African countries spend over $4 billion (about 512 billion) to import 150,000 expatriate professionals yearly.
An administrator with the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), Mr. Kemal Dervis, while speaking on the effects of brain drain in Africa at the on-going 11th regional conference of the International Labour Organisation (ILO) said, �To fill the human resource gap created by brain drain, Africa employs up to 150,000 expatriate professionals at a cost of US $4 billion a year�.
Emphasizing that �over 300,000 professionals reside outside Africa� he said, �this large exodus of qualified Africans is a huge burden on the African economy. African institutions are increasingly dependent on foreign expertise.”
Apart from this, he said, �the loss of trained professionals due to HIV/AIDS and brain drain erodes the valuable human capital critically needed for economic growth and human development�.
The UNDP official who suggested that African efforts need to be complemented by the international community, said: �Employment creation policies need to be backed up by better aid, greater debt relief and follow- through on the financing commitments that have already been made by donor countries�.
In his welcoming remarks, the ILO Director-General, Mr. Juan Somavia said the ILO and the UNDP are involved in building a very strong agreement to promote decent work . �We want to generate coherence in delivering on employment creation�.
On his part, Dervis said partnership with the ILO is designed �to make economic growth employment enhancing. The road to successive productivity is through productive employment�.
He emphasized that development assistance need not be charity, though charity is for humanitarian purpose for people in distress, adding that, �development assistance is for productive work for human beings.� The UNDP official called on African Governments and the people to �redouble their efforts to tackle poverty and promote the pro-poor employment policies that are so vital to bringing about sustainable human development for all in Africa.�