Anita Nikova Bundovski

• Country Director, CIDR/North Macedonia
• DAI, North Macedonia

Anita Nikova Bundovski of DAI is the North Macedonia Country Director for the Critical Infrastructure Digitalization and Resilience (CIDR) program. CIDR is an initiative of the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) and part of the agency’s U.S.-Europe Energy Bridge portfolio.

CIDR is a five-year program (2021-2026) that is providing development assistance in Kosovo, Moldova, and Serbia in addition to North Macedonia, and will soon launch activities in Albania and Georgia. The CIDR team provides assistance to nations to develop cybersecurity governance, critical infrastructure resilience, cyber workforce, and the sharing of critical cyber data.

In North Macedonia, Ms. Bundovski leads a team that supports: 1) the national Critical Infrastructure Cybersecurity Working Group composed of essential officials from government, critical infrastructure entities, private sector, academia, and civil society; the working group develops cybersecurity national priorities and recommendations that are forwarded to top decision makers; 2) cyber workforce development, including CIDR’s Cyber Pathways for Women initiative; 3) preparations for the upcoming national Digital Transformation; and 4) cybersecurity strengthening at the Ministry of Agriculture.

Ms. Nikova holds a bachelor’s degree in business administration (finance) and master’s degree in computer science from the University of Sheffield. She has worked for 18 years in the ICT sector in North Macedonia and the Western Balkans. Ms. Nikova holds specific experience and knowledge in ICT talent pool development and extension.

Prior to joining DAI, Ms. Nikova served as Executive Director of the Macedonian Chamber of Information and Communication Technology (MASIT), a non-governmental organzation that manages the interests of ICT-sector companies and lobbies for them. In parallel, Ms. Nikova served as IT team lead at the USAID Regional Economic Growth project, where she supported the ICT business sector in Albania, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Georgia, Kosovo, Macedonia, Moldova, Montenegro, Serbia, and Ukraine. Her main activities included supporting companies to export their products and services through business-to-business trade missions.