Diabetes remains a big challenge across the African continent with an estimated 20 million adults reportedly suffering from the disease even though 60% are unaware of their condition

Due to the pandemic we marked our Ecobank Day slightly differently. We held a pan-African webinar, led by medical experts, which helped educate people across the continent on the scale, impact and urgency of NCDs in Africa.

We also took the message out into our regional communities, with fundraising initiatives and screening programmes. All with the goal of taking action against Diabetes.

It is estimated that one-in-four of us will experience a mental health problem at some stage in our lifetime. There are many types of mental health disorders including depression, schizophrenia, dementia and development disorders such as autism.

Our 2021 Ecobank Day activities focused on raising awareness of mental health issues - encouraging the lifestyle changes to help prevent them, and the importance of speaking openly about mental health.It was the third and final year of our 'Together For Better Health' campaign.

Over 5,300 people participated in the pan-African Group webinar entitled ‘Mental Health – Time to Talk and Act!’. Our wide range of mental health focused activities reached a potential 29 million people online, and 25 million people on social media. We also organised physical exercise activities to encourage healthy lifestyles, and also made significant charitable donations aimed at making a significant difference in our communities.

Being financially literate means having the necessary awareness, knowledge and skills to make rational financial decisions. Having such skills is beneficially life changing, but it is estimated that 68% of sub-Saharan Africans are not financially literate.

Our 2022 Ecobank Day activities focused on promoting financial literacy and financial inclusion across the continent, particularly among women and youth in marginalised communities. Our ’Leave No One Behind! Financial Inclusion for All’ campaign, in partnership with UN Women, saw a wide range of local activities across all 33 of the sub-Saharan African countries in which Ecobank operates.

Over 1,600 people participated in the pan-African ‘Financial Inclusion for All’ webinar, whilst many of our affiliates gave donations and hosted training sessions to help improve financial literacy amongst their local communities – empowering people to improve their lives.

Having digital skills is truly life changing. Learning coding, programming or leveraging artificial intelligence will expand people’s career options, equip them with transferable skills and make them more attractive to employers.

Ecobank Day 2023 marked the start of our three-year ‘Transforming Africa Through Education’ campaign, and our activities focused on digital education and equipping children and youth with the digital skills they need for the evolving jobs of today and tomorrow.

Over 1,000 people participated in our pan-African ‘Igniting Africa’s digital future through the power of coding’ webinar, which we held in partnership with the Global Partnership for Education and UN Women. Across our affiliates, activities included creating IT Labs, refurbishing schools, digital skills training workshops and more – all aimed at empowering children and youth to enhance their future opportunities.

Africa’s children are our continent’s future and the importance of them having foundational digital, literacy and numeracy skills cannot be overstated. Having these basic skills will transform their future, broaden their career opportunities and enable them to contribute meaningfully to their communities.

Ecobank Day 2024 marks the second year of our three-year ‘Transforming Africa Through Education’ campaign and focused on foundational learning and how artificial intelligence (AI) can be harnessed to drive basic education and reading skills for African children.

Over 2,000 people participated in our pan-African ‘AI in the classroom: What does it mean for our children?’ webinar, which we held in partnership with the Global Partnership for Education. Across 33 affiliates, we provided AI awareness training to an estimated 10,000 children and donated digital equipment worth US$750,000 - all aimed at equipping and creating IT Labs in schools and communities, in order to empower children with digital literacy and facilitate learning to help set them up for their future life opportunities.