OPERATIONS
Mike Malmberg, Associate
Mike joined KOMAZA in September 2009 and is working with the Crop Production team to develop all aspects of field operations to handle increased capacity as KOMAZA grows rapidly. He is also helping to design and run experimental crop production trials at the KOMAZA farm. Prior to joining KOMAZA, Mike spent the last four years managing native plant restoration projects in Northern California, including a stint with the National Park Service and several years with a land management contracting firm. Mike has a degree in Biology from New York University.
Kennedy M'baraka, Field Manager
Kennedy has been with KOMAZA since the start in 2006 and is currently serving as supervising Field Manager for plant operations. In this role, his responsibilities include coordination of social marketing and recruitment and oversight of new community plantings with KOMAZA field staff. He has previously worked as a supervisor on Kenya's National Youth Service Farm and managed his own successful independent farm business. Kennedy also has experience in engineering and has received training in business management.
Gibson Mwarumba, Field Manager
Gibson is one of the original KOMAZA field staff and now supervises maintenance activities of all existing KOMAZA farms. In addition to managing field staff and consulting with farmers, Gibson's leadership and skills in community relations are an invaluable resource to smooth running of field operations. As a certified agriculturalist, Gibson brings years of farming experience and his bright green thumb to our team.
Clare Hunt, Associate
As part of KOMAZA’s Operations team, Clare leads research on crop production and value capture. Prior to joining KOMAZA, she worked for three years as an Associate Consultant at Bain & Company, a global management consulting firm, in Boston and London. Clare completed strategy work in various industries, such as information technology services, financial services, software, medical devices and pharmaceuticals. After Bain, Clare was a horticulture consultant on a short-term contract with TechnoServe, Inc. in their Swaziland office. At TechnoServe, she helped to launch operations for a female fruit cooperative that now exports produce to an international grocery chain. Clare graduated magna cum laude from Princeton University, where she received a Bachelor of Arts degree in International Political Economy, with a minor in Environmental Studies.
Tunje Ngombo, Field Manager
Tunje joined KOMAZA in September 2009 as a Field Manager and is currently working directly with our extension network to expand our planting operations. Prior to joining KOMAZA, Tunje worked as a Project Extension Officer for Alisei, an Italian non-governmental organization. In this role, he supervised 20 farmers on a mixed-crop farm in Malindi, Kenya. He also has experience establishing and managing private tree nurseries and is an avid beekeeper. Tunje earned a certificate in agriculture from Kilifi Institute of Agriculture.
Alfred Mwatsuma Kiti, Field Manager
Alfred joined KOMAZA in early 2010 and currently works as a Field Manager on our Crop Production team. Prior to KOMAZA, he was a field extension officer for Mace Foods, where he was responsible for recruiting and managing a large network of outgrowers and supervising the production of food crops. Alfred also has significant experience working with international development organizations, including Plan Kenya, Heifer International and TechnoServe. Alfred holds a Certificate in Agriculture from the Kilifi Institute of Agriculture.
Wycliffe Etemesi Indetie, Experimental Farms Manager
Etemesi manages our industry-leading experimental farm in Ganze, where he is spearheading crop production research that will help us improve our current planting practices and advance our R&D work on a number of agricultural innovations for semi-arid farmers. Prior to joining KOMAZA, Etemesi worked at Eagle Aviation in Mombasa.
David de Vries, Analyst
David has been with KOMAZA since February of 2010 as a Crop Production Analyst. Currently taking a year off from Harvard University, where he is pursuing a BA in Neurobiology, David is working closely with KOMAZA’s field staff to ensure the continued success of tree-farming operations. In addition to being a Division 1 varsity athlete, David has worked in the fields of cancer research, neuroimmunology and gene therapy prior to joining KOMAZA.
Jacquelyn Lee, Associate
Jacquelyn Lee is an Associate with KOMAZA's Operations team. She graduated with a Bachelor of Arts degree in Business Administration and a Masters in Professional Accounting from the University of Texas. Jacquelyn brings with her valuable management consultant experience from her time with Booz & Company, where she partnered with multinational companies to solve strategic and operational challenges. Within the non-profit sector, Jacquelyn has also worked with organizations in India to maximize profitability for women income-generation groups and the United States to help the Girl Scouts redefine their strategic plan. At KOMAZA, Jacquelyn uses her extensive non-profit and corporate background to develop a robust understanding of the Kenyan wood products markets and to define KOMAZA’s future value chain processes.
Sudeep Cherian, Analyst
Sudeep joined KOMAZA in February 2010 and is working with the Operations team to define how to successfully harvest and process agricultural outputs from KOMAZA farms. Sudeep brings five years of experience from Microsoft where he worked in various areas of the business, including Sales, Marketing, Operations, and Channel Strategy. Sudeep has a Bachelors of Business Administration from the McCombs School of Business at The University of Texas at Austin.
ORGANIZATIONAL DEVELOPMENT
Maria Langat, Associate
Maria joined KOMAZA in September 2009 and serves as the Technology Associate. In this role, she is responsible for driving new technology initiatives for KOMAZA program delivery and managing all of KOMAZA’s technology infrastructure. She has experience working in software development and graduated with a Bachelor of Science degree in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science from Yale University.
Janet Dubi Chihanga, Administrative Manager
Janet is responsible for the bulk of KOMAZA's administrative work in Kenya and has played a major role in establishing KOMAZA from its first days in Kenya. She brings an extensive background in non-profit administration with her to KOMAZA, as well as experience as a successful entrepreneur. Her knowledge of local infrastructure, resources and cultures is invaluable, and her ability to navigate government bureaucracy borders on awe-inspiring.
Ali Abbas Causer, Associate
Ali Abbas Causer joined as an Associate in April 2010 to help define, design and implement the Rural Cell model that will be used for scaling KOMAZA's operations. Prior to joining KOMAZA, he worked for several years as an Investment Banking Analyst at Credit Suisse and Centerview Partners in New York City. During this time, he worked on teams advising several public and private companies across a broad range of industries on complex corporate situations and the strategic direction of their businesses. He brings with him a skill set in financial and operational modeling, budgeting, business planning and data analysis. Ali Abbas graduated from Columbia University in 2007 with a Bachelor of Science degree in Applied Mathematics and a minor in Economics. He was born and raised in Karachi, Pakistan.
Juliet Odhiambo, Procurement & Logisitics Manager
Juliet joined KOMAZA in early 2008 and earned several promotions before becoming KOMAZA's Procurement and Logistics Manager. She holds a diploma in Community Development and Counseling from Mombasa Polytechnic and has significant experience working with community organizations in KOMAZA's current program areas. Juliet plays an important support role at KOMAZA by ensuring that our field and office teams have the materials they need, when they need them. Juliet is currently studying sustainable development at Pwani University.
Philistine Anzazi Chigiri, Bookkeeper
Philistine has worked in KOMAZA's accounting department since the organization's inception. She is a certified Kenya Accounting Technician and has significant experience and training in financial management and controls. Philistine helps keep our operations running smoothly by ensuring the proper management of KOMAZA's finances.
EXTERNAL RELATIONS
Leah Harrison, Associate
Leah joined KOMAZA in October 2009 as an Associate. She brings significant experience working with non-profits in Africa, Latin America and the United States and graduated magna cum laude from Brown University with a Bachelor of Arts degree in International Relations - Political Economy and Development. Before joining KOMAZA, Leah worked in rural Sierra Leone as a coordinator of microfinance and agriculture initiatives and managed project fundraising, monitoring and evaluation, and accounting. She has worked in conflict zones and was the founder and coordinator of a major educational program for resettled refugees. With KOMAZA, Leah is helping to drive the capital investment campaign required to bring KOMAZA to scale and enable self-sustaining growth and impact.
Matt Foerster, Associate
Matt joined KOMAZA in late 2009 after spending three years working at a global public affairs consulting firm, where he helped corporate, government and non-governmental clients develop and administer public-private partnerships to address global health and development priorities, with a primary focus on water stewardship and sustainable agriculture. He also has professional experiencing working abroad in Europe and Asia. Matt earned a dual Bachelor of Arts degree in International Affairs and Communications from Elon University, where he graduated with honors in 2006. He has completed additional graduate coursework in economics at New York University as well as academic research in Brussels at the European Commission.
