Zambia is one of the youngest countries in the world, with about two-thirds of its population under the age of 25. This young population has been described as a demographic dividend, an opportunity for a large and productive workforce to drive economic growth. However, a young population does not automatically become an economic advantage, it only becomes one when young people have the skills, opportunities, and freedom to participate meaningfully in the economy.
The window for Zambia to get this right will not remain open forever. Within the next seven to ten years, many of today’s children and teenagers will become adults and enter the labor market. Zambia must answer the question of whether its schools, universities, training institutions, and economy are being prepared to receive them. At present, the answer is no.
Skills Gap in Zambia
According to Zambia’s 2022 Labour Force Survey, more than 3.3 million young people aged 15 to 35 were not in employment, education, or training. This is too large a number to dismiss as a temporary employment problem. It points to a deeper weakness in the relationship between education, skills, and the economy. Young Zambians are more educated than previous generations, yet many still struggle to find meaningful work.
Digital financial services, agricultural technology, logistics platforms, and e-commerce are changing how businesses operate and how people work. Technology is no longer limited to companies in the information and communications technology sector. A farmer, accountant, logistics officer, public servant, or entrepreneur increasingly works in an environment shaped by digital tools. Yet Zambia’s education and training systems are not changing at the same pace.
The World Bank’s assessment of skills development for young people in Zambia points to significant challenges in the relationship between skills development and employment. Zambia’s own National Digital Transformation Strategy 2023–2027 also names digital literacy and skills as one of its core pillars, recognizing that the country’s economy is becoming increasingly digital.
Digital Skills and the Future of Work
Research by the International Finance Corporation and the World Bank estimates that by 2030, some level of digital skill will be required for jobs in several countries, including 50 to 55 percent of jobs in Kenya, and 35 to 45 percent of jobs in Nigeria, Rwanda and Côte d’Ivoire, and 20 to 25 percent of jobs in Mozambique. Notably, roughly 70 percent of this demand is not for advanced technical expertise but for basic, foundational digital skills.
Zambia has made real progress on connectivity, with active internet subscriptions reaching roughly 13 million in 2024, up from far lower levels a decade ago. However, barely a third of Zambians are active internet users. A 2020 FinScope survey found that only 23.6 percent of adults are financially literate, falling to 16.2 percent among adult women.
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The skills gap is not simply about whether a graduate knows how to use a computer. It is more specific than that.
Education Must Change with the Economy
The first priority is to rethink how digital and practical skills are taught. Digital literacy cannot remain a single course taught to students and forgotten after an examination. It must be integrated into different fields of study. Economics students should be comfortable working with data and digital research tools. Agriculture students should understand how technology is changing farming, markets, and supply chains.
There are already building blocks to work with. The Digital Learning Passport, developed by the Ministry of Education with UNESCO, UNICEF, and Microsoft, now reaches more than 300,000 students with digital, curriculum-based content, including in remote areas. That kind of platform shows what is possible at the basic education level.
A graduate entering the labor market in 2030 will work in an economy that is more digital than the one we have today. The Ministry of Education, universities, and training institutions should be designing for that economy now. But curriculum reform must begin with evidence. Zambia needs a clear understanding of the skills employers and growing industries will require over the next decade.
Technical Education Is an Economic Asset
Zambia must also rethink how it treats technical and vocational education. For too long, university education has been presented as the main measure of academic and professional success. Technical and vocational training is often treated as a second option for those who do not enter university.
A well-trained technical graduate with practical and verified skills may be more prepared for the labor market than a university graduate whose qualification has little connection to available economic opportunities. There are signs of what stronger technical education could look like. TEVETA, the European Union, and the International Labour Organisation launched a pilot apprenticeship programme in mining, agriculture, energy, and tourism, benefiting more than 1,000 young Zambians.
Businesses must help build the workforce they need. Companies frequently complain that graduates are not ready for work. But businesses that understand the skills they need must also help build the workforce they expect to hire. Some companies are already doing this.
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Hitachi’s work-based learning scheme, for example, has offered dozens of young Zambians structured, on-the-job placements linked to TEVET’s apprenticeship framework. Examples like this show that employer-led training is achievable in Zambia. The gap is not proof of concept; it is scale.
No Young Person Should Be Left Outside the Digital Economy
The rural-urban divide and the gender gap also require deliberate attention. Young people in rural communities often face greater barriers to digital infrastructure, training, and exposure to technology. Women and girls face additional barriers, including lower device ownership and lower rates of financial literacy, which compound over time into weaker labor market outcomes.
Regional examples show what deliberate inclusion can look like. Kenya’s Ajira Digital Programme has opened training centers across the country to connect young people, including in underserved areas, to digital skills and online work. The African Development Bank’s Coding for Employment programme, delivered through university and technical college partnerships across the continent, has reached more than 150,000 young people.
Zambia does not need to copy these programmes exactly, but it should study what has made them reach young people that markets and institutions typically overlook. A national skills strategy that ignores these differences will simply reproduce existing inequalities in a new economy. Expanding digital skills must therefore include rural training institutions, community-based learning opportunities, and deliberate efforts to increase the participation of young women.
The children who will form Zambia’s workforce in 2033 are in school today. What they learn now, the investments made in technical education, the apprenticeships businesses create, and the reforms government pursues will determine whether they enter an economy ready to use their talents. Structural unemployment becomes far harder to reverse once it is entrenched. Zambia still has time to act—but time itself is not a policy.
Zambia needs a national labor market skills audit, education and training aligned with real economic demand, a stronger technical education system, deeper partnerships between business and educators, and an economy where enterprises have the confidence to invest and hire. Zambia’s youthful population has the potential to become its greatest economic advantage—but only if today’s policy decisions prepare tomorrow’s workforce.
