Nearly a third of institutions that responded to the UNESCO survey declared they had no access to any quantum research facility. UNESCO documents a one-to-seven gap between Africa and Europe or North America in the number of quantum scientific events organized per country: a ratio that documents a strong inequality in capacity and activity, without by itself establishing the progressive exclusion of an entire continent from technological definition. African participation in quantum networks and events exists, but remains limited according to UNESCO. Quantum standards already exist and others are being developed.
The essentials
- Nearly a third of institutions responding to the UNESCO survey have no access to any quantum research facility.
- Europe and North America recorded more than seven times Africa’s activity per member state in the events documented by UNESCO.
- Quantum standards are being built in international standardization bodies, with unequal participation depending on available capacity and networks.
- A few African initiatives exist, but their funding and scope remain limited to weigh in on the definition of uses and standards.
- The window for organizing shared capacity remains open, provided action is taken before technical architectures become locked in.
Quantum computing, a technology unfolding now
Quantum computing is not just another laboratory promise. American, Chinese, and European governments are dedicating billions to it. IBM, Google, and dozens of startups are running quantum processors in production. And the applications taking shape—breaking or reinforcing encryption protocols, simulating molecules to design drugs, optimizing logistics networks of complexity inaccessible to classical computers—directly touch sectors vital to emerging economies: agriculture, health, finance, infrastructure.
The window for participating in defining this technology is short. In the history of digital technologies, standards and dominant architectures become fixed early, often in the first decade of commercial deployment. Actors absent from this phase inherit a technology designed for other uses, other contexts, other problems. The UNESCO report on the quantum moment names this risk the “quantum divide”: having no voice when the rules are being defined, regardless of whether or not you possess a quantum computer.
Africa is missing this window. And the mechanism producing this exclusion deserves close examination, because it is more subtle than simple lack of money.
Seven times fewer events: what this figure really measures
UNESCO counted scientific events related to quantum computing—conferences, workshops, hackathons, industry summits—by region and country. Result: Europe and North America organize seven times more per country than Africa.
This ratio measures access to the networks where science is built. A quantum conference allows a doctoral student to meet the director of an American laboratory who might invite them to collaborate, an African team to present its results and attract co-funding. Technical standards emerge there, consortiums form, and research agendas are coordinated.
This unequal access to events reduces participation in the networks where science is built and where standards emerge.
The mechanism reinforces itself. An African researcher who cannot attend major conferences publishes less in the highest-ranked journals, which reduces their visibility, which decreases their chances of obtaining international funding, which keeps their institutions in chronic under-equipment. UNESCO notes that this cycle affects one researcher in three worldwide, a proportion that rises well beyond that in low-income countries.
This dynamic is not specific to quantum computing. It reproduces a pattern already documented in other scientific fields, where the concentration of publications and patents in a few dominant economies ends up orienting global research agendas toward the priorities of these economies. What artificial intelligence already illustrates—productivity gains flowing to capital and the economies that own the infrastructure—quantum computing is reproducing upstream, at the very stage of fundamental research.
Equipment inaccessible by design as much as by cost
The lack of access to quantum facilities stems from several simultaneous factors. The most obvious is financial. An operational superconducting quantum processor costs tens of millions of dollars to build and maintain in extreme cryogenic conditions. Out of reach for virtually all African universities.
But the problem cannot be reduced to money. Online access to quantum computers, which companies like IBM or Google offer via the cloud, exists. Qualified academic researchers can request free IBM Quantum credits to access quantum processors remotely, but adherence to the IBM Quantum Network requires a minimum purchase. The problem is that this access requires stable digital infrastructure, a local community of trained researchers to exploit it, and institutional frameworks capable of structuring competitive research projects at the international level. These three conditions are not systematically met.
Training is the weakest link. Training a quantum physicist takes ten to fifteen years, and African universities that have integrated advanced quantum mechanics into their master’s curricula are few. African students who reach this level almost systematically leave to pursue their doctorate in Europe, the United States, or China, and do not always return. Brain drain then deprives local institutions of precisely the expertise needed to attract funding and build capacity.
The connection between under-equipment in research and under-representation in emerging technologies is moreover documented beyond quantum alone. French public science returns ten times less to industry than in Germany, and France, despite its relative weaknesses, possesses a research infrastructure incommensurable to what most African countries have.
What already exists on the continent
Africa is not absent from quantum computing. A few initiatives deserve to be named precisely because they show that the expertise exists and that exclusion is not inevitable.
South Africa hosts the National Institute for Theoretical and Computational Sciences, which has begun developing activities in quantum computing. Kenya and Nigeria have seen informal research groups emerge, often based at under-funded public universities but led by researchers returned from the diaspora. In Egypt, Cairo University and several technical institutes have launched specialized courses. Côte d’Ivoire and Senegal are beginning to integrate the theme into their national digital strategies.
These efforts have something in common: they are driven by individuals more than institutions, and they remain fragile because their funding depends almost entirely on ad hoc international partnerships rather than permanent national budget lines. When the key researcher leaves or the pilot project ends, the momentum stops.
The African Union has inscribed science and technology in its priorities for several years, via the Strategy for Science, Technology and Innovation in Africa. But budgets allocated to fundamental research remain far short of what stated ambitions require. Africa devotes on average less than 0.5% of its gross domestic product to research and development, according to UNESCO Institute for Statistics data published in 2026, compared to more than 2% in Europe and the United States.
The advantages dominant countries derive from exclusion
The quantum divide proceeds from structural dynamics rather than deliberate intention. Available data confirm a strong geographic inequality in quantum activity, notably in the concentration of scientific events, without attributing this exclusion in a demonstrated way to specific mechanisms of funding concentration and project calls.
But it is true that exclusion profits them. Countries that define quantum standards, notably in post-quantum cryptography, which will condition the security of global communications, enjoy a considerable structural advantage. The standards they set naturally favor their equipment, their protocols, their companies. This is a well-known mechanism in the history of technological standardization, from mobile telephony to semiconductors.
Post-quantum cryptography is a textbook case. In 2024, the U.S. National Institute of Standards and Technology finalized the first encryption standards resistant to quantum computers; these algorithms are ready to be adopted and system administrators are encouraged to integrate them gradually. These standards were developed in an open process, but one requiring very high technical capacity to participate actively. African participation in this standardization process was reduced. They will thus adopt standards developed without their active participation, in contexts that do not necessarily reflect their specific needs.
Avenues that could change the trajectory
A few levers are available to the international community and African governments, without requiring massive redistribution of resources.
The first is shared access to existing infrastructure. The model of regional centers, one well-equipped quantum laboratory serving multiple countries, worked in particle physics with the European Organization for Nuclear Research, and in life sciences with regional synchrotrons. The African Light Source, a continental synchrotron under design, applies this logic to X-rays. A regional quantum facility, shared among several African countries with guaranteed access rights, would allow the constitution of critical masses of researchers without multiplying investments.
The second is distance training, combined with short residential periods. Agreements between African universities and European or American quantum laboratories, allowing doctoral students to spend six months in an equipped environment then return to their institutions, with accumulated expertise and connections, have shown effectiveness in other disciplines. UNESCO and the African Union could structure this type of program at the continental scale.
The third is active participation in standardization bodies. It requires little equipment but considerable expertise, precisely those that training initiatives can begin to build. A few African engineers trained in quantum, integrated into the working groups of the International Organization for Standardization or equivalent bodies, can influence decisions that will affect billions of people.
These avenues are not new. They resemble what the international community has proposed for thirty years to bridge other technological gaps, with mixed results, because slogans do not replace budgets and permanent institutions. The difference with quantum is that the window is shorter and the consequences of exclusion more lasting: a technology from which you are absent at the moment standards are defined structures dependencies for decades.
The precise question facing us by 2030 is: will global quantum architectures be locked in before Africa had the means to contribute to them? The trajectory will depend heavily on the access policies that UNESCO, the European Union, major research funders, and concerned technology companies adopt regarding the integration of African researchers into their networks.
Sources
- UNESCO, One in three researchers have no access to quantum research facilities, depriving society of its full potential, unesco.org
- UNESCO Institute for Statistics, 2026 R&D Data Release, uis.unesco.org
- U.S. National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), Post-Quantum Cryptography Standardization, nist.gov (no link, exact URL not guaranteed)
- African Union, Science, Technology and Innovation Strategy for Africa, au.int (no link, exact URL not guaranteed)
- African Light Source Foundation, africanlightsource.org (no link, exact URL not guaranteed)
