A highly polyvalent marketing and communication professional with over 15 years of experience, Yasmine Fofana is a culinary content creator and a communication consultant from Côte d’Ivoire. Her professional background includes working for companies such as Microsoft and LG Electronics. While she is equally passionate about women empowerment issues, Yasmine is a culinary and travel enthusiast who believes in uniting food and tourism to drive economic development in Côte d’Ivoire. For the past 10 years, her mission has been to shift the African narrative through its cuisine and promote Gastronomy tourism on the continent. 

Yasmine is a pioneer in promoting the culinary scene of Côte d’Ivoire. She did not only launch the 1st food blog in the country in 2012: “Journal d’une Foodie” now rebranded as “Afrofoodie,” but she also launched the 1st Restaurant Week of Côte d’Ivoire: “Abidjan Restaurant Week” in 2017. Thanks to her continuous efforts in sharing Côte d’Ivoire culinary scene with the world, Yasmine was selected as a Mandela Washington Fellow 2016 under President Obama’s Young Africa Leaders Initiative (YALI), a Chevening Scholar by the Foreign Commonwealth and Development Office of the United Kingdom for the year 2017/2018 and as a 2019-2020 African Women Entrepreneurship Cooperative (AWEC) beneficiary. 

Currently, on a mission to shift the African narrative through its cuisines and flavors, Yasmine partnered with the non-profit organization Africa No Filter as one of their Narrative Champions and recently became a World Food Tourism Association Ambassador for Côte d’Ivoire. Yasmine holds a Bachelor of Science in International Business from Mansfield University of Pennsylvania in the US and a Master in International Tourism Development from the University of Surrey in the UK.