Nene Akwetey-Kodjoe

Mr. Nene Akwetey-Kodjoe is Chief of Party for the USDA Food for Progress funded TRACE Project in Nigeria, implemented by Lutheran World Relief. Nene has been working in the cocoa sector in West Africa (Cameroon, Côte d’Ivoire, Ghana, Nigeria, and Togo) starting the World Cocoa Foundation’s African Cocoa Initiative (WCF/ACI and ACI II) funded by USAID. Most significantly, under ACI, he helped to expand seed garden capacity in the region and to establish flavour laboratories, which now provide the capacity for flavour quality analysis for 70% of the world supply of cocoa beans.

He is a proven leader with 20 years of progressive management experience across the cocoa, cashew, handicrafts, rubber, shea, and specialty foods sectors in West Africa. He has experience in facilitating product and business development, training, capacity building, monitoring and evaluation, access to finance, and market access for SMEs. As an experienced leader, he is adept at creating and maintaining stakeholder relations, managing partnerships, and driving communications with farmers, input suppliers, financiers, regulators, and government officials through significant work on donor programs funded by USAID, Agence Française de Développement (AFD), Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA), and the African Development Bank (AfDB).

He holds a master’s degree in Development Economics, a Postgraduate diploma in Finance, Accounting and Management and a Bachelor’s in Economics with Geography and Resource Development. He is fluent in French and speaks basic Spanish.