David McDermott

David became a Member of the Chartered Institute of Marketing in 1992 and has worked with the Public, Private, Associative and Third sectors as a business analyst and strategist, mentor, trainer, project manager and fundraiser.

David, subsequently, became the Director of a Programme at Cranfield School of Management, that he designed, set-up and managed to help British and foreign companies from many sectors with their expansion plans and funding requirements. This was the basis for his private practice, which has also run development projects for the European Commission in Africa and the Caribbean, building the capacity of trade associations in various sectors, including agriculture, to improve services to members and represent their interests to government.

Most recently, he has been engaged by the UK’s largest charity supporting disability, Leonard Cheshire, on its programme for disabled business owners, analysing the broad spectrum of needs, adapting mentoring techniques and developing partnership networks for service enhancement and delivery.

Nicholas Ferguson

Nick is a development funding specialist who brokers highest level expertise from a broad range of sectors to strengthen consortium bids for multilateral aid projects in Africa. Originally from South Africa and educated at Michaelhouse and Wits University, graduating in marketing and industrial design, he came to England to attend the Royal Military Academy at Sandhurst, graduating a Commissioned Officer. He is also qualified in agriculture.

In view of his background, Nick has access to extensive academic, political, professional, commercial and industrial networks which he has deployed throughout Sub-Saharan Africa in the private and public sectors facilitating investment and technology transfer. An Associate of Cranfield School of Management for many years during its administration of UK Department of Trade and Industry initiatives, supporting the national and international expansion of British companies, he has also conducted projects for the European Development Fund, the UK Department for International Development, the Welsh Development Agency and the Industrial Development Board for Northern Ireland.

Most recently, he has been engaged by top Europaid contractor Hula & Co Human Dynamics KG, which has been shortlisted and awarded more Europaid contracts than any other practice, to support their expansion into Africa.

Dr Lawrence McCrystal

Lawrence was born and lives in South Africa. He graduated from the London School of Economics (Estate Management) and was awarded his PhD by Kwazulu Natal University (Economics) where, subsequently, he taught. Following a brief period with Unilever, Durban, as an economist, he joined the Industrial Development Corporation, Johannesburg, as its Chief Economist.

Lawrence has held numerous distinguished posts, as Chairman, Chief Executive or Director, at various times, of both public and private companies and governmental bodies including many Development Corporations (eg Malawi, Lesotho), which have a primary focus on the upliftment of the poor, the promotion of entrepreneurial activities, market access, value chain development, and small and medium-scale lending.

He was Chairman of the Board of Trade and Industry (The government body that oversaw industrial development policy in South Africa), and a Member of the Competition Board, the President’s Economic Advisory Council and the Task Team that established the Development Bank of Southern Africa.

Lawrence was, for over 20 years, the Chairman of and is presently a Trustee of the Africa Co-operative Action Trust, a rural development and human sustainability organisation with partners in most African countries. His is also Chairman of Agrifica which facilitates assists and supports the development process by channelling South African entrepreneurial; managerial and technical expertise into the most promising opportunities and projects in sub-Saharan Africa.

John Bell

John is a private sector development expert with more than 30 years’ experience in the Caribbean, Africa, India and SE Asia. His approach to PSD is based on substantial commercial and industrial experience which has combined both institutional capacity building and international marketing, initially with Ford Motor Company and later with the Metra Consulting Group.

For the past nine years he was part of the management team of the EU PRO€INVEST Programme where he was responsible for the Programme’s activities in the Caribbean region 2008-2011. During this time he tripled the amount of capacity building technical assistance provided to Caribbean private sector organisations (€9.1m). John has undertaken international marketing studies for company clients across a wide range of sectors worldwide and key sector identification studies for donor funded investment and trade promotion programmes.

John has a BA in Business Studies from the North East London Polytechnic/CNAA, a BA in History from London University, a Postgraduate Diploma in Organisational Psychology from Lancaster University and an MSc in Politics from London.

Kevin Davey

Kevin is an experienced senior manager of international, enterprise, vocational training and disability projects including EU-Asia London-Vietnam supply chain and business partnership initiatives in Ho Chi Minh City and the Mekong Delta, and enterprise development in Shenyang and rural north eastern China.

In London he was also for a decade the director of an incubator for new businesses in Shoreditch, developing international partnerships with business networks and NGOs in Vietnam, Laos and China and other countries where he had formerly worked as a journalist, and providing specialist business support services for disadvantaged communities. His knowledge of vocational training is extensive, the result of an ongoing thirty year involvement with Hackney Community College where he was once a senior manager.

Kevin was made a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts (FRSA) in 2012 for his work on disability and employment, which has included involvement in Leonard Cheshire Disability’s Ready to Start and Enabled for Enterprise projects, specifying, fundraising for, and acting as senior business adviser in the Enabled for Growth project, and developing film projects for the Ability Media Centre and winning funds for them.

David Foot

David qualified as a Chartered Certified Accountant in the 1970s, when working for GEC, and is now designated an FCCA. He has had a successful career in financial management working for multinational organisations and smaller businesses in the insurance, furniture and construction sectors, rising to Board level.

Towards the end of the 1980s he established himself as an independent management consultant with a strong financial and training bias, working for a range of SMEs and UK government support organisations, including the Department of Trade & Industry, Learning & Skills Councils and Business Link. As this business grew, he set up a consultancy practice with complementary skills to manage larger public sector projects, administered by bodies, such as the Greater London Authority, primarily supporting training and development initiatives.

These projects have included the management of substantial £m European Regional Development Fund and European Development Fund initiatives for training and development in the UK and Africa, the latter in conjunction with International Development Group supporting the upliftment of agriculture in rural African communities.