Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) has the highest incidence of undernourishment, poverty and conflict-related deaths. While poverty remains the foremost challenge, many African countries also feature deficient infrastructure and productive capacity, conflicts, corruption and mismanagement. At the same time, SSA has to put up with rising food and energy prices. Productivity of agriculture is relatively low; water resources suffer from suboptimal distribution and mismanagement. Overpopulation is the foremost problem in SSA, while the growth perspectives are the world highest. In South Africa, the number of people increases additionally due to legal and illegal immigration. Efficient solutions would require a revision of some stereotypes and application of new principles, namely that no population group may achieve advantages through faster growth. Unemployment, poverty and conflicts are known to be interconnected. Social unrest and violence impact the food security, healthcare and education. In this connection, the war in Ukraine and Russia can be compared with recent Congo Wars. Countries that have emerged from conflict are at risk for another war. It can be reasonably expected that another “Special military operation” will follow somewhere in the South or East of the Russian Federation. The invasion of Ukraine, having undermined the internationally agreed status quo, has triggered armed conflicts in different parts of the world. Analogy of some events in South Africa and the post-Soviet space during the 1990s is discussed.
Robertson et al. (Mon,) studied this question.