User Profile

Divisional Manager: innovation Support & Protection, Companies and Intellectual Property Commision

Nompumelelo Obokoh, Ph.D., is the divisional manager of innovation support and protection for Companies & Intellectual Property Commission. She recently resigned as chief executive officer for Africabio, where she was responsible for creating awareness, understanding, and knowledge on biotechnology and biosafety in South Africa and the African region. Nompumelelo has more than 12 years of international and local experience in agricultural and environmental research, development, education, and management. She has led a number of agricultural projects geared toward addressing African food security, poverty, and the achievement of Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) through small-scale farmer (especially women farmer) empowerment. In South Africa, she has worked as a Senior Researcher and Program Manager in the Biotechnology Division at the Agricultural Research Council, Roodeplaat in Pretoria. During that period, she received competitive research grants to establish linkages and extend collaboration with UK project partners. She also took up an African Fellowship Programme at the Research Institute in Aberystwyth, Wales, sponsored through Rothamstead International.  Nompumelele has worked in Abuja, Nigeria, heading the first West African satellite office of the Nairobi-based African Agricultural Technology Foundation (AATF), an international non-profit organization, where she oversaw and managed its strategic public-private partnership projects and led all AATF operations in the region. Nompumelelo is registered as a Professional Natural Scientist in Biological Science with the South African Council for Natural Scientific Professions. She trained as a plant molecular biologist at the University of Cambridge Magdalene College, and also worked as a post-doctoral research associate at the University of Cambridge Institute of Biotechnology. Nompumelele is a Fellow of the tenth class of the Africa Leadership Initiative – South Africa and a member of the Aspen Global Leadership Network.