Vice President Harris’ historic trip to Africa signals America ‘means business’

On Wednesday, the vice president announced more than $1 billion in public-private global initiatives geared toward economic empowerment and security for women and youth in Africa and around the world. 

African and foreign policy experts are praising Vice President Kamala Harris’ trip to Africa, where America’s first Black, Asian and female vice president delivered sharp remarks about the history of slavery and announced U.S. investments to bring economic and gender equity to the continent.

On Wednesday, Harris convened a roundtable with several female African business owners in Ghana to discuss ways the United States and private-sector companies can partner with African nations to advance gender equality.

“When we lift up the economic status of women, we lift up the economic status of families, of communities — and all of society benefits,” said Harris. “There’s a direct correlation between policies that are directed at the economic empowerment of women and the general prosperity of societies.”

The vice president led with a White House announcement of more than $1 billion in public-private global initiatives geared toward economic empowerment and security for women and youth in Africa and around the world. 

Mvemba Phezo Dizolele, senior fellow and director of the Africa Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), told theGrio that the vice president’s focus on young people and women is significant because most of the population in Africa is young and female.

Notably, the Continent is more than 50% percent female and the median age is about 19. Africa also happens to have the fastest-growing population in the world.

“This means this is the future of the world,” noted Dizolele, who said the Continent’s youth is a “readily available resource” for the global society. “There is no contingency that the world is grappling with today that does not find part of the solution in Africa,” he said.

He explained, “If you look at the issue of stability, the issue of transition to green energy or climate change issues … the world isn’t going to be able to achieve that if African youth and females are excluded from that.”

Asha Castleberry-Hernandez, the founder of the Diversity in National Security Network, said investing in women is also a matter of national and global security, which was also a focus of Harris’ trip to Africa. “When you marginalize women, it creates instability overall. It’s a regional issue overall,” she told theGrio. “Investing in women makes a lot of sense in terms of bringing on stability.”

The U.S. Army veteran and national security expert said empowering African women to be successful businesswomen also promotes good models for African youth. “If that younger African child looks up to a mother who is a CEO of a start-up company in tech, who’s working at a company involved in climate change or some sort of innovation firm, they’re inspired to also do the same thing.”

The federal, private and philanthropic dollars that the vice president announced included hundreds of millions of dollars to promote economic security for women entrepreneurs and close the gender digital divide.

Dizolele said bringing more access to the internet in Africa “increases output” in terms of commercial business and trade. “There is no limit to the digital space. Africa is ready to embrace that and I think this inclusion can only benefit both sides of the Atlantic.”

In her remarks on Tuesday to Ghanaian youth at Black Star Gate, Harris presented a scenario for a bright future. “Imagine a future where every person is connected to the digital economy,” she said. “A future where every young person trusts that their voices are heard. A future that is propelled by African innovation.”

Dizolele noted that closing the digital divide will be especially important in empowering African youth, whom he described as “digitally savvy” despite their limited access to online platforms. “We saw African youth mobilized online throughout the entire three years [of the COVID-19 pandemic] that the world was almost shut off,” he recalled. “We saw a lot of youth movements that were able to generate a lot of momentum online.” 

One of those online movements was the End SARS movement in Nigeria under the banner of which young people protested police brutality. Black Lives Matter, which originated in the United States, inspired this movement.  

“We saw that not just in a democratic space, but it’s no wonder in other areas as well in terms of education and others,” noted Dizolele.

Castleberry-Hernandez said the United States partnering with Africa to create more pathways to the internet also wanes the influence of China, which has helped set up internet infrastructure on the Continent. “That’s what starts the beginning of … controlling the hearts and minds of those that need it,” she said of the dangers of China’s influence. “It’s in our strategic interest to play a part in internet connection … because there’s a lot of areas that do not have that.”

She also said America investing in the youth population is also a great strategy to deter young people who are “inspired to join terrorist groups because of the lack of opportunities.”

“That’s why part of [Harris’] strategy is to not just give humanitarian assistance but to help build out businesses in the Continent,” she emphasized. “You can help combat the high unemployment rates and create more jobs for young people.”

Dizolele remarked that the United States has a “great opportunity” to support Africa’s economic development in ways it has not done in the past. “The U.S. has done well in talking about democracy [and] … on the humanitarian side,” he said. “There is almost no country that comes close to what the U.S. does in that space, [but] the U.S. has not done well in beefing up the [economic] development space in Africa.”

He continued, “People do not eat democracy. People need roads. People need bridges. People need schools.”

Overall, he said through the vice president’s trip, the Biden administration is sending a message to Africa that “they mean business.”

Gerren Keith Gaynor is the Managing Editor of Politics and White House Correspondent at theGrio. He is based in Washington, D.C.

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