Background
Sub-Saharan Africa will need to create 18 million new jobs a year by 2035, while currently only 3 million are annually created. This issue is a crucial priority for the The Youth Café. In this endeavor of job creation, young people are uniquely positioned to stimulate innovation and create social capital, especially in key sectors such as agribusiness and renewable energy. Youth must be empowered to participate in shaping a shared future and economy, working closely in partnership with agribusiness and renewable energy. There are gaps in support services for young entrepreneurs, in knowledge of and access to current flagship initiatives.
Our objectives for Business, Jobs & Entrepreneurship.
“To harness the job creation potential of agribusiness and renewable energy by fostering collaboration, investment, knowledge transfer, organizational support and scale-up for young incubators/accelerators of start-ups and Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs). ”
“Two or more incubators are strengthened to deliver services to young entrepreneurs in the agribusiness and renewable energy sectors. ”
“An initial group of high-potential young entrepreneurs is trained, mentored and supported, enabling their start-ups/SMEs to grow (job creation, turnover increase, partnerships) and addressing gaps in the agribusiness and renewable energy value chains.”
“Enhanced knowledge transfer between African entrepreneurship stakeholders, focused on agribusiness and renewable energy.”
Our activities and aspirations on Business, Jobs & Entrepreneurship
Enhancing Business incubators (“Co-Creation Labs”) with physical locations in Africa for capacity-building and virtual connection/access throughout Africa and internationally, focused on the agribusiness and renewable energy sectors. The Co-Creation Labs in each target location are and will be supported.
Selecting young entrepreneurs working across the agri-business and renewable energy value chains, based on a set of criteria (e.g. already owning a business or a proof of concept, innovative, oriented to the future markets, with potential for digital applications,…).
Providing support and services (skills development, capacity building, coaching, mentoring, seed funding) to the selected entrepreneurs as well as local associations, networks or foundations, enabling business growth, income and sustainability.
Facilitating joint partnerships and/or investment in and between the rest of the world and Africa;
Enabling and maintaining a virtual platform/digital directory of high potential African businesses in the two sectors to facilitate joint partnerships and/or investment in and between African countries, knowledge exchange, networking and building a community of practice, partnership development.
Raising visibility and awareness of the Co-creation Labs to attract high quality entrepreneurs and investors; facilitate private sector support, public investments and public-private partnerships.
Providing recommendations on how to address the gaps in current agribusiness and renewable energy value chains.