The Women in Business Award is a biannual award given by the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD). The competition is restricted to women who have taken part in the EMPRETEC programme. It was first awarded in 2008.
The Women in Business Award is a biannual award given by the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD). The competition is restricted to women who have taken part in the EMPRETEC programme. It was first awarded in 2008.
The winner of the Gold award in 2018 was Uneiza Ali lssufo, a civil engineer from Mozambique whose contracting company, ConsMoz Lda, employs 800 people. The award was presented in Geneva in October 2018. The judges singled out the emphasis on green construction and the jobs that she had created for women in particular. [1] Issufo and the two runners-up will receive a watch, mentoring and special training. [2] The Silver award was given to Ms. Lama Sha'sha'a from Jordan. She is the founder of International Robotics Academy. The Bronze award was given to Ms. Barbara Ofwono Buyondo, the Principal and founder of Victorious Education Services in Uganda. Two Special recognition awards were also given. Ms. Chandra Vadhana R from India, founder and CEO of 4TuneFactory and Prayaana Labs won a special recognition in Social entrepreneurship for her works done in enabling skill development of girls and women. Ms. Rosana Marques, founder of Ouseuse from Brazil won her special recognition for Export Potential. The Awards were given on October 25 at the Pales Des Nations, Geneva in the presence of dignitaries including Mr. Mukhisa Kituyi, the Secretary-General of UNCTAD.
The other 2018 finalists were
Previous winners have been
The United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) was established in 1964 as a permanent intergovernmental body.
Rania Al-Abdullah is the queen consort of Jordan. The daughter of a Palestinian couple, her father being from Tulkarm in the West Bank, she was born in Kuwait. She received her bachelor's degree in business at The American University in Cairo. In 1991, following the Gulf War, she and her family fled to Amman, Jordan, where she met the then-prince Abdullah. Before meeting him, she worked at Citibank and then took a job in the marketing department at Apple. Since marrying the now King of Jordan in 1993, she has become known for her advocacy work related to education, health, community empowerment, youth, cross-cultural dialogue and micro-finance.
Makerere University, Kampala is Uganda's largest and oldest institution of higher learning, first established as a technical school in 1922. It became an independent national university in 1970. Today, Makerere University is composed of nine colleges and one school offering programmes for about 36,000 undergraduates and 4,000 postgraduate. The main administrative block recently was gutted by fire in September of 2020 and the cause of the fire is yet to be established.
The Mountains of the Moon University (MMU), is a public university in Uganda. Founded as a private, non-profit institution, the university became a public institution following an executive directive in January 2018. It is named after the Rwenzori Mountains, also known as the Mountains of the Moon.
Vikram Chandra is an Indian journalist, who founded Editorji Technologies, a multilingual video news platform. Chandra set up editorji in October 2018, positioning it as a disruptive offering in the digital news space.
The International Trade Centre (ITC) is a multilateral agency which has a joint mandate with the World Trade Organization (WTO) and the United Nations (UN) through the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD).
Susan Elizabeth Holmes-McKagan is an American model, television personality, and fashion designer. She is also known as the public face and founder of her business venture Susan Holmes Swimwear. According to an interview by Elsa Klensch on CNN, Holmes earned the title "The Body" from iconic fashion photographer Steven Meisel. She is married to Guns N' Roses musician Duff McKagan.
Andrew Yan-Tak Ng is a British-born American computer scientist and technology entrepreneur focusing on machine learning and AI. Ng was a co-founder and head of Google Brain and was the former Chief Scientist at Baidu, building the company's Artificial Intelligence Group into a team of several thousand people.
Sunny Varkey is a non-resident Indian, Dubai-based education entrepreneur and education philanthropist. He is the founder and chairman of the global advisory and educational management firm GEMS Education, which is the largest operator of private kindergarten-to-grade-12 schools in the world, with a network of 52 schools in 4 countries. He is also the chairman of the umbrella business organisation the Varkey Group, and the founder and trustee of the philanthropic Varkey Foundation. As of 2012, Varkey is also a UNESCO Goodwill Ambassador. And in June 2015, Varkey committed to The Giving Pledge, vowing to donate at least half of his money to philanthropic causes over his lifetime. He is the first education entrepreneur to join the pledge.
Edigold Monday, a Ugandan accountant, businesswoman, bank executive, and educator. She is the Uganda Country Director of German Savings Banks Finance Group for International Cooperation ., since December 2018.
Kasha Jacqueline Nabagesera is a Ugandan LGBT rights activist and the founder and executive director of the LGBT rights organization Freedom & Roam Uganda (FARUG). She received the Martin Ennals Award for Human Rights Defenders in 2011 and the Right Livelihood Award in 2015.
Dayawati Modi (1915–1994) was the wife of the founder of Modi Enterprises, Rai Bahadur Gujarmal Modi. People she helped due to her altruistic nature colloquially referred to her as Maji as a sign of respect and gratitude. Her contribution towards the development of society in Modinagar and elsewhere was underlined by her dedication towards uplifting the underprivileged and providing educational opportunities to women and children. She is the grandmother of Lalit Modi, the founder of the Indian Premier League (IPL).
Bisila África Bokoko Toichoa is a Spanish-born American businesswoman, entrepreneur, speaker and philanthropist. She is the founder and CEO of BBES, a New York-based business development agency that represents, promotes and markets brands internationally. Prior to starting her company, she held the position of executive director of the Spain-US Chamber of Commerce in New York City from 2005 to 2012.
Beatrice Ayuru Byaruhanga is an Ugandan entrepreneur and school founder. She won the UNCTAD Women in Business Award in 2010 after opening the Lira Integrated school ten years before.
Santa Anzo is a Ugandan model, fashionista, fashion designer and businesswoman, who is the founder, chief fashion designer and managing director of Arapapa Fashion House, based in Kampala, Uganda's capital city. She is also the founder and President of Uganda International Fashion Week, an annual fashion exhibition.
Maggie Ireri, is a Kenyan businesswoman and market research professional, who serves as the CEO of TIFA Research Limited, a market research company, headquartered in Nairobi, Kenya's capital city. She is also an award-winning market researcher professional, recognized for her contribution to the development of research methodologies for Africa, by regional research bodies such as Pan Africa Media Research Organisation (PAMRO) and South Africa Market Research Association (SAMRA).
Lydia Oile, is a Ugandan businesswoman and corporate executive, who is the founder, owner and chief executive officer of Le Mémorial Medical Services Hospital, in Kigo, Wakiso District, in the Central Region of Uganda.
Nina Angelovska is a Macedonian politician and the former Minister of Finance in North Macedonia. She co-founded and was heading the first deal platform and leading e-commerce company in Macedonia, Grouper.mk, launched in 2011 that transformed the e-commerce market. In addition to heading her company, she worked as a consultant in business development, digital economy and e-commerce. She initiated the establishment of the First Macedonian Ecommerce Association where she served as a President until joining the Government. Angelovska used to sit on the boards of the Economic Chamber of Macedonia and the European Ecommerce and Omnichannel Trade Association (EMOTA). In 2019 she was named one of the seven global UNCTAD eTrade for Women Advocates.
Shamim Rajani is an entrepreneur and businesswoman from Karachi, Pakistan. In 2004, she began to work professionally in the Information Technology (IT) industry of Pakistan. In 2005, she co-founded Genetech Solutions, a software development company, based in Karachi, Pakistan. Since 2010, she has been serving as the chief operating officer (COO) in the same company. In the year 2017, she launched the computer training program under the ConsulNet Corporation to educate non-tech women in Karachi. In 2018, she launched another training program, CodeGirls, in partnership with Faiza Yousuf. The CodeGirls is the subsidiary of ConsulNet Corporation. In the same year, she also began to serve as an advisor for WomenInTechPK and became the Pakistani ambassador at CryptoChicks, a research institute based in Toronto, Canada. In 2019, she became the board member of the Pakistan Agile Development Society. In the second quarter of the year 2020, she was elected as the vice-chairperson of P@SHA. She began to serve in the office from the mid of October 2020 while working closely with Jehan Ara, the president of P@SHA.
Hamza Arsbi is a social entrepreneur living in Canada. He is known for his work on access to education and education policy. His work has been recognized by several international awards and fellowships, such as the Laureate Global Fellowship, the Dalai Lama Fellowship, and the Obama Foundation, where he was awarded the Obama Foundation’s Scholarship at Columbia University in 2020–2021.