Venkat Raman
An Award-Winning Marketing Specialist and Planning Strategist has been appointed to head the Starship Foundation in Auckland.
Aisha Daji Punga took charge as Chief Executive of the Organisation on April 3, 2018.
A graduate in Commerce (BCom) with Marketing as the major subject from the University of Auckland, she has more than 20 years of experience in senior executive positions in the fast-moving consumer goods and telecommunications businesses.
Ms Punga is a passionate advocate of children’s health and wellbeing and has been a volunteer at the Life Education Trust for the past 12 years and has been a mentor at the Akina Foundation, apart from being involved in Ko Awatea and the South Auckland Health Equities campaign.
Lofty Target
Ms Punga hopes to raise at least $20 million every year for Starship.
“We are more ambitious than ever in our drive to unlock and enable all New Zealanders to demonstrate their goodwill and support for Starship. Despite the extraordinary support and work of many, New Zealand’s health outcomes are still far from where they should be – we are ranked in the bottom-third of developed countries in terms of overall child health and wellbeing. I look forward to the Starship Foundation playing a pivotal role in accelerating better health outcomes for all New Zealand children,” she said.
Three Priorities
Ms Punga said that the Starship Foundation will continue to invest in several priority areas.
These include (a) Research and innovation that will accelerate the pace of change, bringing new treatments, smarter ways of delivering them and helping to retain Starship’s brightest minds (b) the latest advances in medical technology and better facilities, so that the team at Starship has the resources to go above and beyond for their patients; and (c) the best training and professional development to enable staff to meet the most challenging and complex cases.
Good Choice
Starship Foundation Board Chair Martin Wiseman said that he and his colleagues are delighted at the appointment of Ms Punga.
“She will ably work together with the Starship Foundation team, Starship Child Health and our wonderful donors as we embark on an exciting time ahead of enabling our national children’s hospital to achieve even greater heights providing world-class care to children and their families,” he said.
For donations, please call 0800-78277447 or visit www.starship.org.nz
Photo Caption:
Aisha Daji Punga with Starship Clinical Directors Dr Mike Shepherd (left) and Dr John Beca (right).
(Picture by Olivia Hemus)
