Nomsa Daniels, member of APCO Worlwide’s International Advisory Council, is the Founder and CEO of Blue Zebra Projects (Pty) Ltd. Blue Zebra works with social entrepreneurs in Southern Africa to help them expand into new markets, raise capital and magnify their social impact. She is also a Director of Anibok Investment Research Chambers (Pty) Ltd, which conducts research and provides analytic support for various funds which invest in a wide-range of African asset classes, including equity, debt and real-estate.
Ms. Daniels also has extensive experience in the development sector, having served as CEO of the Graça Machel Trust, where she led a team of programme specialists who drove the Trust’s work in Women’s Economic Advancement, Children’s Rights, Nutrition, and Leadership and Governance in twenty African countries. As CEO she harnessed her experience in advocacy, policy development, research, network building, stakeholder engagement and fundraising to amplify the work of the Trust at national, regional and global levels.
As a founding member of New Faces New Voices (NFNV) and its first Executive Director, also known as the Graça Machel Trust’s Women in Finance Network, Ms. Daniels led the organisation to be at the forefront of pan-African initiatives aimed at advancing women’s financial inclusion and leadership in the financial sector. Through various NFNV programmes, she was instrumental in developing and conducting research projects on women’s financial inclusion in ten African countries as well as managing its network of seventeen chapters, spread across the five regions of the African continent.
Ms. Daniels has served on the boards of many investee companies and non-profit boards such as the Sešego Foundation, Roedean School, the African Leadership Academy, the CORBUWAS International Youth Organization to Transform Africa and as a Trustee of the Graça Machel Trust Board.
Ms. Daniels holds a master’s degree in Geography and Environmental Studies from the City University of New York, Hunter College and a bachelor’s degree from the University of Toronto.