Of the 1.3 billion people on the African continent, how many do you think speak English, French, German or another European language as their first language?
While these languages are commonly used for business, education, advertising, and the internet in Africa, it may surprise you to learn that only 0.5% of Africans speak English as their mother tongue. This highlights the lack of recognition of African languages and their speakers, despite the proven benefits of learning in one’s mother tongue.
We aim to address this gap with Diji, an online learning platform designed specifically for African language speakers.
Traction
We piloted Diji using a WhatsApp chatbot that offered an introductory course on digital literacy in the Zulu language. Over a three-month period, we attracted more than 3,300 learners who access the resources over 4,000 times.
In an additional three-month trial, we expanded to Xhosa (South Africa), Yoruba (Nigeria), and Swahili (East Africa), reaching 4,532 learners who engaged with the course materials 16,481 times. These trials were done without any marketing budget. We simply shared our content across different social media channels.
We are now broadening our reach to include more African languages and regions, with plans to offer courses on basic financial literacy, growing your own food, publishing on the web, and entrepreneurship.