President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo has appointed Ms Kosi Antwiwaa Yankey as the Acting Executive Director of the National Board for Small Scale Industries (NBSSI).

A statement from the NBSSI said she took over from Mr Lukman Abdul-Rahim who has served the NBSSI for seven and half years. She is the first female to head the Board.

The NBSSI is the apex governmental body responsible for the promotion and development of the Small and Medium Scale Enterprises (SMEs) sector in Ghana.

It is an agency under the Ministry of Trade and Industry and was established by Act 434 of 1981.

NBSSI operates in 10 regional secretariats and 174 business advisory centres (BACs) in the metropolitan, municipal and district assemblies in Ghana.

Before Ms Yankey’s appointment she was a founding and managing partner for an international development consulting firm based in Boston, United States of America.

Ms Yankey graduated from Harvard University, USA with a Masters in Public Administration and Public Policy from the John F. Kennedy School of Government.

At Harvard she received the Excellence Award for academic distinction and distinguished contribution to the Edward S. Mason Programme.

Ms Yankey received her Bachelor of Arts in Government from Wesleyan University, Connecticut, USA and also has a certificate in Market Access for Sustainable Development from Wageningen University, Netherlands.

She has many years of work experience in the USA, Europe and West Africa.

Her experiences range from working as a banker at various banks including the Deutsche Bank.

Among the many roles she had played was her role in the establishment of one of the first multi-million-dollar microfinance fund. Through her work she developed a deep understanding and knowledge of financing SME’s, incubating businesses and accelerating their growth.

She has developed international incubator programmes to provide support, implement research and scale up medium and small scale enterprises and entrepreneurs in Africa. In 2014, an incubator she setup was listed amongst the top 10 to watch in Africa.

As a consultant Ms Yankey had worked and supported programmes funded by various partners such as USAID and CIDA.

Ms Yankey brings on board her wealth of experience in championing the promotion and development of the micro, small and medium enterprise sector.

She will lead the strategic development and re-organisation of NBSSI and the President’s vision for MSMEs.