The developing impact investment ecosystem provides capital to address the world’s most pressing challenges in various enterprise sectors. At the heart of it is the rise of social enterprise in which profit is a means, not an end. For many impact investors, financial returns are as important as the measurement of social and environmental impact. Therefore, social enterprises should make their value proposition clear.
As a movement, impact investing seeks to foster widespread behavioural change by reshaping the ways people view the purpose of money and business in society. In short, the impact investing movement aims to raise the bar for how investments can positively impact society.
Join us at the Institute of Distance Learning (IDL) Conference Centre in Kumasi as we provide a contextual understanding of impact financing in Ghana and opportunities for Social Entrepreneurs.
Date: Thursday, 28 November, 2019
Time: 18:00
Venue: Institute of Distance Learning (IDL) Conference Centre, KNUST, Kumasi
Theme:Impact Financing in Ghana: Opportunities for Social Entrepreneurs
Hashtags: #SocialThursday
MODERATOR AND PANELLIST
Ama Duncan
Ama Duncan is the Founder of The Fabulous Woman Network (The FWN) where she conducts activities to economically empower women. Through The FWN, she has organised entrepreneurial development events for over 1500 women and shared life-changing stories of 200 fabulous women reaching over 10,000,000 people on social media. She recently created Fub Hub Ashanti – a shared office and event space for women in business- which has trained over 100 women including entrepreneurs under the National Entrepreneurship Innovation Program.
Ama has over 14 years’ experience in Human Resources Development and is Founder of Corporate Training Solutions (CTS) through which she has trained over 2000 professionals. Projects she has facilitated include the EU-Ghana Circular Economy Conference and British Council Jobs For Youth Project. Ama is also team leader for the curriculum review of the NBU (No Business As Usual) Hub Youth Entrepreneurship and Employability Program.
She mentors women and youth, speaks on radio, television and in conferences including CAMFED-Mastercard Foundation Tertiary Scholars Graduation, Science Forum South Africa and National Treasure Conference, Dubai. Ama is the author of Yarns of inspiration I and Networking Made Easy, an Access Bank W Ambassador and a 2017 Mandela Washington Fellow. With a Masters in Business Administration from Paris Graduate School of Management, and a Bachelor of Arts Degree from University of Ghana, Ama is committed to working towards an Africa in which women are economically empowered to create wealth and impact people.
WORKSHOP PANELLISTS:
Emmanuel Appiah, Kumasi, Ghana
Emmanuel deeply believes that in order to see change you have to change or become your own source of change. He has over five years of work experience in web & mobile application development, four years in corporate communication skills as a radio broadcaster and talk show host, a lecturer and is a certified Mechanical Engineer, Computer Science & Networking Engineer, and GSM Architecture Networking Engineer. He is highly knowledgeable in business model canvasing and development of minimum viable products (M.V.P). He speaks three (3) other international languages. Emmanuel is the inventor of aireceive, wonelcycer, and iseecash.
Emmanuel has been funded for the development of a mesh network (aireceive) for smartphone users to connect even when there is no internet for but not limited to calls, messaging, payments and e-commerce. He has been supported by Kumasi Hive, British Council and UNICEF in cash and resources to use computer visioning system in augmented reality to help solve the plastic waste problem, i.e. Wonelcycer (reads backwards as recycle now) – a social enterprise.
In his leisure, Mr. Appiah, loves to write computer code, read books on A.I, M.L, business and life, and listen and plays the piano.
Jesse Gyau Gyasi
Jesse is a Data Strategist, and a passionate Social Entrepreneur who leverages on contemporary technologies to optimise growth and functional metrics in achieving measurable milestones . He has over 5 years of experience in Project and Innovation Management. He designs scalable and impact driven campaigns to meet the needs of consumers. He grooms startups and SMEs through measured and SMART strategies that projects analytical insights in achieving competitive results. He is the Cofounder of Learn Again Foundation a Social Enterprise that works on upscaling educators and learners in areas of STEM education through the integration of Computational Thinking and Computer Science (CS) Educational pedagogical routines. He has managed projects supported by Google for Education, Reach for Change, Africa Code Week Organization, Women in Data Science and the CS Department of KNUST. He's the licensee for TEDx Bantama and TEDx Ahodwo respectively. He is a mentor for Google Innovators Academy.
Jorge Appiah
Jorge Appiah is a Technoprenuer and Africa Tech-Policy Expert with a background in Electrical/Electronic Engineering (BSc), Business Administration (MBA) and Renewable energy (MSc). He is passionate about youth employment and impact innovations which causes him to focus on accelerating the adoption of the 4th industrial age technologies in solving crucial challenges and creating jobs in Africa through Human Capacity building.
Jorge has over 10 years’ experience in technology development, innovation process management and managing technology-entrepreneurship communities. He served as Consultant in various capacity in e-governance, digital skills development and digital entrepreneurship for the Government of Ghana and International development agencies. He is the Co-founder/CEO of Kumasi Hive; a Tech Innovation Hub which through its Future Workforce for Africa Initiative trains undergraduate, unemployed and underemployed youth to acquire competent skills in emerging technologies (IoT, VR/AR, Biotech, Blockchain etc) for Problem-Solution-Startup incubation or getting employment. Jorge is also the former Executive Chairman of the Ghana Tech and Business Hubs Network (TBHNG) and Technical partner of the implementing consortium for the Ghana Tech Lab, an digital innovation space aimed at acceleration of digital skills and digital entrepreneurship in Ghana.
He is a member of the Africa Union Commission stakeholder engagement group for E-Commence development in Africa. Jorge is also the Curator for the Science and Education Track for Republica Accra 2018.
Maurice Nii Adjei Cashinco
Maurice Nii Adjei Cashinco is a Technoprenuer, Business Consultant, Coach, Project Manager and Africa Entrepreneurship-Policy Expert, with a background in Marketing Management (BSc), and a Chartered Global Investment Analyst Alumni (CGIA).
Maurice is an innovative and versatile organizational leader specializing in sustainable social enterprise growth and implementing impact business transformation. A quality acknowledged by VIVO Energy International having being honoured with the Reputation Builders award for his work on social innovation on creating a recycling program and creative capacity building for communities and waste pickers in and around the coastal and urban areas in Greater Accra, Ghana.
He is passionate about youth employment and impact innovations which causes him to focus on accelerating the adoption of the 4th industrial age technologies in solving crucial challenges and creating jobs in Africa through Human Capacity building.
He is a lead member of the I4Policy forum – a network of stakeholders across 25 countries in Africa in government, private sector and entrepreneurs to support the emergence of relevant policy reforms driven by local communities of “policy users (people affected by public policy) building tools, methodologies and trainings to support common interest formation and public policy co-creation at scale.
Rita Krampah
Rita is a corporate trainer, customer service consultant and a motivational speaker. She is also the General Manager and Co-founder of Paradyse Home Care for the elderly, a subsidiary of Paradyse Clinic, Ejisu,Ashanti Region.
Product of KNUST with a Bachelor of Science degree in Managerial Science (HRM) and two professional certificates in Organisational Development and Adult Learning & Development. She has over 20 years’ experience in Banking and financial management.
She has under the umbrella of British Council/GiZ through Hapaspace Hub trained hundreds of start-ups in entrepreneurship and been actively coaching them to thrive. As well as training NABCO and NEIP participants in various programmes. In addition, she is the Customer Services training facilitator for Mon-Tran Ghana, Ashanti Region; and a facilitator at various Hubs in Ashanti region including Hapaspace, Fab Hub and No-Business-As-Usual, in Ashanti Region.
She also speaks on many youth and family programs and women workshops and is a radio panellist on Ultimate FM (Love and Relationship) and occasionally at Luv FM. She mentors female students from some senior secondary and tertiary institutions as a volunteer mentor.
She is a counsellor with the fabulous woman network, and a TEDEX speaker at TedExAdum (Hapaspace).
Naomi Kokuro
Naomi, YALI RLC Fellow, global goodwill ambassador, Rotarian and has over eight years of experience in the Non-profit and for-profit sectors. She earned a Bachelor of Business Administration, Marketing Option from the Garden City University in Kumasi, Ghana and currently doing her Master's in the same field from KNUST.
Currently she is the Odikro (Founder) of EMB Ahenfie, a social enterprise in the provision of Health and Women related Training and Empowerment for Less privileged, especially Kayayes (Head Potters) and Autistic Persons. The enterprise has two main aspects; KayaApp, a digital grocery shopping services and Kayaye Development programs, a skill and empowering programs for Kayaye (head potters). So far, her organisation has reached out to over 600 Kayaye and employed 3 in the grocery business
Through it, Naomi has a running initiative called the September 27th Autism Initiative where she and her team advocates and creates awareness on Autism which has seen over 150 special needs benefit from their outreach.
Naomi is also the Acting Executive Director for INCAS Impact Foundation, an organization in the provision of youth mentorship, training and startup support services. She has led her team to organize career mentoring events for 700 students.
Naomi has volunteers as a mentor, peer educator, and projects lead on Sales, Marketing, entrepreneurship and health for initiatives for several organizations. Key among them being the GhanaThink Foundation which mobilizes and organizes talent for the primary benefit of Ghana, a member of the Global Shapers Kumasi Hub, part of the World Economic Forum community, No Business As Usual Hub (NBU) and recently completed a business mentoring program with Solidarid and Ashesi University called MASO.
Yaw Adu-Gyamfi
Yaw is a social entrepreneur, researcher and culture for development expert. As Co-founder of the Centre for Social Innovations (CSI), Yaw leverages lived experiences, enterprise development and the harnessing of local resources for sustainable development.
As a Board member of Tamale based Hopin Academy, Yaw makes available enormous development, innovation and enterprise experience from the five regions of Northern Ghana working with World Vision, Ghana Rural Integrated Development, and the Wright Place International (WPI) to support startup development, digital and social entrepreneurship.
PRE-EVENT ACTIVITIES INCLUDE:
| Activity | Description | Time | Venue |
| Exhibitions | Exhibitions by 20 social entrepreneurs at the IDL conference Centre. The exhibition will showcase products and services for patronage by visitors at the event. | 3pm – 7pm | Foyer |
| Workshops | An interactive workshop facilitated by British Council for a maximum of 30 social entrepreneurs, helping them to understand and explore social enterprise and social investment as a way of financing their enterprises and connecting them to impact investors | 2pm – 5pm | IDL break out rooms |
| Social Thursday Panel Discussion | Panel discussion on the theme: “Impact Financing in Ghana: Opportunities for Social Entrepreneurs” | 6pm – 8pm | IDL conference room |
| Networking | Networking over refreshments | 8pm – 9pm | Terrace |