Bridging the Skills Gap: How Africa’s Universities Can Unlock a Green Engineering Revolution

November 20, 2025

By African Visions Editorial Team

Professor Washington Yotto Ochieng

By Professor Washington Yotto Ochieng FREng CBE EBS CEng FCGI, Chair of the Africa Engineers Committee at the Royal Academy of Engineering

Over 60% of Africa’s population is under the age of 25, making Africa’s youth one of its greatest resources. This is both the youngest, and most climate-conscious generation in history. Many young Africans want careers that help tackle climate change and build a sustainable future, yet too many aspiring engineers are held back by education systems that have yet to catch up with their ambitions. The result is a growing gap between climate-aware career goals and the practical skills needed to make those ambitions real.

Africa is also the continent with the lowest number of engineers per capita globally, a shortage that limits innovation, economic growth, and climate resilience. This gap is not only about numbers, but also how universities prepare the engineers they train.

While many African institutions provide strong academic foundations, the education system often remains disconnected from national development goals and industry needs. Students eager to design renewable energy systems or develop circular economy solutions often lack access to well-equipped laboratories, up to date technology, and meaningful industry placements. Universities still tend to teach in narrow specialisms, while today’s students are driven by solving broad societal challenges such as clean energy or waste reduction, challenges that require collaboration across disciplines.

Where alignment does happen, the results are striking. The Royal Academy of Engineering’s Africa Prize for Engineering Innovation showcases young entrepreneurs leading change in renewable energy, agriculture, and infrastructure. Of course, across the continent, creativity and ambition abound. What’s missing is a coordinated effort to provide students with the technical and systemic skills, and the resources, to turn ideas into impact.

Engineering as an interconnected system

The most effective way to close this gap is to approach engineering in a holistic way that considers all aspects of a problem. We need to recognise how different parts of society might interact with potential solutions and recognise that global issues like climate change cannot be addressed in silos.

Engineers must see the bigger picture: energy, environment, health, technology, and society are deeply interdependent. Teaching this mindset means starting with a real-world challenge, such as decarbonising cities, and then showing how each engineering discipline, and related fields, contribute to the solution. In doing so, students learn to collaborate across disciplines and create solutions that are resilient, inclusive, and fit for purpose.

For this shift to succeed, sustainability must move from the margins to the mainstream. Renewable energy, sustainable infrastructure, and circular design principles should sit at the heart of every engineering programme. Universities should also strengthen links with governments and industry to ensure that curricula support national priorities and emerging markets. Incremental reform will not suffice. Climate and development challenges demand transformational change.

To transform engineering education, Africa’s universities require bold investment into modern facilities, properly funded research, and educators trained to deliver future-facing skills. This would form a more comprehensive approach to education, with an ecosystem that links universities, civil society, and government so that students learn not just from textbooks but from real-world systems. We must educate for fitness of purpose, not merely for qualifications.

A continent capable of developing its own green infrastructure, renewable energy, and technology solutions will depend less on imports and create more high-value jobs at home. International partners can play a supporting role, but leadership must come locally, through collaboration between governments, universities, and civil society.

The results could be transformational within a decade, if green skills and systems thinking are embedded at scale. Graduates designing off-grid solar networks for rural communities, developing sustainable transport for expanding cities, or pioneering low-carbon construction using local materials.

Africa’s young people are innovative, driven, and deeply aware of the climate crisis. If we equip them properly, they will be ready to lead the continent’s green transition, not follow it. The question now is whether universities, industry and policymakers are ready to match their energy with opportunity. Meeting the challenge will not only empower a generation, but it will also power the continent’s green, inclusive, and resilient future.