JA Worldwide and JA Africa Announce Partnership with Z Zurich Foundation to Create Bright, Boundless Futures for African Youth – African Business

Z Zurich Foundation (ZZF) announced today—International Youth Day—that it will partner with JA Worldwide and JA Africa (www.JA-Africa.org), building on relationships already established with JA Canada and Junior Achievement España (JA Spain). ZZF has made a strategic decision to venture and fund Africa, and has chosen us, Africa’s largest and most-impactful youth-serving NGO, JA Africa, as their implementing partner.

This three-year partnership will provide thousands of youth with access to JA programs. This will help them become leaders and achieve success in their communities. The partnership will allow JA Africa to expand its operations in four countries and to launch operations in five additional countries.

According to the African Development Bank (ADB), each year 10-12 million African students complete their education and compete to get three million jobs.https://bit.ly/3pbVAZ0), resulting in sub-Saharan African youth becoming entrepreneurs by necessity, not by choice. The ZZFJA partnership empowers African youth to become both innovative job creators, and skilled job seekers, according to their economic realities.

“The partnership integrates the education and economic ecosystems of the countries in which we work,” said JA Worldwide CEO Asheesh Advani, “leading to long-term sustainability. Over the course of the next three years, this partnership will impact the lives of more than 550,000 young people across nine countries—Burkina Faso, Congo, Côte d’Ivoire, Liberia, Sierra Leone, South Africa, Tanzania, Togo, and Uganda—resulting in greater capacity in four current JA Africa countries and brand-new operations in five more.”

JA Africa has been a trusted and respected NGO for over 40 years. They have partnered with local leadership across Africa and communities. JA Africa, as part of the global JA Network, has the advantage of drawing upon the best practices, curricula and pedagogies of effective governance models, fundraising models, communications and financial-management capabilities of over 100 JA member areas, five additional JA Regions, and a global Headquarters, which all provide the solid foundation on which this partnership is built.

Grégory Renand, Head of Z Zurich Foundation, agreed. “JA is best known for utilizing volunteers to deliver educational experiences. We are very proud of this new partnership, delivering interventions and skill-based expertise with the aim to create brighter futures in Africa, building on impactful programs we’ve already built with JA around the world. The Z Zurich Foundation’s expertise on social equity and mental well-being nicely complements JA’s track record in building resilience and self-efficacy in more than 12 million young people every year.”

Simi Nwogugu has been the CEO of JA Africa for over 25 years. “Many young Africans are entrepreneurial by nature,” she said, “but may be limited in their ability to develop solutions to the challenges around them and capture value from those solutions. ZZF and JA will work together to help African youth develop resilience, problem solving, design-thinking, and mental well being. Mentorship will be an important part of the partnership.

“Exposing Africa youth to Zurich Insurance Group employees as global mentors,” Nwogugu continued, “as well as to JA Africa alumni and role models such as Iyinoluwa Aboyeji, who has founded not one but two unicorns in Nigeria, will help build the critical social skills and confidence necessary to validate their ideas and communicate them to a global audience of funders and clients.”

The announcement was made today at an event that allowed members of African media to ask questions. They were particularly interested in scaling and fast tracking entrepreneurship education in Africa. Panelists pointed out that Z Zurich Foundation (JA Worldwide), JA Africa, JA Africa, JA Member Countries in Africa, and JA members countries in Africa are trying to create a new breed partnership that develops an environment of role models and mentors who work with youth through a mix high-tech, digital learning experiences; low tech options like radio, television, and podcasts; as well as face-to-face experiences. After students graduate, there are regional and local vehicles that match students with employers, or help youth start businesses through incubators and grants.

“For Africa to be successful as a continent,” said Nwogugu, “all our youth need access to immersive education that leads to economic success. Through this partnership, we’ll create entrepreneurship ecosystems that work together to fuel young Africans to become changemakers, creating businesses that solve the continent’s challenges with climate change, food shortages, and inadequate infrastructures for health and education.”

Distributed by APO Group for JA Africa

Media Contact
Tere Stouffer
Chief Marketing Officer JA Worldwide
+1-212-641-0747
[email protected]

Mujeni Aseli
Marketing & Partnership Director JA Africa
+254719457434
[email protected]

About JA Worldwide
As one of the world’s largest and most-impactful youth-serving NGOs, JA Worldwide delivers hands on, immersive learning in work readiness, financial health, entrepreneurship, sustainability, STEM, economics, citizenship, ethics, and more. JA Worldwide reaches more than 12,000,000 youth each year through 400,000 teachers and volunteers from the business sector. This organization is one of very few that has the experience and passion to create a future for the next generation leaders, innovators, and entrepreneurs. Visit us at www.JAWorldwide.org.

About JA Africa
As one of the Africa’s largest and most-impactful youth-serving NGOs, JA Africa has a presence in 13 countries in sub-Saharan Africa and collectively reaches over 300,000 youth in more than 3,000 schools each year. JA Africa works in Côte d’Ivoire, Eswatini, Gabon, Ghana, Kenya,