The African Youth Survey suggests a major culture shift in favour of emigration, with two thirds of young African people losing optimism about the future of living on the continent.
BBC News reports researchers organised 4,000 face-to-face interviews across 15 countries for the survey. They discovered there was little optimism about the direction of their countries, but remained optimistic about their personal futures.
As many as 80% of the respondents plan to start their own businesses, with more than half expressing the desire to emigrate in the next few years.
This supports findings from the Africa Center For Strategic Studies’ paper African Migration Trends to Watch in 2022. It indicated that ‘the push-pull forces driving African migration continue to intensify, portending expanding African migration within and off the continent in 2022’. The primary push factors are conflict, repressive governance, and limited economic opportunities. It also reported that the number of documented migrants within and from the African region has nearly doubled since 2010, continuing a two-decade trend of expansion.
The African Youth Survey participants recommended governments prioritise creating well-paid jobs, reducing corruption and fighting climate change to help African countries progress.
Research shows that most African migration remains on the continent, continuing a long-established pattern. Around 21 million documented Africans live in another African country with urban areas in Nigeria, South Africa, and Egypt being the main destinations for this inter-African migration. This reflects the relative economic dynamism of these locales.
Among African migrants who have moved off the continent— some 11 million live in Europe, almost 5 million in the Middle East, and more than 3 million in Northern America.