Harnessing data and frontier technologies offers significant opportunities for Africa to break from low-productivity trajectory and forge new pathways for inclusive and sustainable growth. Strategic adoption of frontier technologies across sectors offers the potential to leapfrog traditional development pathways, raise efficiency, support industrial upgrading, increase productivity, attract investment, create jobs, and promote economic diversification. Data, as a critical economic asset, and the new oil fuelling frontier technologies have also been instrumental in driving economic transformation worldwide and thus hold immense potential to accelerate Africa’s growth, innovation, and overall development. The Economic Report on Africa 2026, using a mixed-methods approach that includes empirical analysis and case studies, highlights the impact of innovation on economic growth and development through enhanced productivity. It also highlights the opportunities, risks, and challenges in harnessing data and frontier technologies and innovations to drive economic transformation, and the actions African countries can take to maximize the transformative potential. The report finds that enhancing Africa’s sectoral productivity and closing the productivity gap through technology and innovation requires differentiated strategies, with agriculture at risk of being left behind without climate-smart reforms, irrigation, and targeted finance. Manufacturing emerges as Africa’s anchor for structural transformation through technology and innovation-enabled clusters and corridors. And services thrive on digitalization and finance, but with limited human capital to sustain growth. Institutions and regional cooperation are decisive enablers for technology and innovation to flourish.
