West Africa: Youth and Ambition
Business Daily
BBC
4.4 • 816 Ratings
🗓️ 13 March 2018
⏱️ 17 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Africa has the youngest population of any continent in the world and that figure is expected to double in less than 30 years. The BBC's Tamasin Ford travels across three countries to hear from young people about their hopes and dreams for their working lives. In Ghana, she talks to award winning actor and producer Yvonne Nelson. In Ivory Coast Tamasin hears from Edith Brou, CEO of her own Digital Agency, the Africa Content Group. And in Liberia, young people tell Tamasin about their hopes for the future in a country where youth unemployment is very high amongst the sixty percent of the population who are under 25.
(Photo; Young men on the streets of Monrovia, Liberia. Credit: Tamasin Ford)
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | Hello and welcome to a special edition of Business Daily with me, Tamerson Ford. |
| 0:06.2 | I've been travelling across West Africa talking to people about the continent's rapidly growing number of young people. |
| 0:13.0 | Africa has the youngest population in the world, and that figure is expected to double in less than 30 years. |
| 0:20.1 | Is it a ticking time bomb of unemployment and potential unrest? |
| 0:24.6 | In this country, we're a young university, colleges and also technical school |
| 0:29.9 | will be a great help for the youth. |
| 0:32.7 | Or is it a spectacular opportunity to harness the dynamism |
| 0:37.1 | young people so often bring with them? |
| 0:39.9 | It's like having a lot of beautiful flowers in your garden |
| 0:44.0 | every time during the year. |
| 0:46.6 | They are energetic, dynamic. |
| 0:50.1 | They can learn very, very fast. |
| 0:53.7 | That's all coming up. |
| 1:00.0 | First to Monrovia, Liberia, |
| 1:03.0 | where the sheer number of young people is visible wherever you go. |
| 1:09.0 | In the market, it's young women behind the stalls. On the streets, it's young women behind the stalls. |
| 1:12.6 | On the streets, it's young men riding the motorbike taxis, or pen pens as they're known here. |
| 1:18.6 | So it's quite fitting that one of the continent's youngest leaders has newly taken the reins. |
| 1:23.6 | At the age of 51, football legend George Weir bucks Africa's trend of old men leading |
| 1:29.8 | their country for decades. The UN estimates more than 60% of Liberia's population is under |
| 1:36.7 | 25 and the majority of them are unemployed. Arguably, Weir's biggest challenge. |
| 1:54.9 | On the outskirts of the city, in Logantown, 22-year-old Corita Thomas is cooking dinner for her five-year-old daughter. |
... |
Please login to see the full transcript.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from BBC, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of BBC and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2026.