The Kosovo Chamber of Commerce has backed Women on Boards Adria (WOBA), the regional initiative for gender-balanced corporate leadership, as the organisation announces the expansion of its operations in Kosovo.
Lulzim Rafuna, President of the Kosovo Chamber of Commerce, met Tanja Mihajlovska Dimitrievska, WOBA Regional Lead Ambassador, and Katerina Boshevska, Managing Director of EOS in North Macedonia and Kosovo and WOBA Ambassador. They discussed WOBA’s programme of activities in Kosovo and cooperation with Kosovar companies, institutions and individual professionals, at a moment when the regional agenda has begun to move quickly.
Since 30 June 2026, EU Directive 2022/2381, commonly known as the Women on Boards Directive, no longer encourages listed companies in the European Union to bring more women onto their boards. It requires it, with consequences for those that fall short.
WOBA was launched in April 2023 at the first edition of what is now the Adria Future Summit, with endorsements from European Women on Boards and Women at the Table. As a not-for-profit regional association, it works with companies, governments and international institutions on three tracks: policy advocacy, board-readiness training and mentoring, and a regional leadership network able to supply credible candidates when a seat opens.
“I have followed WOBA’s work for some time, and what persuaded me is that this is not an awareness campaign. It is practical work on governance: preparing candidates, professionalising how companies select them, and giving management the evidence it needs to act”, said Lulzim Rafuna, President of the Kosovo Chamber of Commerce.
“The Chamber is glad to support it. Our members compete for talent and for capital, and both increasingly ask the same question about how a company is run and by whom. I want Kosovar businesses to answer that question well, and to help shape this reform rather than receive it”, Rafuna added.
Kosovo’s legal framework on corporate boards is already partly in place. The 2018 Law on Business Organisations set a 40 per cent gender quota for boards of directors, rising to 50 per cent after two years of implementation, but it covers only joint-stock companies, and the implementing rules were never adopted. Where it does apply, it works: by December 2024, 14 of 16 central publicly owned enterprises met or exceeded the threshold.
“We see genuine potential in Kosovo. There is a generation of women here who are qualified, visible and ready, and companies already working on this that simply need a structure to work within. That is what WOBA brings: a pipeline of prepared candidates, transparent selection practices, and peers across the region who have done this before”, said Tanja Mihajlovska Dimitrievska, Regional Lead Ambassador at Women on Boards Adria.
She noted that balanced boards decide better and manage risk better, which is an economic gain for the company and the country, and a social signal to every young woman deciding whether business is open to her.
“Kosovo will have to meet these standards on its EU path. Designing that reform now, on Kosovo’s own terms, is far easier than absorbing it later as a condition of membership”, noted Mihajlovska Dimitrievska.
It was also announced at the meeting that EOS Matrix is starting operations in Kosovo again, extending into the Kosovar market the receivables management business the company has built in North Macedonia since 2003. Following the adoption of Kosovo’s new Law on Banks, EOS is able to resume the purchase of non-performing loan portfolios in the country.
“Kosovo is a market EOS knows well, and one we are now building in again. That is not a fresh start so much as a return with twenty years of regional experience behind it, and I am looking forward to it personally”, said Katerina Boshevska, Managing Director of EOS in North Macedonia and Kosovo, and WOBA Ambassador.
Boshevska also noted that she will continue her work as a WOBA Ambassador in the country, a role she said she is proud to hold.
“Twenty years in this industry taught me that the quality of a company’s decisions comes down to who is making them, and to whether the room holds more than one point of view. That is why I support WOBA. It does not ask companies for a gesture. It asks them to look honestly at how they choose their leaders, and then helps them do it better”, concluded Boshevska.
The Chamber and WOBA will now coordinate next steps, including introducing the Leadership and Board Readiness Programme to Kosovar companies, bringing Kosovar executives into the WOBA network, and engaging institutions on the corporate governance provisions of the new draft Law on Business Organisations.
