The African Development Bank Group (www.AfDB.org) has approved loans totaling €139.68 million to support youth employment and entrepreneurship in Côte d'Ivoire, targeting key sectors with high job creation potential.

The loan comprised of €126.32 million from the Bank Group’s commercial African Development Bank window and €13.36 million from its concessional lending arm, the African Development Fund, will help bolster the socio-professional integration of young Ivorians by developing their skills and supporting micro, small and medium-sized enterprises.

A key component of the project is establishing the Youth Entrepreneurship Investment Bank (YEIB) in Côte d'Ivoire to boost financial access for young entrepreneurs, provide technical assistance services, offer equity and quasi-equity financing, and create loan guarantees to encourage local bank lending to young entrepreneurs.

The initiative targets training more than 8,700 young people, with 50 percent being women, in five strategic sectors – renewable energy, digital economy, agribusiness, blue economy, and the textile and clothing industry. It is expected to generate 43,216 direct jobs and 153,094 indirect jobs by 2030, 50 percent of which will be filled by women. It will also finance training at least 214 teacher-trainers and provide multi-faceted assistance to a dozen entrepreneurship support organizations.

Joseph Ribeiro, the Bank’s Deputy Director General for West Africa, underscored the project’s significance. “The African Development Bank Group funding will help Côte d'Ivoire to address the challenges of youth employment by equipping young people with skills needed for the productive private sector,” he stated.

The initiative will partner with trade confederations, private sector companies, incubators, service providers, and agri-industrial clusters to align training with market needs.

In the agribusiness sector, in particular, the project will draw on lessons and good practices from similar initiatives launched by the Bank to scale up its Enable Youth (https://apo-opa.co/3BC1iwW) program. As part of the project, the national training center for harbor master's officers in Abidjan will be renovated and equipped with advanced technical facilities, including a port manoeuvres simulator, to bring it up to international standards as a regional center.