Babban Gona Partners Aspire Institute to Develop Leadership Skills in Nigeria

Africa’s largest producer of maize, Babban Gona, has partnered Aspire Institute, a non-profit organisation founded at Harvard University, to give Nigerians access to a fully-funded leadership development program with access to foreign educators.

The partnership aims to provide selected Nigerian students with access to fully-funded HarvardX courses, a global community of peers, live seminars with world-class faculty, and mentorships from seasoned professionals.

Co-founder and Harvard Business School Professor, Tarun Khanna, said: “The Aspire Leaders Program gets the best talent that has not been noticed from everywhere in the world. The mission of the Aspire Institute is to reach marginalized youth around the world at scale, meaning we want to reach as many youth from low-income backgrounds as possible.”

The Aspire Leaders Program is open to Nigerian undergraduate students and recent graduates within the last years between the ages of 18-26. The  program provides resources for students all over the globe that come from backgrounds of social and financial adversity, specifically students who are first-generation in their family to go to college. 

According to the Deputy Managing Director of Babban Gona, Lola Masha, “Babban Gona is pleased to partner with Aspire Institute to open up this leadership program opportunity to Nigerians from low-income backgrounds. It is in line with our belief that everyone deserves an opportunity to prosper. This partnership will be a great addition to the impact we have had on over 220,000 smallholder farmers. We believe the program will equip Nigerians with the leadership skills to develop the country.” On why Aspire Institute decided to partner with Babban Gona to reach more Nigerians, the Executive Director of Aspire Institute, Meena Sonea,  said: “Nigeria has such a large population of youth, and we are partnering with Babban Gona to give these youth personal, professional, and leadership development skills so that they can become self confident and become young leaders, young change-makers in their communities and contribute to the economy in their country of residence (in Nigeria). We both believe in the power of youth making a change in society and want to provide them with the resources, training, and opportunities to do so.”