Quality of life on rise for Africans

Many of Africa’s 54 nations have made progress in education, health, living standards

Africans are seeing a steady improvement in the quality of their lives, with some countries even nearing world averages, says a wideranging report out Monday on the continent’s future.

While large portions of the continent’s 1.2 billion people live in poverty, many of Africa’s 54 nations have made significant progress in health, education and standard of living.

“At least a third of African countries have now achieved medium to high levels of human development,” said the report published by the African Development Bank, referring to a composite measure of a nation’s condition. “North Africa has the highest levels, approaching the world average, but all sub-regions have seen steady improvement” since the turn of the 21st century, it added.

Despite the advances, some 544 million Africans still live in poverty, according to the report titled ‘African Economic Outlook 2017’.

Rwanda recorded the most progress, followed by Ghana and Liberia in the fight against poverty since 2005. One of Rwanda’s key efforts was a communitybased health insurance system that by 2010 had covered nearly 9 in 10 of its people.

At the same time, North African nations Egypt and Tunisia have health insurance systems that cover 78 per cent and 100 per cent respectively of their residents.