To all those in the job market, thousands of professional jobs in Uganda will phase out and be replaced by machines before the end of year 2025, experts predict.
In less than eight years, Uganda’s population will hit 55 million going by the current fertility and population growth rates, with over 58% of aged less than 24 years.
This was revealed on Thursday during the closing day of The Africa Blockchain Conference 2019 held at Kampala Serena Hotel in a keynote presentation on the ‘Future of Education’ by Dr James Magara, the Founder of Jubilee Dental and Vine Academy.
The presentation raised a number of issues which expanded further in the panel of discussion, ‘The Future of Work.’
According to the moderator of the panel, thousands of jobs in travel agencies, print media, taxi drivers, pilots, librarians, bankers among others will be threatened by the digital revolution.
A World Economic Forum Report on jobs predicts 40% of jobs in some parts of the world face extinction.
“The young people are at advantage; it’s frightening if you’re 45, 50 or 60 years. The degree of relevance will be key to the 4th Industrial Revolution,” said Dr. Charlotte Muheki, the Moderator of the session.
She added that the generation of 20-30 years has suffered most in the current system which calls for change in the education sector.
Ronnie Kawamara, the Country Director of Jumia said that 50% of their operations are done by machines and the rest by human resource compared to 2014 when Jumia had just come in with 70% human beings.
Dr Magara said that most advanced countries in the world have many think-tanks which help in planning for their countries unlike Africa.
“Unfortunately, Africa is still lagging behind; China has over 100 think-tanks, information out of think tanks is used to develop countries. South Korea companies like Sum Sang, LG among others came as a result of think tanks,” he explained.
Ramathan Ggoobi, a Senior Lecturer at Makerere University Business School said that technology shouldn’t be complimentary. He added that Africa needs to invest in the infrastructure in schools.
“The first thing is to prepare the platform for the future, we need occupational changes but technology should not be substitutive but complimentary. In Africa, we haven’t helped sustaining and grooming companies,” he said.
By Aloysious Kasoma
