Charles T. Nornoo is the founder and CEO of GP&SL. He has an MPhil in Agriculture Economics, a BSc. in Agriculture (Economics) and additional fourteen (14) professional certificates/diplomas obtained globally. He has over twenty-eight (28) years’ working experience as an economist, a researcher, an evaluator, a development practitioner, a farmer, a business consultant, and an entrepreneur – a blend of expertise, unique experiences and leadership skills that account for the depth of ideas, solutions, results, and outcomes that Charles is noted for.
Charles began his professional career as an Adjunct Lecturer at the University of Ghana in 1991; joined TechnoServe Ghana in 1993 as an Evaluation Specialist and rose in eight (8) years to become the Ghana Country Programme Manager and the Lead Person for TechnoServe Monitoring and Evaluation Systems development & management.
After leaving TechnoServe in 2001, Charles has been instrumental in the establishment of West Africa Trade Hub for the West Africa Regional office of the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) in Accra; the Newmont External Affairs Monitoring and Evaluation Unit (NEAMU) for Newmont Ghana Gold Limited;
the Programmes unit of Rivers State Sustainable Development Agency (RSSDA) in Nigeria; the Agriculture Fast Track (AFT) Facility for the G7 and the African Development Bank (AfDB) in la Cote d’Ivoire; the Development Solutions Centre (DSC) in Accra; Genuine Products & Services Limited (GP&SL) in Accra; Business & Economic Development (BED) Consults in Accra; and the Ideal Foundation (IF) for the Ideal College of Ghana. All these entities are operational and successful.
Charles has expertise and tremendous experience in resource and people management in Africa. Experience that transcends managing projects/programmes, impacts assessment, managing both private sector and civil society organisations, to advising on corporate social investment strategy, establishing strategic business linkages and systems, mainstreaming gender on projects, mentoring SMEs, promoting e-agriculture systems, strengthening the capacity of duty bearers and empowering rights holders, value chains management & value-addition to agricultural commodities.
Charles recently completed a 40-month consulting assignment for the Government of Ghana, managing two (2) projects funded by the World Bank, USAID, and the Japan Social Development Fund (JSDF) – the US$200 million Ghana Commercial Agricultural Project (GCAP) and the US$2.8 million Ghana Peri-urban Vegetables Value Chain Project (GPVVCP). He led a team of twenty (20) professionals that turned selected Ghanaian farmers into astute investors practicing sustainable, inclusive, and climate-smart agriculture. GCAP brought clarity and guidance to large agriculture land acquisitions in Ghana; increased yields in cereal production; introduced hybrid and improved seeds for the Planting for Food and Jobs (PFJ) Campaign; added sixteen thousand (16,000) MT of storage capacity; changed the face of irrigation practice and water resource management in Ghana via restructuring and modernisation of the key institutions (GIDA & ICOUR), rehabilitation and modernisation (i.e. added metering and automation of gates) of the four (4) largest schemes in Ghana and introduced private sector management; created a corps of profitable Agribusinesses; introduced innovative technologies that have made agriculture less labour-intensive, lucrative and appealing to the youth; and helped Ghana address its nutrition and food security challenges at the community and household levels.
Charles has work experience in all the fifteen (15) Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) countries, USA, Italy, France, Netherlands, UK and seven (7) other countries in East and Southern Africa. Over the years, he has established and nurtured solid professional and business linkages with major international development agencies and companies in Africa, Europe, Asia, and the Americas.
Charles works well with people from diverse cultural and ethnic backgrounds and is also at home interacting and working with the donor community and government employees. Essentially, his forte is in managing multi-disciplinary and multi-cultural team of experts.
Charles belongs to the following professional Associations:
Charles has served on the following company Boards: