Firm Expands Financial Literacy Across Africa

Ugo Aliogo

Junior Achievement (JA) Africa and The Richer TM Media Limited (The Richer TM Media) has signed a partnership to produce The Junior Billionaires Club TM (JBC), an animated TV series designed to teach children across Africa about financial literacy and wealth principles.

The animated series is developed jointly based on The Richer TM Kids Club – an affiliate of The Richer TM Media – and JA’s financial literacy, entrepreneurship and wealth education curricula which give young people the knowledge and skills to make informed financial, business, career and life decisions.

It will feature Lola and Kweku-Sika, two young Africans who go on different adventures to learn key financial and wealth concepts as well as African history and other social studies/economics topics on Africa.

The series would air in English, French and eventually Portuguese across different African countries on traditional and digital media.

Speaking at the signing ceremony, the Chief Executive Officer, Simi Nwogugu, CEO of Junior Achievers’ Africa said: “Expanding financial literacy across the continent is a key area of focus for us at JA Africa. This animated series gives us the opportunity to reach and educate millions of African children and young adults, especially those in hard to reach communities who may not have access to our classroom programs or digital activities. We will also spotlight inspiring African leaders, not only to celebrate them, but also to show young Africans that the continent has role models they can aspire to be like. It is our hope that it will encourage schools across Africa to set up Junior Billionaires Clubs to inspire their students.”

On her part, the Chief Media Officer of The Richer TM Media, Omi Oshikoya, noted that the partnership provides the opportunity to inspire a new generation of Africans that are creating wealth, “and are successful in all areas of their lives which is our mission.”

According to Omi “Africa has a high poverty rate, and this can be traced to the lack of financial literacy. To reduce the financial literacy gap, it is important to note that in every African country two -fifths of the population is younger than 15 years old, therefore, to foster economic development, the focus should be on children who are the future leaders.”

She also stated that the curriculum has been created to include financial literacy, business as well as life and wealth principles to ensure the children are well equipped to thrive in the world we live in today.

She added: “The COVID-19 global pandemic has made it imperative for children to be financially educated and to learn how to invest in their physical, emotional and mental health and other areas of their lives.”