About Us
Championing Africa's Youth Potential
The International Entrepreneurial Development and Innovation Fund for Youth in Africa — transforming unemployment into opportunity through innovation and entrepreneurship.
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1.54B
People in Africa
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60%+
Youth Population
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4
Program Pillars
Who we are
Our Concept Of Intervention
The International Entrepreneurial Development and Innovation Fund for Youth in Africa (iEDIFY Africa) Initiative: The iEDIFY Africa is an innovative concept aimed at contributing to ongoing efforts at finding long-term and sustainable options for addressing the continent's youth unemployment. We will deploy tools of advocacy, training/capacity building and resource/fund mobilization to enhance the entrepreneurial and employment prospects of young people as they transition from school into the world of work. The program will introduce young people to new ways of thinking about national development and their potential role and contribution to economic development and prosperous future for themselves. The agency will work to identify and collaborate with key stakeholders and actors across the spectrum to provide education/training and capacity building and facilitate strategic funding mechanisms to enable the generation of seed for program participants. Advocacy efforts will target policy decision-makers and the broad range of stakeholders and actors with a view to raising awareness and advocating for innovative policy and action that help to address long term issues of funding gaps related to youth unemployment/underemployment and the attendant challenges.
Our Reflections
Africa's Youth Unemployment: A Tale of Great Expectation, Vicious Desperation and Vulnerability
Obed was an unemployed accounting graduate and budding gospel artist who had invested his savings in studio gadgets. On the night of September 14, 2022 — exhausted after a late recording session — he and his younger brother David were home alone when two young men wielding machetes broke in.
The intruders tied the brothers up and ransacked the house for anything of value. When they demanded Obed unlock his iPhone, he used the moment to send a silent alert to their elder brother, then spent the next minutes shielding David from the machetes with his own body.
A church response team arrived within moments and the burglars fled with the phone and Obed's only recording. At the police station, the brothers learned the same pair had robbed another home that night — the kind of desperation that joblessness breeds.
These are the extremes to which hopelessness drives unemployed youth. Yet countless young Africans carry dreams like Obed's — and it is those dreams that iEDIFY Africa champions, believing that even those who have lost their way can be redirected into impactful leaders of the continent's future.
Where we're going
Our Vision
Our vision is that of a thriving Africa where empowered and innovative youth drive sustainable development and transform communities through innovation and entrepreneurship.
iEDIFY Africa Vision
Why we exist
Our Mission
To educate, train and equip African youth with essential skills, resources and funding to create sustainable businesses, overcome unemployment and poverty and lead impactful change through entrepreneurship.
Our strategy
Strategic Perspective
The Bretton Woods institutions, including the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) have long fostered development at the macro level, but it is our view that the endemic youth unemployment in Africa requires a pragmatic shift. True stabilization requires investing directly into the continent's ultimate resource: the innovation and entrepreneurial potential of its youth. Investing directly in youth innovation and entrepreneurship is a transformative action to combat unemployment, poverty and socio-political unrest. With over 60% of Africa's 1.54 billion people under 30, harnessing their potential can drive economic growth and stability while reducing illegal migration and exploitation by human traffickers.
What we stand for
What Guides Us
Youth-Centered
Young Africans are not a problem to be managed—they are the continent's greatest asset for transformation.
Enterprise-Driven
Sustainable jobs and dignity come from building businesses, not waiting for opportunity to arrive.
Partnership-Led
Lasting impact requires collaboration across governments, educators, investors, and communities.
Accountable Impact
We pursue measurable outcomes in employment, skills, and community transformation.