📢 Call for Presentations

WARESA Center for Sustainability Analysis (CESUA) – Inaugural Forum
Theme: Beyond Rhetoric: Tackling the Foundations of Africa’s Stagnant Growth
📅 Date: 20th September 2025
📍 Venue: KDI School, Korea

🔎 Background

Africa’s economic growth has often been framed in terms of industrialization, investment, and governance. Yet, real transformation remains elusive where foundations of growth—such as education, wages, governance, health, infrastructure, agriculture, and social cohesion—remain weak.

The WARESA CESUA Forum seeks to go beyond rhetoric by analyzing and quantifying these foundations to identify where African countries stand, what thresholds must be reached, and which areas require urgent prioritization before sustainable growth can be unlocked.

🎤 Call for Presentations

We invite scholars, policymakers, researchers, and practitioners to submit presentations that:

  1. Quantify Growth Foundations

    • Propose measurable indicators for each foundation (e.g., education, health, wages, infrastructure, governance, agriculture, social equity).

    • Suggest benchmarks or threshold levels that enable the next stage of growth.

  2. Country & Regional Analysis

    • Assess where selected African countries currently stand on these indicators.

    • Compare across countries/regions to highlight disparities and best practices.

  3. Policy & Research Insights

    • Provide recommendations for evidence-based strategies to strengthen foundations.

    • Explore data gaps, innovative methodologies, and tools for sustainability analysis.

✅ Foundations to Be Addressed

1. Human Capital (Education & Skills)

  • Why it matters: Without skilled citizens, industrialization, governance reforms, and innovation remain stalled.

  • Minimum Level Needed: Universal access to quality education (primary–secondary), affordable tertiary/technical education, curricula aligned with labor market needs.

  • Next Step Enabled: Innovation, industrialization, and knowledge economy.

2. Decent Livelihoods & Wages

  • Why it matters: If salaries don’t cover basic living costs, corruption, informality, and social unrest persist.

  • Minimum Level Needed: Living wages covering food, housing, and transportation; expanded formal employment; functional social safety nets.

  • Next Step Enabled: Reduced corruption pressures, stronger middle class, more productive workforce.

3. Governance & Rule of Law

  • Why it matters: Weak institutions undermine trust, discourage investment, and stall reforms.

  • Minimum Level Needed: Transparent institutions, accountable leadership, independent judiciary, consistent policy enforcement.

  • Next Step Enabled: Investment attraction, policy credibility, sustainable planning.

4. Health & Wellbeing

  • Why it matters: An unhealthy workforce lowers productivity and increases poverty cycles.

  • Minimum Level Needed: Universal access to primary healthcare, prevention of major communicable diseases, affordable healthcare systems.

  • Next Step Enabled: Longer productive lives, higher labor participation, resilience to shocks.

5. Infrastructure (Physical & Digital)

  • Why it matters: No education, trade, or industry can thrive without energy, connectivity, and mobility.

  • Minimum Level Needed: Reliable electricity, national transport connectivity, affordable broadband access.

  • Next Step Enabled: Industrialization, digital economy, regional integration.

6. Agriculture & Food Security

  • Why it matters: Agriculture employs most Africans, but low productivity traps economies in subsistence.

  • Minimum Level Needed: Access to irrigation, storage, mechanization, and quality inputs; staple food self-sufficiency.

  • Next Step Enabled: Food exports, workforce transition to industry and services, improved nutrition.

7. Social Cohesion & Equity

  • Why it matters: Inequality and exclusion fuel conflict and stall development.

  • Minimum Level Needed: Reduced rural–urban and gender disparities, inclusive youth opportunities, functional civic dialogue mechanisms.

  • Next Step Enabled: Stable environment for reforms, equitable growth, peace dividends.

📑 Submission Guidelines

  • Format: PowerPoint Presentation (PPT) – max 15 slides.

  • Abstract: 300–500 words outlining your approach, indicators, and key findings.

  • Deadline for Submission: 15th September 2025

  • Notification of Acceptance: 16th September 2025

  • Email Submissions To: 📧 cesua@waresa.org (cc: info@waresa.org)

  • Subject Line: CESUA Forum 2025 – Presentation Proposal

🎯 Outcome

Selected presentations will form the basis of an African Growth Foundations Index, which CESUA will refine into an annual Sustainability Analysis Report to guide policymakers, development partners, and academic institutions.

                                                  📊 Suggested Indicators for CESUA Foundations

1. Human Capital (Education & Skills)

  • Adult literacy rate (%)

  • Net enrollment rate (primary, secondary, tertiary)

  • Completion rate (%) for primary and secondary education

  • Pupil–teacher ratio (quality proxy)

  • Technical and Vocational Education and Training (TVET) enrollment (%)

  • STEM graduates (%) of total tertiary graduates

  • Education expenditure (% of GDP)

Threshold: At least 90% literacy, >80% secondary completion, ≥4% of GDP on education.

2. Decent Livelihoods & Wages

  • Median monthly wage vs. living wage benchmark (ratio)

  • % of workers in formal employment

  • Unemployment rate (youth & overall)

  • Poverty headcount ratio (% living under $2.15/day, PPP)

  • Coverage of social protection (% of population)

  • Labor productivity (GDP per worker, PPP)

Threshold: Median wage ≥ 1.2× living wage; at least 50% formal employment.

3. Governance & Rule of Law

  • Corruption Perception Index (CPI) score

  • Rule of Law Index (World Justice Project)

  • Government Effectiveness Index (World Bank WGI)

  • Tax revenue as % of GDP (capacity proxy)

  • Voter turnout (%) in last election (engagement proxy)

  • Public trust in institutions (%) (Afrobarometer surveys)

Threshold: Governance indicators in at least the 50th percentile globally.

4. Health & Wellbeing

  • Life expectancy at birth (years)

  • Maternal mortality ratio (per 100,000 live births)

  • Under-five mortality rate (per 1,000 live births)

  • % of population with access to essential health services

  • Healthcare expenditure per capita (USD, PPP)

  • Disease burden (DALYs per 100,000)

Threshold: Life expectancy >70 years; maternal mortality <140/100,000.

5. Infrastructure (Physical & Digital)

  • Electricity access rate (% of population)

  • Reliability of electricity supply (hours of outage/month)

  • Road density (km per 100 sq. km)

  • Rail freight volume (ton-km per capita)

  • Internet penetration rate (% of population using internet)

  • Mobile broadband subscriptions per 100 people

  • Logistics Performance Index (LPI)

Threshold: >80% electricity access, >70% internet penetration.

6. Agriculture & Food Security

  • Agricultural productivity (yield per hectare for key crops)

  • Irrigated land as % of arable land

  • Post-harvest loss rate (%)

  • Food import dependency ratio (%)

  • Prevalence of undernourishment (%)

  • Agriculture value added per worker (USD, PPP)

Threshold: >70% staple self-sufficiency, <10% undernourishment.

7. Social Cohesion & Equity

  • Gini coefficient (income inequality measure)

  • Gender parity index in education & employment

  • Youth NEET rate (% not in employment, education, training)

  • Urban–rural income ratio

  • Conflict-related deaths per 100,000

  • Trust in other people (%) (Afrobarometer/World Values Survey)

Threshold: Gini <0.40; youth NEET <15%; gender parity index ~1.0.

📝 Guidance for Presenters

  • Presenters may focus on one foundation or compare multiple.

  • Use existing data sources (World Bank, UNDP, ILO, Afrobarometer, WHO, ITU, FAO, etc.) wherever possible.

  • Innovative methods (satellite data, citizen surveys, AI-driven indexes) are encouraged.

  • Proposals should highlight data gaps and how they might be filled.