Ghana stands out globally for its high percentage of women-owned businesses. According to the Mastercard Index of Women Entrepreneurs, approximately 46% of companies in Ghana are owned by women, a higher proportion than in any other country studied.
Despite this significant representation, the logistics sector in Ghana, as in many parts of Africa, remains predominantly male-dominated. Challenges such as inadequate transport infrastructure, high costs of moving goods, and inefficient regulatory frameworks contribute to inefficiencies in the supply chain. These obstacles can be particularly daunting for women entrepreneurs seeking to expand their businesses beyond local markets.
Moreover, a study by the Oxford Africa Women Leadership Institute revealed that 92% of women-led businesses in Ghana have never exported. This statistic underscores women entrepreneurs’ barriers to accessing broader markets, including the complexities of logistics and trade regulations.
Led by Miishe Addy, Jetstream Africa is addressing these challenges using technology. They provide comprehensive logistics solutions tailored to the needs of African businesses, including those owned by women. By streamlining supply chain processes and offering support in navigating trade regulations, Jetstream empowers women entrepreneurs to overcome logistical barriers and access international markets, promoting greater inclusivity and growth within the sector.
From Harvard to Ghana
If Miishe Addy could go back in time and give her younger self one piece of advice, it would be to trust her intuition. That instinct led her to co-found Jetstream Africa, a company revolutionising cross-border trade logistics in Africa. But before she started handling the complexities of African supply chains, she was a young girl in Texas curious about how the world worked.
Miishe Addy was born in the United States to Ghanaian parents. She studied philosophy at Harvard and later attended Stanford Law School. She worked as a strategy analyst at Bain & Company and eventually practised law at the prestigious Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz.
However, she moved to Ghana in 2017, where she initially joined the Meltwater Entrepreneurial School of Technology (MEST) as a business fellow, mentoring young software entrepreneurs. There, she met her future co-founder, Solomon Torgbor.
Cracking the code of African trade
For many African businesses, international trade is a maze of inefficiencies, multiple intermediaries, opaque pricing, and endless paperwork. Jetstream Africa, founded in 2018, was designed to solve this problem. The company provides businesses with a more explicit, faster, and more efficient way to move goods across borders by integrating freight forwarding, trade financing, and cargo tracking into one seamless platform.
Jetstream Africa addresses the challenges of fragmented supply chains, document management inefficiencies, and financial barriers hindering businesses from scaling global trade. It is a logistics technology company revolutionising supply chain management across the continent. Through its flagship Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) platform, the company provides businesses with seamless, AI-driven logistics solutions that improve efficiency, visibility, and control. Jetstream Africa serves six countries and 100 Jetvision.
Misshe Addy is breaking the mould in the logistics sector, inspiring other women to enter the industry, and ensuring that African businesses can trade as smoothly as their global counterparts.
