The Rockefeller Foundation has announced the creation of a $100 million youth employment initiative for Africa.

Announced at a recent World Economic Forum meeting in Cape Town, South Africa, the Digital Jobs Africa initiative aims to capitalize on the youth bulge in Africa, which boasts the world's youngest population and where 60 percent of young people are unemployed, and the rapid expansion of the continent's information communication technology (ICT) sector to connect one million young people in six countries — South Africa, Kenya, Nigeria, Ghana, Morocco, and Egypt — to job training and employment opportunities.

To help address the unemployment problem on the continent, Digital Jobs Africa will focus on three specific interventions: leveraging rising demand from multinationals and African companies and governments to create so-called digital jobs in areas such as data entry, service center support, online research, and Web design; working with local organizations to provide ICT skills training to young people; and coordinating among government and businesses to create a supportive and sustainable environment for digital job creation.

"The current pace of job creation in Africa is insufficient to meet the demands of a youth population growing in size and becoming better educated," said Mamadou Biteye, managing director of the Rockefeller Foundation's regional office in Africa. "Digital skills are fast becoming a requirement to gain employment, and ICT-enabled jobs are more critical than ever in helping young people develop the required skills for the jobs of the future."