Isabella Makuta is CEO of Mapletree Enterprises, a consulting, property development and investment company operating in Sub-Saharan Africa. She is lauded as one of the most courageous and insightful contributors towards the attraction, development and retention of technical women in corporate South Africa. She is an achieved business leader with a track
record of working in technical environments. She is the immediate past President of the South African Forum for Civil Engineering and Construction (SAFCEC) and also served as Deputy Chairperson of the Black Business Council’s (BBC) Infrastructure Committee. She has over 20 years’ working experience in government and private sector organizations
operating in transportation, engineering, construction and property development.

Her qualifications include among others an MBA (Bond University, Australia); a Post Graduate Diploma in Management (Wits Univ.); BA degree (NUL); Diploma in Marketing Communication (Vega Brand School); Diploma in Labour Law (GIMT); Global
Executive Development certificates (attained from GIBS- University of Pretoria and Wharton – University of Pennsylvania, USA respectively) Strategic Public Affairs certificate (Pinnacle, London UK), and Executive Development certificate (Harvard, USA).

Isabella is member of the Institute of Directors and also director of the University of Johannesburg’s Women in Engineering and the Built Environment (WiEBE). She championed the development and launching of Transnet’s Women in Rail program and was also founding chairperson of the Transnet Chairman’s executive women’s programme during her 7-year stint at the SOC. She served on the management committees of the Black Management Forum (BMF) and the Businesswomen Association (BWA) Johannesburg chapters respectively over a number of years. She founded and chaired Group Five ‘s award winning Basadi programme – a fast track initiative aimed at increasing females in the company and in the construction industry. The programme was cited as “the most innovative women training programme” in the sector at the 2015 Women in Construction Totally Concrete Awards. As a result of her ongoing efforts, Group Five attained 2nd runner up position in SA’s “2017 Gender Mainstreaming Awards” under the Women Empowerment in the Workplace category.

Isabella was nominee of the “Shoprite Checkers Woman of the Year Award” in 2001 for her contributions in community development, and also recipient of Transnet’s “Leadership Award for Women Empowerment” in 2002. In October 2014, she received a “Champions Award in Business” in recognition of her role in the development and empowerment of women in corporate South Africa. She is also the recipient of BMF’s “2017 Manager of the Year” award.