Promoting IT talent
and creating jobs

African countries are increasingly offering attractive business prospects: a young population with a great affinity for digital applications, a growing workforce and increasing availability of skilled labour, new markets and a better integration into global value chains. Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) and digital service provision in particular offer huge growth potential.

IT companies that want to operate in these countries often face a variety of challenges. This is where Digital Skills Accelerator Africa e.V. (DSAA) can help by actively supporting companies engaging in Africa. It can help with training programmes for professionals in the IT sector and digital services or can promote networking between companies with a view to implementing (business) activities together.

Invest for Jobs supports DSAA, a registered non-profit association of companies in the digital services sector. The member companies have the common goal of inspiring, training and employing talented people in Africa for and in the IT sector. While doing so DSAA attaches great importance to promoting diversity in its member companies, for example by supporting women and fostering inclusion of people with disabilities.

The approach pursued by DSAA contributes to the future development of the digital sector in the countries in Africa – Côte d'Ivoire, Egypt, Ghana, Morocco, Rwanda and Senegal. From their locations DSAA companies offer digital services for local and European clients in areas such as telecommunications, automotive, banking and insurance. The association is open to new members and plans to extend its activities to other countries too.

DSAA aims to create business and employment opportunities in Africa. To do so, it promotes cooperation and networking between European companies and African IT firms. In addition, DSAA enables young people to take part in IT courses and further training programmes. Young people thus acquire not only the necessary IT expertise but also language and management skills to subsequently work for international clients in the IT service sector and customer experience management. DSAA’s member companies identify the expertise that their potential employees currently lack.

One of the aspects DSAA focuses on is the economic empowerment of women. The member companies offer career advice and hold motivational talks, for example. Another goal involves including people with disabilities and ensuring that they have equal access to the labour market. DSAA member companies receive advisory services on barrier-free recruitment processes and infrastructure, to enable them, for example, to design training rooms and computer programmes that are accessible to all.

In the next few years, DSAA aims to achieve the following:

• Exploit its potential to create up to 5,000 good jobs in the African branches of DSAA member companies and other international companies.
• Expand the training programmes at DSAA member companies in order to offer training to even more talented young people.
• Foster the inclusion of people with disabilities through inclusive recruitment processes and barrier-free workplace infrastructures.

During the corona pandemic, Invest for Jobs and DSAA supported companies in securing jobs and protecting employee health in the partner countries. Through online seminars, digital learning platforms, hygiene measures, mobile working concepts and employee shuttle services, DSAA member companies have been able to keep their businesses up and running even during the pandemic.

DSAA’s current and future projects are geared towards making lasting improvements in the situation for talented young IT specialists and in labour market access for disadvantaged people. For instance, DSAA member companies have recently launched programmes in Côte d'Ivoire and Ghana.

In May 2022, Atos launched the first training programme with the support of Invest for Jobs in Egypt. Atos is a leading international provider of digital solutions and consulting services in the field of digital security and the end-to-end partnership concept. Up to 240 trainees are expected to complete the 'Campus Training Programme', and almost all of them will be taken on as permanent employees at Atos.

In Rwanda, Tek Experts – a global leader in software development and technical support services – ran a training programme that reached 160 trainees by March 2022. The two-month programme was aimed specifically at women trainees and trainees with disabilities and focused on encouraging their participation. Tek Experts is working with the National Union of Disability Organizations of Rwanda (NUDOR) to pursue an inclusive approach to promoting women applicants and people with disabilities.

A local company, SolvIt, is also implementing a programme in Rwanda. With the support of Invest for Jobs, the Rwandan company is providing training for young people, in particular, to give them the skills to meet international clients’ requirements. After successfully piloting its Software Development Training programme, SolvIt is expanding its activities in Rwanda, with plans to train a further 300 trainees by July 2023 and prepare them for the international developer market.

DSAA is supported by the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) GmbH in the context of Invest for Jobs on behalf of the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ).