ECA Executive Secretary K.Y. Amoako has predicted that Africa faces sharply worsening unemployment and poverty unless governments take multi-faceted actions to create jobs.
"We need to do much, much more than we are now doing if we are to make progress in reducing poverty," he said.
He was addressing Finance, Planning and Economic Development ministers from across the continent at their annual conference, taking place in Kampala, Uganda. Some twenty-one ministers were present at the opening session as well as a number of Africa's Central Bank governors.
Uganda's President Museveni, the Africa Union's trade commissioner Elizabeth Tankeu also addressed the meeting. Ghana's finance minister Yaw Osafo-Maafo read a speech on behalf of his South African counterpart, Trevor Manuel.
Noting that African populations was growing much faster than the continent's economies, Amoako said the number of Africa's poor is likely to rise from 315 million in 1999 to 404m in 2015.
He added that "40-50%" of Africa's population was under 15 years of age and warned: "That percentage is growing."
With farm plots being sub-divided between more and more people, agricultural productivity stagnant and little growth in jobs, Amoako said, trends were against policy makers unless they took action.
He argued for "holistic policies" to modernize agriculture, develop agro-processing industries and to support small and medium-sized firms by removing red tape and reforming the banking sector to provide credit.
He also pointed to the value of trade with regional integration as an engine of growth which could expand employment as diversified exports find new markets in other parts of Africa and abroad.
Other speakers also focused on the trade theme, stressing that while Africa urgently needed to have success in international negotiations, changes were needed at home too.
South African Minister Trevor Manuel said that while negotiations at the WTO to increase market access were critically important, African countries must provide an economic climate conducive to private sector confidence and avoid policy reversals.
Commissioner Tankeu said Africa had been on the losing side of the globalization process and that trade had not served as an instrument of growth and rising prosperity, as in other developing regions. Becoming more competitive would require sound macro-economic policies, investment in human capacity and physical infrastructure.
President Museveni, however, stressed the need for more open international trade rules: "If you deal with the supply-side but you don't have access, you won't be able to offload your goods," he said.
