Aga Khan Foundation USA is hosting a special webinar titled Workforce Development for the Future: Lessons from Accelerate Prosperity on July 29, 2026, at 5:00 PM Eastern Time, featuring Imran Shams, Executive Director of Accelerate Prosperity, in conversation about how the initiative is supporting entrepreneurs across Central and South Asia through business incubation, mentorship, access to financing, and innovation programming. Registration is open at akfusa.org/apwebinar. The webinar is part of AKF USA’s Conversations About Our Global Work series, which brings the foundation’s international development work directly to its supporter and donor community through accessible, online programming.
Accelerate Prosperity is a joint initiative of the Aga Khan Foundation and Industrial Promotion Services of the Aga Khan Fund for Economic Development, operating within the broader framework of the Aga Khan Development Network’s commitment to sustainable economic development and poverty reduction across the communities it serves. The programme has built a significant operational presence across Pakistan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, and most recently Syria, delivering business incubation, acceleration, and direct investment support to early-stage and growing enterprises across a range of sectors, with particular emphasis on ventures led by or serving youth, women, and communities in economically underserved areas. The combination of incubation support, mentorship, and access to patient debt financing that characterises Accelerate Prosperity’s model reflects its design as an integrated enterprise development platform rather than a single-service intervention, addressing the multiple and interconnected barriers that prevent promising entrepreneurs in these markets from building viable, sustainable businesses.
The webinar will be moderated by Rozina Mussani, member of the AKF USA National Committee and Director of the Ismaili Center Houston, whose facilitation of the conversation will give AKF USA’s community direct access to the insights and experiences that Imran Shams has accumulated across Accelerate Prosperity’s operations in some of the world’s most challenging but also most promising entrepreneurial environments. The conversation is expected to cover the specific approaches Accelerate Prosperity has developed for supporting entrepreneurs at different stages of development, the lessons learned from operating across diverse cultural, economic, and regulatory contexts, and the role that access to financing plays within a broader enterprise development ecosystem that also requires mentorship, technical assistance, and market connectivity to be genuinely effective.
For AKF USA’s community of supporters, donors, and engaged individuals who are interested in how development finance and enterprise support programmes create lasting economic opportunity in the regions where AKDN operates, the webinar offers a substantive and accessible engagement with one of the foundation’s most active and impactful entrepreneurship initiatives. The workforce development framing of the webinar reflects a growing recognition within international development practice that enterprise creation and employment generation are inseparable dimensions of economic development, and that programmes like Accelerate Prosperity contribute to workforce development not just by training individuals in business skills but by creating the enterprises that provide employment, generate income, and build the economic resilience of communities across Central and South Asia. Those interested in joining the conversation are encouraged to register at akfusa.org/apwebinar ahead of the July 29 webinar.
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