The Tony Elumelu Foundation (TEF) has deployed $100 million in seed capital to empower 24,000 young entrepreneurs across all 54 African nations since its inception in 2015.
This milestone highlights the foundation’s commitment to driving grassroots economic transformation and providing critical business consulting services to the continent’s next generation of leaders.
The Foundation’s CEO, Somachi Chris-Asoluka, announced this during a press conference in Abuja on Saturday.
The briefing served to introduce the 2026 cohort, which will see an additional 3,200 young African entrepreneurs receive funding and mentorship to scale their enterprises.
According to her, past beneficiaries of the programme have gone on to create incredible impact the continent, including generating 4.2 billion dollars in revenue and creating over 1.5 million direct and indirect jobs.
“These entrepreneurs are growing up and rising to the responsibility to help protect Africa’s climate resiliency.
“Since 2015, when we started our programme, we have disbursed over 100 million dollars to over 24,000 young men and women across the entire African continent.
“Every African country is massively represented on our programme,” foundation CEO said.
According to her, the mission is to empower African entrepreneurs because that is a way to create the millions of jobs that the African continent needs.
“Many parts of the continent are battling with high youth unemployment rates.
“It is not governments or big businesses that can create the millions of jobs, but actually entrepreneurs and their SMEs that will create all these jobs that our continent needs.
“A lot of us have been frustrated with the narrative of Africa as a basket case.
“We want to empower these entrepreneurs so that their businesses can generate the revenues and drive innovations that help convert our continent from one that is known for poverty to one known for real prosperity,” she said.
“Inclusive, meaning that nobody is left behind. Meaning that our women are equal participants in economic activity. Meaning that our entrepreneurs and our young people living and thriving with disabilities are not left behind.
“Through our intervention, we are creating more equitable access to economic opportunity.
“At the TEF, our mission is threefold: create the jobs to these entrepreneurs, help eradicate poverty, and ensure inclusive economic empowerment.
“We know that entrepreneurs do not just need one type of support. We know that they need a combination of support.
“Through our projects, we enable them to become successful businessmen and women,” she said.
She said that TEF also armed the beneficiaries with Artificial Intelligence (AI) training, adding that in 2026, all businesses must begin to integrate AI to be competitive in today’s world.
“All of our entrepreneurs are working through a training curriculum that arms them in business management, but also in AI thinking.
“For entrepreneurs in the green or agriculture sector, we also have a green business management training, we have developed for entrepreneurs in waste management and recycling and in other parts of the green ecosystem.
“We arm you with that training, so that you start green businesses and you are able to scale green businesses.
“Green businesses are still a little nascent on our continent, meaning that there is not that many resources out there to support them,” she said.
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