Written by Ilja Riekki
Navigating Change and Building the Future through better innovation and startup policy : skilling, supporting instutionalization, governance and coordination mechanisms and service delivery.
Africa is undergoing a remarkable transformation. As populations surge and urban centres expand, the continent is witnessing rapid economic and societal shifts. Many Sub-Saharan African countries record GDP growth rates from 8-6% of annually, rapidly advancing digitalization transforms domains and opens promising opportunities. A burgeoning middle class is fuelling the growth of national, regional, and even sub-national markets, while demand for goods and services rises in tandem. Yet, these opportunities are accompanied by significant challenges of job creation, high levels of informal labour market challenging domestic resource mobilization, high levels of youth unemployment, equitable access to education, skilling and lifelong learning opportunities.
Many African nations still rely on official development assistance (ODA) and concessional loans, which are crucial for developing hard infrastructure — like transport networks, research institutions, and technology parks — and for building strong educational foundations. However, legacies of colonial boundaries continue to complicate regional cooperation, and questions linger about whose needs are truly being served—those of the donor countries or the African nations themselves. Despite these obstacles, certain African countries, such as Seychelles and Mauritius, now boast GDP levels comparable to parts of Eastern Europe, showing the continent’s potential for economic growth and global engagement.
Institutional development is also in motion, continental African strategies for innovation, technology, and artificial intelligence are emerging alongside agreements for free trade and greater mobility of individuals, companies, products and investments. The Africa Union’s STISA 2034 strategy aims to transform Africa through innovation-driven growth, focusing on increased R&D investment, gender equality, and private sector engagement. Regional Economic Communities and continental multilateral and technical international organizations are a key for alignment and strengthening of national and sub-national frameworks, organizations and operations.
Creating an Enabling Environment for Innovation Policy
In this context of change and complexity, fostering innovation policy is more than a developmental necessity—it’s a strategic imperative. African countries face the dual challenge of sustaining social and environmental growth while empowering local populations to drive their own progress. Supporting innovation policies helps to strengthen local expertise, retain investment within the continent, and leverage the skills of Africans both at home and abroad. Nationally, mandates and responsibilities should be clarified to efficiently coordinate, collect intelligence and work with stakeholders across the wide variety of organizations withing innovation ecosystem. This will build a foundation for evidence and data led policy and decision making, every day management and development and delivery of services for thriving entrepreneurial and innovative societies, also increasing resilience.
For European and Finnish partners and stakeholders’ collaboration offers mutual benefit. Not only does it create opportunities for business and the co-development of solutions to global problems, but it also encourages learning from diverse approaches and exchanging best practices in a wide variety of development objectives which fall under the concept of ‘innovation ecosystem’: from lifelong learning, skilling and academic development, STI policy, tech transfer and research commercialization, SME, startup and entrepreneurship regulation, policies and services, financial landscape and institutional development. This is achieved through supporting establishment of participatory practices and inclusive methodologies in governance systems. By investing in Africa’s capacity for innovation, all parties contribute to a sustainable, more resilient, and interconnected world.
While over regulation might be argued as a threat, simultaneously, companies build in Europe are world class in terms of privacy and social sustainability. This is reflected as strengths in data governance and management, ethics by design, sustainability as a core factor in technological innovation and but also in terms of social innovation through withholding strong rights of consumers and workers – in current global turmoil, value in itself.
AEDIB 2.0: Bridging Africa and Europe for Digital and Green Innovation
The Africa-Europe Digital Innovation Bridge (AEDIB 2.0) stands at the crossroads of these developments. This ambitious project, where HAUS, Finnish Institute of Public Management participates as one of the European implementing partners, is part of the Global Gateway efforts and aims to foster innovation by supporting policy development implementation of regulatory frameworks and linked activities, technical and capacity development support for entrepreneurship support organizations (ESOs), stakeholders and financiers. Its priorities include nurturing start-ups, promoting industry growth linked to digitalisation, AI and green transition and solutions for sustainable development, and supporting market entry and growth through funding establishment of joint consortia directly to companies and public private partnerships.
AEDIB 2.0 also recognizes the importance of tailored approaches: support measures are adapted to the specific needs of each participating country. This includes systematic consultation with stakeholders, multi-ministerial cooperation, and technical assistance for innovation structures. The project is a collaborative effort between the European Union and African partner countries, with funding provided by both the EU and participating EU nations through self-financing.
Ultimately, AEDIB 2.0 represents a shared commitment to building future-ready entrepreneurship and innovation ecosystems—where African ingenuity and European partnership come together to address challenges, unlock growth, and lay the groundwork for sustainable prosperity on both continents. By 2028 AEDIB will have financially supported over 170 cross-border partnerships and over 70 digital small and growing businesses to scale their innovations, 14 Sub-Saharan African countries would have been supported through capacity development of policymakers, entrepreneurship support organizations and financiers, supporting the economic diversification, growth, job creation and entrepreneurial opportunities.
This is first blogpost related to our work on innovation policy and AEDIB, we welcome you to follow our work through our channels to receive updates of the work in practice!
Start exploring the ecosystem now, through Smart Africa Network on Incubators and Accelerators (SANIA): https://sania.smartafrica.org/.
Written By
Ilja Riekki
Innovation Policy Expert
Africa-Europe Digital Innovation Bridge 2.0 (AEDIB 2.0) Project
Finnish Institute of Public Management/ HAUS kehittämiskeskus
This article was first published here by Haus:
https://haus.fi/en/topical/navigating-change-and-building-the-future-through-better-innovation-and-startup-policyka1-skilling-supporting-instutionalization-governance-and-coordination-mechanisms-and-service-delivery/
