Africa is undergoing a demographic transition and its youth are often presented as a driving force for its development. However, the growth of the continent’s population also leads to an increase in the number of older people, who are left behind by the migratory temptations of the younger generation. This inevitable fact will be one of the priorities for African governments in the coming decades. Thus, new public policies will also need to be adopted.
Of all the fields of study in African demography, it is not aging that comes immediately to mind, given how much the continent is associated with youth.
To learn a little more about this issue, which remains largely unknown, the National Institute of Demographic Studies (INED) and the French Development Agency (AFD) have produced a study that presents, based on available statistical data, the state of existing public policies as well as the prospects for their implementation.
Young people, previously the majority, are the driving force in Africa
The median age, which defines the age that separates the population into two numerically equal parts, one younger and the other older, is 38 years in Europe and 30 years in Asia. On the African continent as a whole, this age is about 19 years, making it the youngest in the world.
This strong demographic dynamic is also expressed by the fact that more than % 60% of the African population is under 25 years old. Of course, this reality imposes an adaptation of social and economic policies, particularly in terms of employment. In most sub-Saharan countries, high fertility rates have contributed and continue to contribute to an exponential increase in the population. Several geopolitical projections estimate that the African population could reach 2.5 billion people by 2050 (Note: it currently has nearly 1.5 billion). Of these 2.5 billion people, those aged 60 and over will number approximately 215 million, or just over 8% of the global population. In 2023, only 5 to % 6% % of the African population was aged 60 and over. This statistical average should not obscure the fact that there are significant disparities between countries: % 3 to 4% in Uganda and Niger, compared to 7 to 9% in % South Africa and Tunisia. Compared to Europe, this proportion of the population represents 25% of % the total population recorded, 16% in North % America and 12% in Asia %.
Ageing, a new challenge for policy-makers
With a high mortality rate, the relatively low proportion of older people in particular in sub-Saharan countries explains the lack of commitment so far by policymakers to establish robust social protection and care systems for the elderly, even though they often live in very precarious living conditions, combining poverty and forms of vulnerability brought about by old age.
The elderly in Africa still rely heavily on family support or even close community structures (households, families, neighbors), but these social structures are rapidly changing with urbanization and the broader effects of globalization: the change in consumption patterns and the increased use of social networks are leading to a change in socio-anthropological values.
Although old age currently represents a small proportion of the African population (in percentage terms), this number is inevitably set to increase due to the continent’s strong demographic growth. As a result, new public health, social protection and pension-related challenges will undoubtedly need to be addressed.
The first of these challenges concerns the necessary progression in the level of social coverage of the population, which must also take into account the weight of informality in the economy. In order to guarantee protection for individuals against the broad range of social risks (illness, unemployment, work accidents, old age), it is essential to link this protection to the informal context of work, which accounts for approximately 80 % % of employment in Africa.
To do this, and according to experts, this social protection could be initiated in three phases. First, the implementation of «flexible» contributory schemes that would value contributions based on irregular income linked to informality. Second, the valorization of community systems such as the tontine, which could be better extended and shared, as well as the promotion of health mutuals adapted to self-employed workers, small production and trade entities. Finally, the extension of digital payments via «mobile money» that would simplify contributions and benefits, as is already widely the case in Rwanda or Kenya.
Necessary adjustments and the will of public policies
According to the AFD (the French Development Agency), the implementation of efficient social protection for the elderly, however, depends on several prerequisites. The first is the ability of the states to develop the human and technical skills necessary to raise taxes and, consequently, finance social protection through fiscal revenues. Moreover, the implementation of a linkage between health insurance and retirement benefits, aimed at ensuring individuals throughout their working life and beyond financial security that allows them to access care systems, is essential. Also, it will be necessary to combine the contributions collected from the income of workers in the formal sector (to fund health coverage and pension rights) with the public funding of informal workers, the unemployed and/or the more broadly defined vulnerable populations (isolated women, individuals with disabilities, etc.). Just as in so-called developed countries, other sources of funding must be considered: taxes on luxury products, new vehicles and fuels, on airline tickets, or even, but much less popular, financial transactions.
Of course, Western models are not always welcome on the continent and are difficult to transfer due to the great disparity between economies. On the one hand, massive investment in education and vocational training will be necessary to make African youth an engine of economic growth. On the other hand, health and social protection systems will also need to be built and reformed to meet the needs of an increasingly aging population. In other words, proactive management of the demographic dividend (i.e., the opportunity for countries with a demographic rejuvenation to see their economies grow temporarily) can ensure better consideration of the challenges associated with the aging population.
The persistent issue of the lack of reliable statistical data
Whatever the preferred scenarios for implementing social protection for the elderly, the big question arises in the collection and analysis of reliable and comprehensive socio-demographic data by country. However, the issue of demographic statistics remains a titanic undertaking in Africa. Indeed, the shortcomings in this field of study have significant consequences for many countries, more generally for the development of the continent.
In many African countries, a major weakness of underfunded civil registration systems, lacking human and technical resources, and an increasingly rare use of censuses, data collection and processing, make the task more complicated or almost impossible. Moreover, counting the populations living in areas of conflict or food insecurity remains particularly difficult, as does identifying the causes of death. Generally, only sporadic and targeted figures reported by various NGOs are of any reliability.
Managing the aging of the population illustrates the socio-economic realities of the continent
The financing of social protection for the elderly, which should be based on a strategic vision and, of course, political will, remains hypothetical or at least not a priority. Although solutions exist, ranging from mobilizing national resources through taxes, especially in economies that allow for them, to innovative actions in collection and rational management systems, to supporting international partners on pilot initiatives and targeted subsidies, finally including the informal sector in an adapted contributory system.
Beyond the various civil or military conflicts that characterize the continent, the issue of aging presents itself as a revelation of the fundamental levers for the development of most African countries in any case.
First, it will be for the governments of the continent to make a clear and sustainable choice of an economic growth model when the cohorts of older people grow. Moreover, public policies related to aging will also need to integrate the necessary adaptation to climate change, of which we already know that it particularly affects the African continent. This will have to be done through the implementation of systems of early warning for older people, practices for diagnosing the effects of extreme climatic events on vulnerable individuals such as the elderly, adapted housing, early warning systems, and various systems of local solidarity.
Also, the development of sustainable and lasting economies through the social organization of African societies appears clearly as a solution to curb the exodus of young people to the West, in particular.
For policymakers in sub-Saharan African countries as well as other local actors (businesses, civil society organizations), it is therefore crucial to anticipate the planned aging of populations. Without an absolute transposition, but by adapting the models, as in developed countries that have historically seen their economies develop thanks to an industrial and manufacturing model where the formal salaried workforce was at the core of building social protection systems.
In conclusion, the challenge facing Africa in the face of the aging of its population is to devise public policies adapted to an economic model specific to each cultural and social territory; at present, however, everything still relies too extensively on an informal economy based on ingenuity.
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