Dr. Mandas Marikanda is a visionary, financial leader dedicated to advancing women’s economic empowerment through inclusive and innovative financial systems. With over 30 years of experience in economic empowerment, microfinance, Developments Finance, rural development, and cooperative finance, her work has consistently focused on creating practical pathways for women and underserved communities to access, use, and benefit from financial services.

She Founded and spent close to a decade at the Zimbabwe Women’s Microfinance Bank, where her leadership delivered immense impact through innovative ways in the face of limmited funding, expanding financial inclusion for women across Zimbabwe. During this time, she played a pivotal role in strengthening women-focused banking models, driving outreach into underserved communities, and shaping products that made finance more accessible, practical, and empowering. Her tenure at the bank not only transformed access to financial services for tens of thousands of women, but also deepened her insight into the structural funding gaps that limit the scale of such impact.

Now serving as Chairperson of Co-op Pay SACCO Society and Chairperson of the Cooperative Debentures Exchange (CDE), Dr. Marikanda’s leadership reflects a natural progression into the next level of financial development — capital markets. Building on her experience, she recognized a critical missing link: while institutions can mobilize savings and extend credit, there is limited access to large-scale, structured capital that banks and cooperatives need to sustainably finance women at scale.

Her transition into these roles represents a strategic move up the financial value chain — from enabling access to finance, to unlocking access to capital. At Co-op Pay SACCO Society, she champions member-driven financial empowerment through savings, credit, and investment. At the Cooperative Debentures Exchange, she is helping to build innovative platforms that connect cooperatives and women-focused institutions to investors, enabling long-term, scalable funding solutions.

Dr. Marikanda’s experience also includes serving as a consultant and accredited trainer under the ICT/ILO “Making Microfinance Work” program, as well as contributing to regional development initiatives across Southern Africa, supporting entrepreneurship, employability, and financial inclusion for women and youth.

She holds a PhD in Economic Empowerment and Microfinance from Aldersgate College in the Philippines, an MBA from Eastern University (USA), and an Honours degree in Human Resources Management from the University of Zimbabwe.

Through her work and her presence on allWomen.africa, Dr. Marikanda is committed to building a complete financial ecosystem for women — one that goes beyond access to finance and positions women as active participants in investment, capital formation, and economic leadership.