AFE TRAINING WORKSHOPS IN:
Promoting Market Solutions
to Subsector and Business Constraints

KEY PERSONNEL

The training program is led by two AFE professionals with extensive business development training and facilitation experience. This team of senior AFE trainers is the key personnel responsible for the overall design, development, and delivery of the training. The professional qualifications of the key personnel are summarized below.

Frank Lusby (Executive Director) – Mr. Lusby is an enterprise development professional with 26 years experience in subsector/value chain analysis, program design/implementation and monitoring. He has conducted both long and short-term assignments throughout Africa, Asia, and the Caribbean. 

As Executive Director of Action for Enterprise (AFE) he has helped the organization become a leading authority in value chain-based enterprise development, has provided direct technical support to field activities, and has overseen administrative, market development, and strategic management issues. Prior to AFE, he served as Chief of Party for a USAID-funded enterprise development project in West Africa. 

Mr. Lusby is an active participant, speaker, and trainer in enterprise development forums and conferences worldwide. He holds an MBA in International Business, a bachelor's degree in Finance, and is fluent in French. He has also authored numerous papers on value chain and market development approaches.

Henry Panlibuton – Mr. Panlibuton is an international development professional with over 14 years experience in the training, design and implementation of microenterprise and business development programs; subsector and industry analysis; export trade promotion; impact monitoring and performance evaluation; and multi-country project and program management. As a Senior Manager with Action for Enterprise (AFE), he helped develop and co-author AFE’s innovative approach to business development program design and implementation. Applying this approach, he provides technical consulting on enterprise development and promoting market solutions to subsector and business constraints for donors and implementing organizations around the world; co-facilitated six one-week training programs in Kenya, Bangladesh, Egypt, and the U.S. for 115 participants from over 20 different countries; and conducted workshops on subsector selection and business service assessments in Bhutan. 

Prior to AFE, he served as Program Director for TechnoServe in Ghana where he oversaw the field operations of a $2.3 million enterprise development program and a professional staff of over 45 business advisors—utilizing proven skills in training, market and industry research, strategic and business planning, financial administration, communications, and cross-functional team leadership. With expertise in bilateral and multilateral bids and proposal development, budgeting, and recruitment he helped generate over $32 million in new business operations worldwide. 

Mr. Panlibuton holds an MBA in International Management from Thunderbird (The American Graduate School of International Management) and has a working knowledge of French.

Alfons Eiligmann – Mr. Eiligmann is an experienced trade promotion specialist with over 14 years of experience in trade promotion and industrial development cooperation. His areas of expertise include trade promotion marketing; handicraft sector development; trade fair promotion; organization of trade delegations, congresses and seminars; preparation of market studies; project evaluation. He has extensive professional experience in a number of countries, including Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Chad, Egypt, Estonia, Eritrea, Ghana, India, Kenya, Latvia, Lithuania, Madagascar, Mali, Morocco, Russia, Tanzania, Tunisia, Uganda, Ukraine, Zimbabwe.

As a Senior Consulting Associate with AFE, Mr. Eiligmann provides on-going technical support to business service programs in Ghana and Mali, and is involved in AFE training workshops on business service program design and implementation. A German citizen, he has degree in agronomy from the University of Göttingen and is fluent in English and French, in addition to his native German.

Eric Derks – Mr. Derks has over 11 years’ experience in international development covering much of Africa and parts of the Caribbean. He has designed, managed, and evaluated business development, agricultural assistance and civic education programs for USAID and multilateral development banks. He is also proficient in business planning, training and facilitation and project implementation. In addition, Mr. Derks serves as the Program Director for AFE Mali and has worked with both international trading and multinational companies to develop export trade and business linkages in developing countries. He has designed programs to assist companies mitigate social and environmental risks through inclusion of local stakeholder concerns and responsible management of natural resources. He has also helped develop and promote a how-to-guide to international trade for US companies.

Mr. Derks is fluent in French and English with functional knowledge of Haitian Creole, Congolese Tshiluba, and Spanish. He has significant database development experience and is proficient in a wide range of computer programs.

Steffen Cambon – Steffen Cambon is a skilled enterprise development professional with experience throughout the former Soviet Union, West Africa, China, South Asia and the Balkans. As an AFE associate he conducts value chain training and consulting assignments worldwide. As an entrepreneur, Mr. Cambon developed international market linkages for local producers of handicrafts and indigenous artwork, processed cashews and dried fruit in Senegal and Guinea Bissau. He has extensive skills in value chain analysis, program design, market research, and training. Mr. Cambon is fluent in five languages including English, French, and Russian. He holds a masters degree from the Institute for Development Studies (Sussex University) in the UK.