Speaker Bio

I am the Director of Rise Sustainability Consulting Ltd (Rise) and a Gender and Social Performance Specialist based in Nairobi, Kenya.  Before establishing Rise in 2018, I worked at Environmental Resources Management (ERM); an international sustainability consultancy, based in the UK and Kenya.  I have over 14 years of experience in social safeguards and risk assessment.

My work focuses on linking gender equality and risk with environmental and social standards using international good industry practice (GIIP) requirements and 2X Global benchmarks to support gender-lens investing for international and development finance institutions, and private developers.  This includes undertaking internal (workforce/human resources) and external (end user/supply chain) gender assessments, developing gender strategies and action plans, and facilitating training workshops with portfolio companies covering multiple sectors (e.g., financial institutions, energy, infrastructure, transport mining, agriculture, and oil and gas).   I have also supported companies mainstream gender into their environmental and social management systems, including developing gender policies, gender-sensitive grievance mechanisms and gender impact assessments.  I am currently leading a gender and inclusion (G&I) assessment and strategy for a planned oil development in Tanzania, developing action plans for Swedfund’s Women4Growth programme, and leading a gender-based violence and harassment benchmarking study.   Other experience includes social performance advisor for a mining project,  environmental and social assessment related to refugee influx in Uganda and acting as Regional Gender, Social and Environmental expert for Agence Française de Développement East Africa.