As Africa intensifies efforts to tackle youth unemployment, Ghanaian agricultural journalist and content creator Enyonam Manye is set to join a high-level continental dialogue in Kigali, Rwanda, aimed at expanding economic opportunities for young people.
Happening on June 29, the 2026 Young Africa Works Summit, convened by the Mastercard Foundation, has come to add to the several agricultural and youth-based gatherings Enyonam attended across the continent and beyond to share experience, build knowledge and capacity.
She uses The Ghanaian Farmer TV platform, which she founded six years ago, to inspire and change the narrative about farming and agribusiness. Over this period, the channels on YouTube, Facebook, X, LinkedIn, among others, have inspired not only Ghanaians but also the youth and businesspeople in Africa and the diaspora, with some making investment decisions on the continent.
The Kigali summit is offering a critical platform that promises to shape the future of work on the continent. The event will attract leaders from government, business, and development sectors to evaluate progress and recommend actionable strategies to improve access to jobs.
The host of The Ghanaian Farmer TV’s participation underscores the growing recognition of agriculture as a catalyst for employment and economic resilience.
Aside from farm and agribusiness processing facility visits for extensive interviews, she also hosts online webinars with representation of youth across the continent.
Through her journalism and advocacy, she has consistently promoted youth engagement in agribusiness as a solution to unemployment and food insecurity.
“As our slogan says, ‘business tilling the land’, we cannot continue to see agriculture as just farming. Africa’s future of work must include everything that comes with agriculture, where young people see farming as a business, not a fallback,” Enyonam said.
The summit will adopt a working-session format, encouraging deep cross-sector engagement and the development of concrete action plans. Participants will identify barriers to opportunity and propose scalable solutions to ensure more young Africans can access meaningful and sustainable livelihoods.
The 2026 gathering in Kigali aligns with the Mastercard Foundation’s 20-year milestone of changing and improving lives across the world. In Africa alone, the Foundation has facilitated access to work opportunities for millions of young people while equipping many more with critical skills and supporting entrepreneurship development.
“In Africa, the Mastercard Foundation has enabled over 20 million young people to access work opportunities, equipped nearly 80 million with work-enabling skills and tools, supported 30 million entrepreneurs, and committed over 57,000 scholarships,” an invitation letter from the organisation detailed.
Enyonam Manye’s participation at the summit represents an opportunity to contribute to continental policy discussions while showcasing Ghana’s commitment to empowering its youth through agriculture and innovation, climate-smart farming, among others.
“I believe this summit will amplify the voices of young Africans and push for practical solutions and implementations from leaders to make agribusiness more profitable and attractive to the next generation,” she added.
The Ghanaian Farmer TV channels on YouTube have over 84,000 subscribers with more than nine million views, over 229,000 followers on Facebook, and more than 15,000 and 29,000 followers on LinkedIn and X, respectively.
