Ivory Coast: Patricia Zoundi Yao, the entrepreneur committed to rural access to money transfer

Patricia Zoundi Yao is an Ivorian social entrepreneur in the field of Fintech and agribusiness. In 2010, she founded “Quickcash”, a company that aims to make money transfers accessible to people in rural areas. Since 2015, she has also been committed to the emancipation of women farmers through her company “Canaan Land”.

Today in Côte d’Ivoire, Patricia Zoundi Yao is one of the entrepreneurs with an inspiring career. At the head of two companies, the Ivorian advocates for rural populations and for the empowerment of women.

Patricia Zoundi Yao is a lawyer by training.  She began her studies at the University of Ouagadougou in Burkina Faso where she obtained a bachelor’s degree and a master’s degree in Business Law. After a Specialized Higher Studies Diploma (DESS) in business administration in 2005 at the Conservatory of Sciences of Abidjan, in 2013 she obtained a university diploma in mediation at the Institute for training in mediation and negotiation of the Catholic University of Paris. In 2016, she obtained a certificate in management and leadership from the WomenLead Institute.

She started her professional career in 2002. For four years, she helped her uncle launch Zenith Finance, of which she is co-manager. A company managing 12 money transfer agencies, under the Western Union franchise.

In 2006, she set up her own money transfer company, Magnific Service, based on the Western Union business model. But the company went bankrupt after a while.

Following this experience, she decided to rebound and to position herself on money transfers for rural populations. She realised that the European money transfer platforms used in Côte d’Ivoire were not accessible to people in rural areas who had no electricity or internet connection and no access to banks. In 2010, she therefore created Quickcash, which makes money transfers accessible to urban populations (via the internet) and for rural populations via mobile phones. Thanks to a mobile phone, people in rural areas can send and receive money securely. The company is also present in Burkina Faso, Mali and Togo.

Thanks to this initiative, she joined the Stanford Institute for innovation in Developing economies in 2014, where she met other entrepreneurs, coaches and mentors and obtained a Certificate in Entrepreneurship and Innovation in 2015.

Empowering women farmers

Passionate about agriculture, in 2015 she worked on the creation of an inclusive model of sustainable agriculture for Côte d’Ivoire, Liberia and Burkina Faso. She met small women farmers in rural areas and became aware of their challenges, particularly the lack of resources and production factors, including access to land. She also noted that 75% of deforestation in Africa was due to agricultural activities and that in 2017, nearly 70 million dollars of fruits and vegetables were imported into Côte d’Ivoire.

In 2015, she created Canaan Land, a social enterprise whose ambition is to contribute to the emancipation of women farmers. In particular, it enables women farmers access to workable land, quality seeds and technical assistance. The company also supports women farmers in practising sustainable and rational agriculture in order to limit the environmental impact of farming activities. It buys and sells the products of women farmers to its partners in Abidjan.

In addition to her two businesses, the entrepreneur is also president of the Stanford Seed Program Alumni for Côte d’Ivoire, Burkina Faso and Benin. She also heads the Coalition of Christians, Men, Women and Christian Decision Makers in Africa (CCHFDC). Since 2021, she has been president of the Small and Medium-Sized Enterprise Movement.

Due to her commitments, she has won several awards, including the National Award of Excellence of the President of Côte d’Ivoire in 2014. In 2019, the African Forum of Women Leaders (FAFL) awarded her the Women Leadership prize. That same year, UNCTAD honored her with the title of e-Trade for Women Advocate. In 2019 – 2020, she was ranked in the Top 100 influential people in Côte d’Ivoire.