DIGITAL AFRICA (FRENCH EDITION)

Technological Transformation for Jobs

By Tania Begazo, Moussa P. Blimpo, and Mark A. Dutz

All African countries need better and more jobs for their growing populations. Digital Africa: Technological Transformation for Jobs shows that broader use of productivity-enhancing digital technologies by enterprises and households is imperative to generate such jobs, including for lower-skilled people. At the same time, broader use can support not only countries’ short-term objective of postpandemic economic recovery but also their vision of economic transformation with more inclusive growth.

These outcomes are not automatic, however. Mobile internet availability has increased throughout the continent in recent years, but Africa’s uptake gap is the highest in the world. Areas with at least 3G mobile internet service now cover 84 percent of country populations averaged across Sub-Saharan Africa, but only 22 percent use such services. The average African business lags in the use of smartphones and computers, as well as more sophisticated digital technologies that catalyze further productivity gains.

Two issues explain the usage gap: the affordability of these new technologies and the willingness to use them.

August 2023. 274 pages.

Stock no. C211970 (ISBN: 978-1-4648-1970-4). US$49.50

For those countries already using these technologies, the development payoffs are significant. New empirical studies for this report add to the rapidly growing evidence that mobile internet availability directly raises enterprise productivity, increases jobs, and reduces poverty across Africa.

To realize these and other benefits more widely, Africa’s countries must implement complementary and mutually reinforcing policies to strengthen both consumers’ ability to pay and willingness to use digital technologies. These interventions must prioritize productive use to generate large numbers of inclusive jobs in a region poised to benefit from a massive, youthful workforce—one projected to become the world's largest by the end of this century.

Also Available In English

Digital Africa

Technological Transformation for Jobs

April 2023. 246 pages. Stock no. C211737 (ISBN: 9781464817373). US$ 48.50

LAND MATTERS (FRENCH EDITION)

Can Better Governance and Management of Scarcity Prevent a Looming Crisis in the Middle East and North Africa?

By Anna Corsi and Harris Selod

Across the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region, land is scarce and valuable. Demand for land is projected to dramatically increase to meet the needs of a fast-growing urban population. At the same time, the supply of land is restricted by weak governance and climate factors, causing the quasiexhaustion of cultivable land reserves. As a result, a crisis is looming—yet, land continues to be used inefficiently, inequitably, and unsustainably.

Land Matters: Can Better Governance and Management of Scarcity Prevent a Looming Crisis in the Middle East and North Africa? identifies and analyzes the economic, environmental, and social challenges associated with land in the MENA region, shedding light on policy options and proposing paths to reform. It concludes that MENA countries need to act promptly, think more holistically about land, reassess the strategic trade-offs, and minimize land distortions.

This report promotes a culture of open data, transparency, and inclusive dialogue on land, while filling major data gaps. These important steps will contribute to renewing the social contract, transforming the region economically and digitally, improving women’s land rights, and facilitating recovery and reconstruction in a context of dramatic social, political, and climatic transformation.

Also Available

LAND MATTERS (ENGLISH EDITION)

Can Better Governance and Management of Scarcity Prevent a Looming Crisis in the Middle East and North Africa?

February 2023. 128 pages. Stock no. C211661 (ISBN: 9781464816611). US$48.50

LAND MATTERS (ARABIC EDITION)

Can Better Governance and Management of Scarcity Prevent a Looming Crisis in the Middle East and North Africa?

February 2023. 114 pages. Stock no. C211889 (ISBN: 9781464818899). US$43.95