…Africa is home to the world’s fastest-growing youth population, yet nine out of ten children in sub-Saharan Africa cannot read or do basic mathematics by age ten.
THUR OCT 30 2025-theGBJournal| Human Capital Africa (HCA) and the Hempel Foundation have announced a landmark two-year partnership to strengthen political commitment, accountability, and data-driven reform for foundational learning across sub-Saharan Africa.
The partnership was officially launched during a closed-door session at the 2025 ADEA Triennale, attended by senior representatives from both organizations alongside key partners and education leaders. The initiative underscores a shared commitment to ensuring that every child in Africa learns to read, write, and count by age ten, a milestone that lays the foundation for all future learning and human capital development.
Addressing Africa’s Foundational Learning Crisis
Africa is home to the world’s fastest-growing youth population, yet nine out of ten children in sub-Saharan Africa cannot read or do basic mathematics by age ten.
This learning crisis limits opportunity, deepens inequality, and threatens the continent’s economic potential, with the World Bank estimating a global loss of US$ 21 trillion in lifetime earnings in present value.
The HCA–Hempel Foundation partnership seeks to tackle this challenge by embedding foundational learning at the heart of education systems, fostering stronger political leadership, institutional accountability, and evidence-based decision-making through the use of data in advocacy, policy, and planning.
A Partnership Anchored in Systemic Change
The partnership will drive system-wide transformation across Africa by strengthening political leadership, deepening accountability, and reinforcing the institutions that sustain lasting reform.
At the policy level, it will build and sustain high-level political momentum by engaging Heads of State, Ministers of Education and Finance, and other senior leaders to position foundational learning as a top development priority.
Through this engagement, the partnership will elevate foundational learning on both national and continental agendas, ensuring it remains central to broader human capital and national development strategies.
A core pillar of this effort will be the strengthening of the African Foundational Learning Ministerial Coalition—a minister-led platform for peer learning, collaboration, and mutual accountability.
By reinforcing this coalition, the partnership will help Ministers champion foundational learning within their own countries, foster cross-country exchange, and sustain a shared sense of purpose and progress.
This work will also lay the foundation for a continental accountability mechanism to track progress and guide reform, ensuring that political commitments translate into measurable outcomes for children across the region.
Complementing this advocacy focus, the partnership will support governments, in Malawi and Uganda, to embed data use and accountability at the system and district levels. By applying tools such as the Adoption Tracker and FLAT, it will strengthen monitoring, promote evidence-based decision-making, and ensure that lessons from the classroom inform policy at every level.
Together, these efforts will drive regional alignment, reinforce political will, and translate commitment into tangible improvements in learning for every child.
Dr. Obiageli “Oby” Ezekwesili, Founder and Chair of Human Capital Africa, said, ”we already know what works to get children learning — what Africa needs now is the political will, the discipline, and the partnerships to take those solutions to scale.
Foundational learning is achievable when governments lead decisively, when accountability is clear, and when the private sector and philanthropy step up alongside them.
This partnership between the Hempel Foundation and Human Capital Africa is one more example of what collaboration can do when it is anchored in evidence, transparency, and a shared belief that every African child deserves the chance to learn.”
Anders Holm, CEO of the Hempel Foundation, added ”accelerating progress in children’s learning requires strong political leadership, accountability, and the smart use of data and evidence.
Through our partnership with Human Capital Africa, we aim to strengthen all three — helping governments place foundational learning at the heart of national policies, track progress more effectively, and translate data into tangible improvements in classrooms.”
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