s youthful population, which he described as “the largest, most connected and most entrepreneurially ambitious in human history”, has the capacity to accelerate the continent’s socio-economic development.
“Africa’s greatest resource is not beneath its soil; it walks on two legs and is under the age of 25,” Amb Musoni said.
“Let me begin with the opportunities, because Africa’s challenges are well-documented; what is less told is our extraordinary promise. Africa is home to 60 percent of the world’s uncultivated arable land; the solution to global food insecurity grows in our soil. We hold 30 percent of the world’s mineral reserves, including critical minerals such as lithium, cobalt, coltan, upon which the entire global green energy transition depends. We have a youth population that is the largest, most connected and most entrepreneurially ambitious in human history.
“Our creative economy, including music, film, fashion, cuisine, is reshaping global culture.”
Amb Musoni also said Africa should fully utilise existing free trade agreements, particularly the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA), to strengthen intra-African trade and accelerate economic integration.
He called for increased trade among African countries to promote industrial growth, create employment opportunities and reduce dependence on external markets.
“AfCFTA is perhaps the single most consequential instrument Africa has created since the founding of the OAU,” he added.
“It is the largest free trade agreement on earth by number of participating nations. And yet, we trade more with Europe and Asia than we trade with each other. Intra-African trade sits at approximately 15 percent of total African trade, compared to 60 percent within Europe and 58 percent within Asia. This is not a natural condition; it is the residue of colonial trade architecture that was deliberately designed to extract, not to circulate.”
Africa, he added, must urgently implement practical measures to strengthen regional integration under the African Union’s Agenda 2063 framework.
He said there was a need for African countries to remove tariff- and non-tariff barriers, including bureaucratic bottlenecks, differing standards and cumbersome customs procedures, which continue to hinder trade.
Amb Musoni also called for increased investment in infrastructure such as roads, railways, energy networks and digital systems to improve connectivity between African markets and facilitate trade and industrialisation.
African governments also have to harmonise payment systems through the accelerated implementation of the Pan-African Payment and Settlement System to enable intra-African transactions to be conducted more efficiently without reliance on foreign currencies, he added.
The envoy, who is also Rwanda’s Ambassador to Zimbabwe, stressed the importance of empowering the private sector, particularly women entrepreneurs and youth-led enterprises, saying they are central to driving intra-African trade and economic growth.
He, however, bemoaned the current global governance system and said it no longer reflects present-day geopolitical and economic realities, as major international institutions were established in the aftermath of the Second World War without meaningful African participation.
He said institutions such as the United Nations Security Council, International Monetary Fund, World Bank and World Trade Organisation were created in 1944 and 1945 to serve a post-war global order that has since evolved.
