MERCY CORPS - Key Persons
Job Titles:
- Digital Banking Manager, Mercy Corps AgriFin
Betty joined the AgriFin Accelerate (AFA) Program with 17 years' experience in banking at Barclays Bank and Bank of Africa in Kenya. She has strong skills developing and implementing sustainable digital products and high level exposure to digital financial services solutions.
Prior to this role, Betty led card management and multi-channel services at Bank of Africa Kenya, owning the bank's strategy with regard to product development, business development, support and implementation of projects. She was actively involved in developing digital channels at the bank and worked directly with telecommunications companies and technology partners to deliver electronic services to retail banking clients across industries.
Betty holds a Global Executive Masters in Business Administration from United States International University Africa (USIU-A) and an undergraduate degree in International Business Administration from USIU-A. She has continued to update her expertise through advanced banking courses over her extensive banking career.
Job Titles:
- Director, DAAS Product, Digital Agricultural Advisory Services, Digital Green
- Product Director at Digital Green
Beza Bogale is a Product Director at Digital Green, based out of Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. She is currently leading the implementation of various products for digital agricultural advisory systems in Ethiopia. In collaboration with the Agricultural Transformation Institute, she is implementing FarmStack, a data exchange protocol in the agriculture ecosystem. Also with the ministry of agriculture, she led the development and implementation of a farmer profile system that enables targeting farmers with customized advisory.
Prior to Digital Green, she worked in the public health domain by leading information systems development and implementation for the ministry of health and its agencies in Ethiopia. She leads the national implementation of the health commodity supply chain management system, and vaccine distribution management system. She has a master's degree in information systems development and B.Sc in computer science.
Chloe Stull-Lane is a management consultant with nearly 20 years of experience in international development research, policy and practice, primarily in fragile and conflict-affected areas of Eastern Africa.
She currently leads the SPARC Innovation Research Facility to identify, amplify and scale innovation in the drylands in partnership with a wide range of stakeholders in the Horn of Africa and the Sahel. She also supports foundations and businesses to invest in innovation in the drylands. She has a Masters in Entrepreneurship and Innovation (2022) and a Masters in Sustainable International Development (2009).
Job Titles:
- Chief Executive Officer, ACRE Africa
An experienced business leader who brings a vast experience in development finance, acquisitions, and organizational turn around. He has also worked in the African insurance investment space as the CIO of Aprica Investments Ltd and previously with African Development Bank where he managed investments in East Africa.
He also serves as a Non-Executive Director on the Board of ZEP-Re, is a Private Equity Consultant and advisor to the Mauritian insurer, Swan Group on international development and business expansion and scaling where he is also a Non-Executive Director in Zambia Ltd. Ewan Wheeler holds a BSc. of Economics from The London School of Economics, MSc State, Society and Development from School of Oriental and African Studies and a postgraduate in Investment Appraisal & Risk Analysis from Queens University, Canada.
Job Titles:
- Deputy Program Director at Mercy Corps AgriFin
Grace is the Deputy Program Director at Mercy Corps AgriFin supporting the Program Director with programming and management of the portfolio. Grace has 12 years' experience in the financial inclusion and international development sectors. Grace joined AgriFin from the GSMA Innovation Fund where she supported innovative start-ups and SMEs using mobile centric innovative solutions to achieve sustainable growth and improved socio-economic impact across Africa and Asia Pacific.She has also worked at KPMG East Africa's International Development Advisory Services unit where she managed among others the Mastercard Foundation Fund for Rural Prosperity whose objective was to provide financial access to unbanked and under-banked communities of rural sub-Saharan Africa.
Grace was also the programme coordinator for a youth programme in Kenya, funded by the Government, and supported by the World Bank that provided training and funding for 750 young entrepreneurs across the country.Prior to joining KPMG, Grace gained extensive experience as a technical advisor with one of the leading boutique financial inclusion consulting firms, MSC Consulting. Grace led and executed technical assistance assignments to financial service providers for delivery of market-led products and services.
She has worked with banks, telcos, micro-finance Institutions, Savings and Credit Co-operative Unions (SACCOs) and donor agencies in Africa and Asia to develop and customize products and channels of delivery, optimise operational efficiencies, reengineer processes, manage risks, design and deliver training. She has also been a micro-finance consultant for one of the leading commercial banks in Kenya where her major tasks including growing the business for the bank targeting customers at the base of the pyramid.
Grace also sits on the board of the African Women in Fintech and Payments (AWFP) network - Kenya chapter, as a founding board member.
Hetal Patel is Director of Investments Mercy Corps Ventures and leverages his consulting and entrepreneurial experience to support the portfolio companies from due diligence to scale. In his role, he leads investments in Africa, focusing on innovative business models that drive financial and climate resilience.
He has 12+ years experience working in Global South markets, with the last 4+ in Africa and has an extensive network of entrepreneurs, co-investors, and ecosystem enablers. Prior to his Investment role, Hetal managed MCV (Mercy Corps Ventures) Platform, the engine that supports portfolio founders accelerate growth. He created products that focus on business model validation, financial modelling, and investment readiness for growth capital. Hetal has specific experience in, Agricutech and FinTech, and is specially interested in future facing models that address the climate risk for the under-served and poor.
Job Titles:
- ICT Specialist and Data Scientist at KALRO
- Specialist and Data Scientist at KALRO
Irene Wambui Kimani is an ICT Specialist and Data Scientist at KALRO where she works closely with lead e-Agriculture teams in the development of communication tools to improve knowledge access and sharing. She is at the forefront in digitizing agricultural value chains in Kenya.
Jointly she has developed training programs to promote efficient and effective technology transfer, case in point "lead farmer" training currently on going in 24 Counties. Irene is passionate about improving the visibility and accessibility to agricultural data and science in Africa. She is the Secretary to CODATA Agricultural Task Group. CODATA ATG aims to bring together stakeholders in agriculture to develop and implement strategies for knowledge sharing. Irene holds a Master of Science in Computer Based Information Systems (CBIS) and a Bachelor Degree in Design and Communication.
Job Titles:
- Assistant FAO Representative for Kenya
- Deputy Country Representative, FAO
Mr. Hamisi M. Williams is currently the Assistant FAO Representative for Kenya and in charge of Country Programmes. Until his appointment, he was the Technical Policy and Institutional Governance Advisor to the Cabinet Secretary, Ministry of Public Service, Youth and Gender Affairs, having concluded the same function in the Ministry of Agriculture, Livestock, Fisheries & Irrigation where he served on secondment from the Executive Office of the President. Mr. Hamisi has also served in various capacities as the Head of Policy Research and Strategy at the State Corporations Advisory Committee (SCAC) unit under the Executive Office of the President where he led and implemented research outcomes on institutional governance.
Mr. Hamisi has a keen interest in institutional reforms vis-à-vis governance, more so within the transformation of Kenya's agricultural landscape in promoting food and nutritional security.
He holds a Master of Science in Agricultural Information and Communication Management from the University of Nairobi and Master of Business Administration (MBA) in Strategic Management. Others include Cochran Fellow in Agricultural Policy from North Carolina State University (USA), Data Management Tool from Harvard University (USA), Project Management from University of Adelaide (Australia) and Agricultural Products and Trade Policies from AMI Institute, Beijing, China.
Job Titles:
- Regional Director
- Regional Director, Africa
Sean Granville-Ross is the Regional Director for Mercy Corps covering Africa. Granville-Ross has been with Mercy Corps for twenty years. He first worked with the agency's team in Kosovo. He also has served as regional director in East Asia, country director in Mongolia, Indonesia and Uganda. He currently is based in Nairobi, Kenya.
Mr. Granville-Ross is an economic and agricultural livestock development specialist and a seasoned field leader, with more than 25 years of experience working in both the private and non-profit sectors. Born and raised in Kenya, Mr. Granville-Ross has intimate knowledge of East Africa with specialization in agriculture and livestock production in the tropics. As Regional Director for Mercy Corps, he currently oversees a portfolio of $195 million in complex programming. His guidance and knowledge as Regional Director has helped Mercy Corps advance sustainable and quality agricultural and economic development, pastoralist livelihoods and financial services programs, climate change adaptation, disaster risk reduction, water and sanitation and health interventions, government partnerships and capacity-building across the region.
Mr. Granville-Ross brings a global track record in successful program design, monitoring and evaluation and management that encompasses economic and market development projects, and sustainable livelihoods in Africa, the Caribbean, the Balkans, Mongolia and Indonesia. He has specific experience administering multiple, complex subgrants, enhancing and diversifying value chains and working on community mobilization and civil society programming. Mr. Granville-Ross has effectively built constituencies between government, civic and private sector actors in support of development goals.
Granville-Ross grew up in Kenya and has worked there as well as in the Dominican Republic, the Balkans, Mongolia, Indonesia and Uganda. He speaks English, Spanish, Kiswahili and Indonesian. He earned a bachelor's degree in agriculture from Newcastle University and a master's degree in livestock production from the University of Edinburgh.
Job Titles:
- Senior Program Officer for Digital Agriculture Solutions at the Bill
- Senior Program Officer, Digital Solutions
Stewart Collis is Senior Program Officer for Digital Agriculture Solutions at the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation where he focuses on digital farmer services, smart farming and digital agricultural ecosystems in low and middle income countries across Africa and South Asia.
Mr. Collis has over 20 years' experience in agricultural information technology and was co-founder and CTO at aWhere, a Benefit Corporation providing global ag-weather content, agricultural modeling and analytics to private and public sector partners.
Previously Mr. Collis worked on climate-driven spatial crop simulation modeling and ag-data management tools at Texas A&M University and the International Center for Research in Agroforestry. Mr. Collis has a Masters of Engineering Science in Geomatic Engineering from the University of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia.