This is Africa’s time to tell the stories
By Steve Rock
06-08-2024
In an article written for the Children’s Media Yearbook, storytelling specialist Steve Rock talks about why the kids’ industry should support the production and promotion of content coming from Africa.
There is a multitude of wonderful children’s characters originating from the African continent, excellently written, designed and beautifully produced. But, sadly, you will never see them.
Why? Well, there are a few reasons, ranging from you not looking in the right places to the product not being deemed worthy for traditional Western markets. When it comes to the African continent, there is still a line of thought that anything made there is simply for the people who live there. This could not be further from the truth.
In 2020, Europe ranked as the leading destination for African migrants outside of Africa. Around 11 million African-born migrants lived in European countries that year. Nearly five million Africans resided in Asia, while about three million lived in North America. Overall, more than 19.5 million Africans were living in different world regions as of 2020.
Africa has a population of around 1.2 billion. In 2022, children younger than 15 accounted for 42% of the inhabitants. Without a doubt, Africa has a young population and, as technological innovation takes hold, there will be a change in not only how content is consumed, but what content is consumed.
At the time of writing, there is a lack of global representation for African children’s content worldwide. The smart money is on this changing, sooner rather than later. In this piece I will touch upon some of the great work that’s being created and provide some reasons to think differently about all the commercial and creative possibilities for the African children’s market.

AfriChi TV promotes African inspired preschool content
But first, full disclosure. I am not African – meaning, I was not born on the magnificent continent. I was born in sunny Tottenham, London. (No comments about the football team, please.) I reside in Cape Town and my young family are African; well, South African. Which makes me a foreigner in my own home.
And, like most children, mine consume a lot of media. One day while watching them, two thoughts presented themselves. First, that they were watching wasn’t created by people like them, and secondly, the content didn’t reflect any aspect of who they were (West Indian, African or British).
While some of you may see nothing wrong with this, I choose to. What’s the ‘cost’ to children’s young minds if they continually consume content from people who don’t share their backgrounds or are from different environments? And, from a global perspective, what is the world missing out on if we simply keep promoting and consuming content from the more accepted traditional markets? In 2024, surely we need to expand representation on a global scale.
I grew up in a time and space where representation was sparse, be that at school or on television. Being Black was a rather shallow pool. You were either from “Africa” (that reasonably large place with 54 countries) or, and this is a quote, “from that place Bob Marley comes from.”
When I hear children assuming the actions, language patterns and fashion from North America, it makes me question things: why do so many parts of the world happily accept one culture as the gold standard? Should my children, who have never experienced that culture in person, be sounding like them? For me, the answer to the second part of the question is a resounding ‘no.’
So, with that in mind, I created a platform that offers ‘local’ content where they can hear (and in time, see) themselves, helping to normalise their voices in a regional and global context. And, surprise, surprise, I was far from the only one on this journey. It wasn’t just me who was seeking to create and promote local content, and, more importantly, there is evidence that it’s also being consumed.
Out of Tanzania there is Ubongo, a non-profit social enterprise that creates fun, localised and multi-platform educational content. By 2030 they aim to have 120 million children learning with them. Currently, Ubongo content is regularly viewed and listened to by 24 million learners across 63 TV stations and 21 radio stations.
In Nigeria there is Limitless Studios that produces OmoBerry, a commercial venture that at the time of writing has 312,000 subscribers. OmoBerry leverages high-quality 3D animation and music to produce diverse and inclusive content for young audiences across the globe. These are just two examples of very different models, finding a previously underserved audience.
So, in what ways can we realise the value of this potentially huge emerging market? Let’s take a quick look at another, previously undervalued market.
The African continent, according to the World Economic Forum, is the world leader in digital banking. Now, while this may seem counter intuitive, let’s take a closer look into the ‘why.’
“In Africa and many other developing markets, most digital banking takes the form of mobile banking. This is due to a lack of fixed communications infrastructure for wired internet access. Around three-quarters of online traffic in Africa goes via mobile phones, according to African Business.
“The GSM Association, which represents mobile network operators worldwide, ranks Sub-Saharan Africa as the world leader in mobile banking in terms of live services, subscribers and transactions,” according to the World Economic Forum.
While the West invested heavily in fixed infrastructure, businesses realised that repeating the fixed communications model wasn’t required, as they could utilise and build services around what swathes of the continent already had: mobile phones.
What I’m proposing is a greater use of innovation and free thinking to look at how best to co-create and promote content from the continent. We can all too easily get caught in following old models that worked for a particular time and space. We are living in such a fast-moving environment and we should look to create new models designed to support the production and promotion of content from emerging markets.
The quality of questions we ask ourselves will dictate the quality of answers. What you look for you will surely find. So, let’s stop looking for or rehashing old stories, or reasons why things can’t or won’t work, and figure out how we can make something work.
Let’s find ways to develop strategic partnerships to meet a common goal, open our minds to finding new methods to engage with our market, offer true value for all stakeholders.
Asking a commissioning editor for a bag of cash isn’t the way forward and while budgets may be shrinking, our ability to innovate isn’t. Conversely, broadcasters and established production companies should not simply look to exploit creators and seek to retain the large piece of the ownership pie, simply because that’s how it was done in the good old days.
Times have and will continue to change and we all need to change with it. I’m not saying it will be easy, but, in time, it will be worth it. After all, unexplored markets rarely stay unexplored for long.
Africa is the continent with the largest children’s population. The United Nations projects that by 2050, Africa’s population will reach close to 2.5 billion. Such a figure would mean that more than 25% of the world’s population will be African.
“No force on earth can stop an idea whose time has come.” Victor Hugo.
It’s Africa’s time.
This article was written for the Children’s Media Yearbook 2024, put together by the Children’s Media Foundation, and can be purchased here: https://www.thechildrensmediafoundation.org/the-childrens-media-yearbook-2024