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By Derrick Bangura.
It added that as countries like Nigeria continue to evolve, more chances for developers would open up, which will help to expand the economy.
Despite the hurdles posed by the COVID-19 pandemic, Africa’s developer ecosystem was on the rise, according to the research, which was released on Monday at a Google webinar.
According to the conclusions of a study that included fielded and analyzed surveys as well as interviews with local experts in 16 Sub-Saharan African nations.
According to the report, demand for African developers hit an all-time high in 2021, despite the global economic crisis and the pandemic’s impact.
With the increased use of the internet by small and medium businesses (SMBs) on the continent, which the report estimates to be over 22%, the demand for web development services has increased, as has the demand for remote development work, with the report estimating that 38% of African developers work for at least one company based outside of Africa.
The extent of expansion in Nigeria’s professional developer community, which added an expected 5,000 new professionals to its pool in 2021, demonstrated this, according to the research.
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While Africa’s tech innovation sector is making remarkable achievements, global tech companies, academics, and governments can do more to guarantee that the industry becomes a strategic economic pillar, according to Nitin Gajria, Google’s Managing Director in Africa.
“At Google, we’re focused on kindling more training and support for this community by closing the developer skills gap and focusing our efforts on upskilling female engineers who face specific hurdles.”
By 2022, Google wants to teach 100,000 developers across Africa.
“To date, there are more than 150 active Google Developer Groups and 100 Developer Student Clubs on the African continent.” “These organizations collectively contact over 200,000 community members in 40 of the 48 nations in Sub-Saharan Africa,” Gajria said.
The Africa Developer Ecosystem Report 2021 is the second in a series of reports on the state of the Internet economy on the continent. The first, produced in collaboration with the International Finance Corporation (IFC), estimated that Africa’s Internet economy might grow to 5.2% of GDP by 2025, adding almost $180 billion to the continent’s economy. By 2050, the estimated potential contribution might be worth $712 billion.
“To realize this promise, we must improve access to high-quality, world-class skilling on mobile technology platforms, as well as increase connection in Africa.” Infrastructure, devices, technologies, and product localization are all part of Gajria’s endeavor to improve connectivity.
The research also noted the growth of Africa’s developer population across the continent, as well as a rise in venture capitalist investments in African businesses and support for women’s entrepreneurship in Africa, among other things.
Despite a weakening economy, the number of professional developers climbed by 3.8 percent, accounting for 0.4% of the continent’s non-agricultural workforce, according to the research. Salaries and pay increased as well, and more engineers were able to get full-time positions.
According to the research, African entrepreneurs raised over $4 billion in 2021, 2.5 times higher than in 2020, with Fintech startups accounting for more than half of this funding. For African engineers, the transition to remote work opened up additional job prospects across time zones and countries, while also raising remuneration for senior talent. As a result, worldwide firms are hiring African developers at an unprecedented rate.
Educators, on the other hand, struggled to make progress last year due to a lack of access to in-person education, as well as affordable, dependable internet access and at-home technology. This is evidenced by the fact that the gender disparity between men and women developers has worsened, with 2.5 percent fewer women developers in the workforce in 2020 than in 2010.
The research urged educators, tech companies, and governments to improve internet access, education, and business support in order to help developers succeed.
