Corporate Africa: Online Africa

Bridging Africa's skills gap

Michelle Hakata of the Commonwealth Business Council outlines a new and unique recruitment initiative that aims to draw African workers in the Diaspora back to the continent where their skills can help revitalize the economies of their homeland.

African leaders, concerned at the "brain drain" and its effects on their nation's economies, have endorsed a new initiative aimed at reversing the trend and encouraging Africans in the Diaspora to return to the continent. The initiative is also concerned with retaining the skills of other professionals and executives by encouraging them to remain in Africa.

The initiative - AfricaRecruit - was set up with the support of the Commonwealth Business Council (CBC) as a contribution from the private sector to help mobilize the skills of the hundreds of thousands of African professionals

to provide a vehicle through which human resources issues can be addressed," said Dr Banjoko. AfricaRecruit's wide network of recruitment consultants, organizations and communities in the Diaspora and Africa is coordinated from London. This provides clients with both an international and a local service tailored to their specific needs.

AfricaRecruit consists of AfricaRecruit and www.findajobinafrica.com - a job search engine where companies and recruitment agencies can post vacancies in Africa, which can then be accessed by individuals wanting to find work on the continent. It enables recruitment

who have left or are tempted to leave Africa. It is also a platform for debate with the African Diaspora on how to contribute to an Africa-wide skills strategy and help governments and employers work together to ease the process of skills transferal. AfricaRecruit has registered over 20,000 professionals in its first six months. AfricaRecruit has been endorsed by Nepad, and is hailed as a practical way of bridging and closing the gaps in Africa's human capital base. It aims to support the Nepad human resource development initiative and to reverse "brain drain": building and retaining within

agencies and organizations with vacancies in Africa to connect with jobseekers, wherever they are located. Interest in the website has ballooned since it was set up. The internet site receives nearly a million hits a month, and in the past two years over 14,000 jobs have been advertized on the site.

AfricaRecruit will address the broader human resource challenges faced by Africa by developing practical and innovative measures that can help to improve the professional labor market. It will also create and adopt best practices and strategies between citizens,

the continent the critical human capacities necessary for Africa's development.

An estimated 40 per cent of African professionals have settled outside the continent, and the shortage of skilled and experienced workers is retarding development, holding back investment, job creation and improved services for Africa. The number of doctors who have left Nigeria is, perhaps, an indication of the extent of the problem. Migration organizations estimate that there are 26,000 Nigerian doctors in the US.

Dr Titi Banjoko, one of the founders of AfricaRecruit and a director of the organization, estimates that some 20,000 professionals leave Africa every year and are replaced by expatriates. "Africa has a fragmented employment market place. Policies to address human resources needs and highlight the problems are not in place. AfricaRecruit aims

governments and employers. The official London launch of AfricaRecruit provided a forum for exchange between African leaders, the corporate sector and leading representatives from the Diaspora - as well as African professionals. The inaugural seminar "Skills for Africa," which was attended by an audience of 300 people, identified policies and practical measures to mobilize Africans in the Diaspora who wish to return home.

The launch was accompanied by what became Africa's biggest recruitment job fair, attended by over 3,500 African professionals and expatriates living in the UK and Europe who were interested in working in Africa. Some 40 leading African and international companies were exhibitors at the job fair. The aim of the fair was to strengthen awareness, and provide practical services to employers and job seekers - as well as to widen the ongoing policy debate about the overall strengthening of technical and professional capacity.