World Bank Group President Ajay Banga has issued a stark warning that over the next 10 to 15 years, 1.2 billion young people in developing countries will enter the workforce competing for only 400 million jobs, leaving an 800 million person gap that could either power global growth or trigger mass instability and migration.
Speaking at the 2025 World Bank and International Monetary Fund Annual Meetings plenary in Washington, D.C., Banga described the demographic shift as one of the great challenges in human history, with Africa bearing the most staggering burden. By 2050, one in four people globally will live in Africa, where countries like Zambia will add 700,000 people annually, Mozambique’s population will double, and Nigeria will grow by 130 million, firmly establishing itself among the world’s most populous nations.
“Four young people will step into the global workforce every second over the next ten years,” Banga said. “So in the time it takes to deliver these remarks, tens of thousands will cross that threshold, full of ambition, impatient for opportunity.”
The World Bank president has made job creation the institution’s central mission, describing it as the “North Star” that guides all development work. He argues that jobs are more than paychecks but represent purpose, dignity, and the straightest line to stability, serving as both the anchor that holds families steady and the glue that keeps societies together.
“With the right investments focused not on need, but opportunity, we can unlock a powerful engine of global growth,” Banga explained. “Without purposeful effort, their optimism risks turning into despair, fueling instability, unrest, and mass migration with implications for every region and every economy.”
To address this challenge, the World Bank Group has restructured its operations around a three-pillar strategy recognizing that nearly 90 percent of jobs ultimately come from the private sector, though they don’t all begin there. The first pillar involves governments building human and physical infrastructure like roads, ports, electricity, education, digitization, and healthcare, financed through the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development and the International Development Association.
The second pillar focuses on creating a business environment with clear rules, a level playing field, and sound economic management, including secure land rights, predictable taxes, transparent institutions, responsible debt management, and exchange rate policies. The third pillar supports private sector scaling through the International Finance Corporation and Multilateral Investment Guarantee Agency, providing capital, equity, guarantees, and political risk insurance.
Banga identified five sectors with the greatest potential to create jobs: infrastructure and energy, agribusiness, healthcare, tourism, and value-added manufacturing including critical minerals. He emphasized these are not aid-dependent sectors but engines of growth capable of generating locally relevant jobs without displacing work from developed economies.
The World Bank’s signature Mission 300 initiative aims to connect 300 million Africans to electricity by 2030, addressing the continent’s energy access gap which has barely kept pace with population growth. Fourteen countries are developing national energy compacts focused on increasing access to electricity and clean cooking through improved infrastructure, regional integration, and private investment incentives.
In agribusiness, the World Bank plans to double annual commitments to $9 billion by 2030 while mobilizing an additional $5 billion in private investment through its AgriConnect initiative. Banga pointed out that Africa holds 60 percent of the world’s uncultivated arable land and can boost yields on land already farmed, while globally, 500 million smallholder farmers produce 80 percent of the world’s food yet remain stuck in subsistence farming.
The bank has also set a goal to help deliver healthcare for 1.5 billion people, bringing together governments, investors, and innovators at a summit in Tokyo this December to drive the agenda forward. Indonesia is already leading the way by committing to provide every citizen with an annual primary care visit on their birthday, an approach that could reshape healthcare delivery for 300 million people.
Ghana was among the countries engaging with the World Bank leadership during the annual meetings. Finance Minister Cassiel Ato Forson met with Banga on the sidelines to discuss deepening their partnership across five key sectors: education, health, energy, roads, and agriculture, areas both sides described as central to Ghana’s medium and long-term development goals.
“We’ve agreed to scale up support for ongoing projects and new initiatives that can have the greatest impact on livelihoods and resilience,” Dr. Forson said, noting the renewed collaboration aims to channel World Bank resources toward sectors with transformative potential for Ghana’s economy.
Over the past two years, the World Bank has dramatically accelerated its operations, cutting average project approval times from 19 months to 12, with some projects now approved in less than 30 days. The institution consolidated leadership in 40 country offices to give clients a single point of contact, with every country expected to have this structure by June 2026.
The reforms have translated into measurable impact. Since launching its new scorecard in 2024, the World Bank has helped 20 million farmers access technology, inputs, and markets; connected 60 million people to electricity; provided education or skills development to 70 million people; and delivered quality health and nutrition services to 300 million people.
Annual financing grew from $107 billion to $119 billion over two years, while private capital mobilization rose from $47 billion to $67 billion. Total commitments, including private capital mobilization, reached $186 billion, and the bank raised another $79 billion from private investors through bond issuances.
Banga emphasized that the World Bank’s focus on jobs doesn’t mean turning away from healthcare, infrastructure, education, or energy but rather doubling down on all of them. “A job is what happens when a school leads to a skill, when a road leads to a market, when a clinic keeps someone healthy enough to work, when energy powers a business,” he explained.
However, critics have raised concerns about whether the World Bank’s job-focused approach adequately addresses climate resilience and environmental sustainability. Banga responded by noting that 48 percent of the bank’s financing last year qualified as having climate co-benefits under the shared multilateral development bank methodology, exceeding expectations, with resilience making up 43 percent of the public sector portfolio.
He explained that when the bank builds a road connecting a pharmaceutical manufacturer to a market that can withstand floods without needing reconstruction, or constructs schools with insulation and reflective roofs so extreme heat doesn’t impact learning, or helps farmers access drought-resistant seeds and drip irrigation, these investments count as both development and climate action.
“Smart development is lasting development,” Banga said. “When we focus on jobs, we are treating development not as charity but as strategy, and seeing jobs not as a side effect but as the outcome of development done right.”
The urgency of the challenge cannot be overstated. Africa remains the only region where the energy access gap hasn’t significantly decreased, with access barely keeping pace with population growth. Meanwhile, the specter of unemployment looms large, potentially leaving 800 million young people without meaningful employment and threatening to destabilize societies across the developing world.
Banga has assembled a High-Level Advisory Council on Jobs led by Singapore’s President Tharman Shanmugaratnam and former Chilean President Michelle Bachelet to guide the World Bank’s strategy. African Development Bank President Dr. Sidi Ould Tah recently joined the council’s meeting, highlighting the continent’s demographic dividend and commitment to youth employment.
The African Development Bank’s Jobs for Youth in Africa Strategy has already mobilized over $105 billion in financing and is projected to generate 19 million jobs by the end of 2025. The bank has also developed the Youth, Skills and Jobs Marker System, a new tool for tracking job quality and inclusion in bank-financed projects.
For Ghana and other African nations, the message is clear: the next 10 to 15 years will determine whether the continent’s youth bulge becomes a driver of prosperity or a source of instability. The World Bank’s three-pillar approach offers a roadmap, but execution will require political will, policy reforms, and sustained investment in infrastructure, education, and business environments that enable entrepreneurship and private sector growth.
“These young people, with their energy and ideas, will define the next century,” Banga concluded. “That is how we deliver what people want most, need most, and deserve most: a job, a chance, a future, and dignity.”
