I have consistently been a proponent of the growth opportunities available across Africa. This is despite my passion being challenged many times by those who believe that the Africa Rising premise has not delivered to the degree required for high levels of growth.
My passion was ignited even more this week when I had a chance to listen to a fellow speaker at the Business Day Dialogues, Stanlib chief economist Kevin Lings.
I was expecting him to share shocking insights about the state of the global and local economy, after which I would then get on the stage and help people recover by reigniting hope and sharing insights on how organisations and teams can continue to thrive under uncertainty.
Lings stayed away from the typical shock factors and emphasised that the noise we focus on is merely short term. Instead, we need to focus on tapping into the opportunities that will emerge from developing Africa's competitive advantages in decades to come.
Africa has the youngest population in the world. We are the only region in the world where the working-age population growth surpasses overall population growth, according to the Africa Competitiveness Report from the World Economic Forum.
The IMF states that 80% of the projected four-billion increase in the global population by the year 2100 will be from Africa.
These are numbers that speak to the competitive advantage our region has over other parts of the world, indisputably so. Even countries with large populations such as China and India do not have the demographic-dividend potential that Africa has.
The answer lies in us systematically collaborating across African markets to find ways to make the most of this opportunity in the long term. We tend to be very short-sighted and disheartened by the current reality of the continent, allowing our long-term plans to be distracted by economic and political turmoil, which, on its own, does not change the fundamental opportunities.
To turn the demographic opportunity into a real dividend the continent will benefit from, we need to prioritise the fixing of issues that prevent us from being able to reap the benefits.
We need to prioritise the youth - the very people whose increased economic participation we will rely on to drive the continent's productivity.
In South Africa, for example, it is clear that factors such as education and basic skills development are getting in the way of creating young people who are productive economic participants. The state of the youth's health is another concern. The list of issues can go on.
Last month StatsSA released a report stating that South Africa needed to prioritise these issues since we were already ahead of most African countries with respect to the demographic transition, meaning that we are under more pressure to make things work so that we do not end up in the same situation in which most developed economies find themselves today: lacking enough productive young people to drive growth.
How about we all pick an intervention for a problem we are most excited about solving? Education, skills, health - let's pick one and invest our time and resources in the parts of this growth story that we are most passionate about.
A couple of years ago, I put my hand up to make a difference in education and invested in the start-up of a new chain of schools focused on teaching innovative ways of learning and acquiring skills.
Today, Nova Pioneer Education Group has educated more than a thousand children and youth in African countries and continues to grow. Within decades, it will have contributed significantly towards materialising the benefits from the demographic dividend.
I hope this inspires us all to similarly put our hands up for the challenges we are passionate about addressing, and make that part of our priorities going into 2018 and beyond.
We always start the year by listing priorities for our lives. This time, let us add to that list the contributions we are prepared to make to help our region be better positioned to benefit from its demographic dividend in the long term.
• Sikhakhane is a global speaker and business strategist specialising in leadership, entrepreneurship and change management, with an MBA from Stanford University
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