Africa in numbers: interesting facts

The United Nations predicts that between 2015 and 2050, Africa will add 1.3 billion people, more than doubling its current population of 1.2 billion.

In the fifties sub-Saharan Africa had just 180 million people - a third of Europe's population. By 2050 it will have 2.2 billion - three times as many as Europe

In Africa jihadist violence has increased by 300% since 2010

The overwhelming majority of Africans today have access to a mobile phone service, but less than two thirds have access to piped water.

In 11 African countries, women hold close to one-third of parliamentary seats. This is more than in Europe. Rwanda, where women have 64% of seats in the lower house, has the highest proportion of women parliamentarians worldwide

Research by the UN shows that African women hold two thirds of all jobs in the non-agricultural informal sector, and on average only make 70 cents for each dollar made by men.

The three biggest economies by GDP in 2017 are: 1- Nigeria, 2 South Africa, 3- Egypt.

Top 5 fastest growing economies in 2018 - A significant number of 2018's top performers are non-commodity intensive economies.1- Ghana, 2- Ethiopia, 3- Ivory Coast, 4- Senegal, 5- Tanzania. Africa has six of the world's ten fastest growing economies this year, according to the World Bank.

In Africa, nine leaders have wielded power for more than 20 years; three of them have been at the helm for more than 30 years

In sub-Saharan Africa, less than 7 percent of students in late primary school are proficient in reading, against 14 percent in mathematics

In 2014 only one African country, South Africa, made it to the global top 50 in terms of research output (35th).

The total number of emigrants worldwide from all sub-Saharan African countries combined grew by 31% between 2010 and 2017, outpacing the rate of increase from both the Asia-Pacific (15%) and Latin America-Caribbean (9%) regions. Only the Middle East-North Africa region saw a larger increase (39%) of people living outside of their birth country during the same span, driven largely by people fleeing conflict in Syria.