In Chapter 1, our experts discuss how the next 10 years of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) will shape policy priorities for African governments and their partners. Progress has been uneven both across countries and across goals, often hindered by a lack of coordination across national and local governments as well as the global system at large. In Chapter 2, our experts discuss not only how African countries can build and sustain peace and end corruption, but also how the global community can support institution-building efforts. More broadly, good governance must be inclusive, so our experts share how support for widespread democracy as well as the empowerment of
women can and will bring gains for all. The authors in Chapter 3, then, offer strategies for governments to invest in sectors primed to grow and create jobs, prepare young people for the jobs of the future, and improve the quality of living in Africa’s rapidly growing cities. Overshadowing all of these challenges is the threat of climate change. Food security is particularly in the crosshairs as climate change threatens means of production and the nutrition of the continent’s people. At the same time, the perils of increasing and strengthening natural disasters loom over the millions of people living in low elevation coastal zones. As the authors argue in Chapter 4, without aggressive and
comprehensive global and local action, other reforms addressing economic growth and human development will be for naught. In Chapter 5, the authors explore how groundbreaking technology—such as artificial intelligence— can, hand-in-hand with enabling and empowering policies, improve business, health care, and the livelihoods of all. In Chapter 6, our experts explore the new commercial
and diplomatic opportunities Africa is creating as it empowers itself from within and suggest how the continent might respond to new foreign partners looking to tap into this potential.
