On an ordinary November afternoon nearly two years ago, something extraordinary was happening in Kigali, Rwanda. Kigali Convention Center's auditorium was filled with nearly 700 participants, including Ministers of Education from 25 African countries, alongside senior officials and leaders from across the development community. At the microphone, Rwanda's First Lady, Jeannette Kagame, captured the moment: "Foundational learning is the bedrock upon which skills are built."
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Looking out over the gathering of policymakers and practitioners, it was clear this was more than just another conference. It was a visible, collective commitment by African leaders to prioritize foundational learning as central to human capital development. And the stakes could not be higher.
Africa has been the fastest-growing continent by population since 1972. Twenty eight percent of all young people in the world live in Africa. Over the next three decades, the region will experience the fastest increase in working-age population of any region, an increase of about 740 million people by 2050. Yet, only 3 million new jobs are created annually. Africa's population boom will only pay off if its young people are equipped to learn, contribute, and thrive. Skills begin with foundations: a child who cannot read is unlikely to acquire the competencies that tomorrow's labour market will demand.
The Africa Foundational Learning Exchange 2024, hosted by the Government of Rwanda in November of that year, was the largest gathering to date focused exclusively on strengthening foundational learning in Africa. Bringing together participants from 34 countries, the conference culminated in a joint declaration to deepen inter-country collaboration, scale evidence-based approaches, align financing, and reduce duplication across initiatives. On that occasion and ever since, African governments explicitly acknowledge the crucial link between strong foundations and sustained human capital outcomes.
And the World Bank Group is supporting the move from commitments to action and impact. It places more and better jobs at the centre of its development agenda for Africa, recognizing foundational learning not as a peripheral education concern, but as an economic imperative.
As governments participate in a steady expansion of peer-to-peer learning engagements across the continent, the World Bank Group supports these transformative efforts. At the centre of these efforts is a clear recognition: learning reforms scale faster when countries learn from each other. African countries are increasingly doing just this.
In May 2024, Somalia sent a delegation of education leaders to Rwanda under the Education for Human Capital Development project. Their goal was to strengthen the structure and delivery of basic education. Through meetings with policymakers, school visits, and engagement with stakeholders, the delegation gained insight from both policy and implementation. By the end of the visit, they were outlining concrete next steps for reform back home.
Similar exchanges have enabled countries to tackle major policy shifts. In March 2025, under the World Bank Group's Accelerator Program, Rwanda's Ministry of Education visited Kenya to learn from its transition to a Competency-Based Curriculum. Instead of examining policy on paper, Rwanda's delegation dug into the messy realities of implementation and left with strategies they could actually use.
The best education solutions do not always come from the nearest neighbour. In May 2025, delegations from Mauritania and Togo travelled to Rwanda to explore approaches to early childhood education, school construction, and the use of learning data. Structured discussions and site visits turned curiosity into concrete ideas.
The same pattern is evident in Southern Africa. In November 2025, Eswatini's Ministry of Education and Training sought strategies to support struggling learners. With support from the World Bank Group's Accelerator Program, officials visited South Africa to observe the Teaching at the Right Level (TaRL) approach. That exposure quickly translated into results: a pilot was launched in Eswatini, with national scale-up already underway.
To sustain and deepen this growing momentum across African Ministries of Education, the World Bank Group is investing in longer-term platforms for peer learning. The Leadership for Progress in Foundational Learning (LEAP) program, launched in 2025, brings together teams of policymakers into an 18-month cohort. Through regular engagements, participants from countries including Ethiopia, Ghana, Kenya, Nigeria, Morocco, Malawi, Lesotho, and Senegal are tackling core challenges, from assessment systems to teacher development. By working as cohorts, these teams are creating a durable network for ongoing collaboration.
This principle underpins the World Bank Group's AIM4Learning program, a $1.5 billion regional initiative designed to benefit 72 million children, reduce learning poverty, and strengthen education systems across Africa. Beyond financing, AIM4Learning catalyses innovation and collaboration. By embedding cross-country learning into program design, it ensures that countries are advancing together. Early phases have already been delivered in Comoros, Ethiopia, Mozambique, Madagascar, and Malawi, demonstrating how shared learning and investment reinforce one another.
This builds on a series of exchanges that have steadily raised the bar for collaboration across the continent. Earlier gatherings, including the inaugural FLEX event hosted by Sierra Leone, laid the groundwork. Rwanda took it further, demonstrating what is possible when countries come together around a shared goal with genuine ambition and depth.
In July, Malawi will host the third Africa Foundational Learning Exchange (FLEX 2026) in Lilongwe, with a focus on accelerating action to end learning poverty by 2035. By deepening knowledge sharing and strengthening policy dialogue, the next phase of this journey will move even closer to impact at scale.
The evidence is clear and so is the opportunity. Foundational skills are the cornerstone of human capital: they shape productivity, drive economic growth, and determine whether young people can successfully transition into further education, training, and the labour market. With the right investments and stronger collaboration, countries across Africa can accelerate progress on foundational learning and begin to close the gap between a fast-growing workforce and the quality skills that workforce deserves for more and better jobs.
The World Bank Group continues to stand alongside its partner governments, supporting their efforts, scaling proven solutions, and strengthening platforms for learning and collaboration to ensure that every child acquires the skills to thrive and contribute meaningfully to their countries' development.
The writer is a Senior Education Specialist in the World Bank’s Eastern and Southern Africa Region.