The African Development Bank
(AfDB) has underscored the success of its program aimed at bolstering job
opportunities for young people in Cameroon.
At a meeting convened in
Yaoundé on April 9, 2024, chaired by Marie-Laure Akin-Olugbade, the Bank
Group’s Vice-President for Regional Development, Integration, and Business
Delivery, stakeholders across various sectors gathered to discuss the Bank’s
Program to Support Youth Employability in Cameroon.
The meeting saw significant
participation from female entrepreneurs and young graduates who have benefited
from work placements in projects financed by the Bank.
The event took place just
ahead of the official inauguration of the AfDB Group’s regional office for
Central Africa, signaling the Bank’s unwavering commitment to regional
development.
Alongside young interns
engaged in professional immersion within Bank-funded projects, the gathering
also brought together male and female entrepreneurs active in agriculture,
fishing, livestock, fish farming, and young women supported by the Bank to
establish their own businesses. Additionally, managers from project management
units were in attendance.
According to the Director-General
of the Bank Group for Central Africa and head of the Bank’s Country Office in
Cameroon, Serge N’Guessan, interns are deployed to projects in roles such as
disbursement or contract award assistants, assistant engineers for road projects,
archivists, among others.
N’Guessan revealed that 284
young individuals had already benefited from 12-month placements, providing
them with valuable opportunities to integrate into various workplace settings,
including projects funded by the Bank or other donors, as well as the private
or public sectors. Notably, seven of them have secured positions within the
Ministry of Public Works.
As the program prepares to
receive its seventh cohort of interns, it has significantly contributed to integrating
the majority of beneficiaries into the workforce.
Dieudonné Toukea, one of the
program beneficiaries, shared her experience, underscoring the opportunities
afforded by her initial exposure to the workplace, which enabled her to pursue
her aspirations in the consultancy field.
“This initial experience
really opened up opportunities for my friends and me. It gave me the chance to
develop other activities after my placement and look for additional
qualifications, which means I can now pursue a career in consultancy. Thank you
for the opportunity we were given,” she said.
The participants advocated
for the opening up a fund to finance entrepreneurs and for more opportunities
to work on Bank projects. Finally, they hoped that the process of creating a
web platform for networking with former interns could be speeded up.
Akin-Olugbade reasserted the
importance of self-employment, especially for young people and women,
emphasizing the Bank Group’s support through initiatives such as AFAWA (Affirmative
Finance Action for Women in Africa). She highlighted collaboration with
commercial banks to make access to credit easier for female entrepreneurs,
emphasizing their reliability and greater capacity for repaying loans.
“We work with the commercial
banks and offer them guarantees that help them to lend to female entrepreneurs.
We also organize training for credit managers in banks to raise their awareness
about being more open to funding applications submitted by women, since –
contrary to popular belief – there is little risk in lending to women and women
are best when it comes to repayments,” she stated.
“The project here in Cameroon
is unique and I urge you to seize the opportunity, keep training and improve
your skills to be even more competitive in the labour market,” the
Vice-President of the Bank Group told the young people present. She pointed out
that Africa needed to find work for the 12 million jobseekers who joined the
labour market every year.
The meeting was also an
opportunity for Jeanine Nkodo, coordinator of the Agricultural Value Chain
Development Project, to highlight the specific efforts to support female
entrepreneurs in this sector.
The Vice-President concluded
by speaking about the Bank’s recent adoption of its ten-year strategy, which
puts young people and women at the heart of its priorities. She also reaffirmed
the Bank’s role as one of Cameroon’s key partners, particularly in terms of
infrastructure funding and support for regions in crisis.
The Bank is also keen to
support large businesses, particularly in the private sector, to encourage
greater openness to young people and women.
“The Bank is open to
providing funding to support these interns’ projects to help them integrate
into society and the workplace by starting their own businesses,” said the
Vice-President.
“We offer guarantees to
commercial banks so that they can lend to female entrepreneurs” – Marie-Laure
Akin-Olugbade, Vice-President for Regional Development, Integration and
Business Delivery.
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