Marianne Smallwood

The HRI Initiative invests in fragile and frontier markets, with an initial focus on Kenya, Somalia, and Mozambique. In this role, Marianne works to unlock private capital and bring together public, private, and humanitarian actors to build investable markets and scale resilience.

Marianne is a former U.S. diplomat with expertise in catalytic capital, international development, and climate finance. She has worked for the U.S. Agency for International Development, WWF, and the private sector and spent the majority of her career based in Southeast Asia and East Africa. Originally from Minnesota, she is a graduate of the University of Minnesota and The Fletcher School at Tufts University. She is a native English speaker and fluent in French and Vietnamese.