How one small statistic became a story that spanned a continent
The two-story house in Nairobi, Kenya, that New York Times journalists have rented since the early 2000s, had a number of striking features when my family moved in three years ago: banana, guava and avocado trees; a thatched-roof, mud-walled hut in the garden built by a previous Times reporter; and a small library of books about Africa, collected over decades.
I dove in. Yellowing reference books, such as “Sub-Saharan Africa: 1996,” were reminiscent of a world before Wikipedia. Biographies of famous people jostle with those of forgotten people. A handful of admirably obscure works, such as Church and State in Ethiopia, 1270-1527, seemed completely untouched.
But the most common type of book was one that sought to describe the state of Africa, usually in far-reaching terms – and, even more dangerously, that attempted to predict its future. These books fell into two categories: in one, titles alluded to dysfunction and conflict, such as “Africa in Chaos.” In the other, the titles sounded optimistic, almost Panglossian. For example: ‘Africa is emerging.’
The sparring themes suggested how difficult, even foolhardy, it was to make broad statements about Africa, a continent that has often defied self-proclaimed experts, mostly foreigners.
It may seem strange that my next big story idea risked falling into exactly the same trap.
It started with one fact. In 2022, I discovered that the average age in Africa was 19 years old – much lower than on any other continent. The global average age was 30 years; in Europe and North America this was 41; in parts of East Asia, such as Japan, this was as high as 48.
I had a striking statistic. But how do you translate this into a story?
My first impulse was to focus on 19-year-old Africans from a wide range of countries and circumstances, and explore their lives, fears, and dreams as a way to describe the forces reshaping the continent. But that device would have disadvantages. At 19, most of us are still trying to figure out what we want from life. Young Africans are no different.
I delved deeper. Looking at databases published by the Population division of the United Nations – huge spreadsheets dating back to 1950 – I found two data points that at first seemed to fit uncomfortably together.
It turned out that although Africa’s average age was the lowest of all continents, it was still rising: as recently as 1989 the average age was 16 years.
Yet Africa’s population was aging much more slowly than other regions, largely because the continent had the highest birth rates in the world. So as populations shrank in Europe and East Asia, they continued to rise in Africa – so much so that by 2050 Africa is expected to be home to a quarter of the world’s population and a third of people between the ages of 15 and 15. 24.
It ushered in a period of stunning changes that would reshape not only Africa but the world.
I had a story.
Others, like Edward Paice, director of the Africa Research Institute in London, had already noticed this trend. In 2021, he published ‘Youthquake’, a book describing the African youth wave. I spoke with him and other experts who were both excited and concerned about this momentous change.
At our annual Africa team meeting in Nairobi, other Times reporters shared their ideas about those changes and how they could lead to a series of stories.
Still, it would be difficult. I was looking for straws in the wind of a demographic hurricane. But journalists do not easily turn to the crystal ball. We are more comfortable using history to inform the present. We are cautious forecasters.
And demography, the science that shapes these predictions, has often been misused or misunderstood. For decades, Africans have borne the brunt of Western fears of overpopulation. a 1960 Time magazine cover entitled ‘The Population Explosion’ prominently featured a bare-breasted African woman holding a child. In 1994, writer Robert D. Kaplan wrote predicted that rising population growth in West Africa would lead to anarchy.
And yet population forecasts for 2050 were largely reliable, experts said. It would be foolish of me to ignore them. As I traveled across Africa reporting for the next eighteen months, I found hints of youth growth everywhere.
After a coup in Burkina Faso last year, I met a man in his late twenties who had spent a decade traveling from one West African country to another, working odd jobs – in gold mines, on farms and on fishing vessels. He was the embodiment of a generation that has struggled to find consistent work.
In Khartoum, the capital of Sudan, I choked on tear gas as young pro-democracy activists, many of them women, violently clashed with riot police during demonstrations – a sign of the new era of protest, led by young Africans frustrated by their old situation. often autocratic leaders.
And in Kenya I met young people bursting with ambition and smarts, many of whom run start-ups, who represented a side of young Africa that often doesn’t make the news: a restless energy fueled by ambition, innovation and an intoxicating feeling of possibility.
Colleagues also found examples. Elian Peltier, The Times’ West African reporter, took a taxi with a young rapper in Ivory Coast. Dionne Searcey, who wrote a book about the lives of women in West Africa, found an inspiring university student in Senegal. Vivian Yee, based in Egypt, spoke to a student outside a school in Cairo.
Hannah Reyes Morales, a freelance photographer, traveled through five countries looking for young people in college dorms, at fashion shows, at religious ceremonies and even at a horse race. The scenes of joy, hustle and struggle she captured reflect this heartbreaking moment of change.
The result was ‘Old World, Young Africa’. which was published last month online and in print in a special 40-page section. In the coming weeks, other Times reporters will publish more articles on the surprising consequences of Africa’s youth growth.
What it will ultimately result in – boom, bust or something in between – will likely vary by country and region.
As my little library shows, capturing all of Africa in one book or article is a difficult, if not impossible, task. Is demography destiny? It depends who you ask.
Yet few doubt that groundbreaking changes are underway on the continent – and our goal is to follow the biggest changes one by one.