On Wednesday, 21st March 2018, the Ghana Climate Innovation Center (GCIC) had the honor of hosting Ms. Sandie Okoro, World Bank Senior Vice President and General Counsel at our office at the Ashesi University campus in Berekuso. She was accompanied by Sheila Braka Musiime (Chief Counsel, Africa) and Nightingale Rukuba-Ngaiza (Senior Counsel for Ghana, Liberia and Sierra Leone).
Ms. Okoro’s visit started with a courtesy call to Ashesi’s President, Patrick Awuah, to discuss the university’s role in enabling innovation in Ghana, with particular focus on artificial intelligence, robotics, bio-engineering and of course, climate change.
She then had a tour of the Ashesi campus, and finally made her way to the GCIC where staff and entrepreneurs gave overviews of the center’s focus areas, marketing initiatives, programs and opportunities.
As a strong advocate of gender equality, Ms. Okoro enjoyed a closed dialogue with the GCIC’s female entrepreneurs to learn more about their challenges, the impact of the GCIC program and special initiatives such as GCIC’s Women Entrepreneurs Transformation Program.
Ms. Okoro’s ended her visit by interacting with some journalists, where she explained her visit was to enable her to understand how World Bank-financed programs and projects were working on the ground and that she was particularly satisfied with the various climate businesses being supported by the Ghana Climate Innovation Centre (GCIC). She also expressed delight that many of the beneficiary entrepreneurs, coming up with innovative and value added services within GCIC, were females.
About Ghana Climate Innovation Centre
The Ghana Climate Innovation Centre (GCIC) is a pioneering business incubator whose objective is to support entrepreneurs and ventures involved in developing profitable and locally appropriate solutions to climate change mitigation and adaptation in Ghana.
The Centre’s key focus is on building businesses operating within the areas of energy efficiency, domestic waste management, solar energy, water supply management and purification and climate-smart agriculture. Located on the Ashesi University College Campus in Berekuso, the GCIC currently has 22 entrepreneurs in the incubator.
GCIC is part of the World Bank Group’s infoDev Climate Technology Program. Its global network of Climate Innovation Centres includes centres in the Caribbean, Ethiopia, Kenya, Morocco, South Africa, and Vietnam. Supported by the governments of Denmark and the Netherlands, the Centre is managed by a consortium led by the Ashesi University College and including Ernst & Young, SNV Ghana, and the United Nations University Institute for Natural Resources in Africa.