Development Finance Leader · Africa
With over 12 years of experience across Africa, focused on trade facilitation, financial inclusion, and climate resilience financing.
"I believe capital can be structured differently. And when it is, markets shift."
— Liz Gathu
"I care about women having access to capital on fair terms. I care about small businesses surviving shocks and growing with dignity."
— Liz Gathu · Development Finance Practitioner
My Journey
My career spans commercial banking, advisory work, and regional programme leadership — each phase building a sharper understanding of how capital moves, where it fails, and how to redesign it for greater impact.
I am most effective where finance meets real markets — where strategy must become action and policy must translate into products that reach people.
Geographic Footprint
Areas of Expertise
My work spans five interconnected areas where finance, markets and policy must move together to create lasting change for people and economies across Africa.
I design and structure capital solutions that reach the businesses, communities and markets most often excluded from mainstream finance. This includes blended finance facilities, guarantee mechanisms, and catalytic funding structures that de-risk private investment and expand access to productive credit — particularly for women-led MSMEs, smallholder farmers, and informal traders.
I work at the intersection of trade policy, market systems and enterprise development — helping build the conditions for inclusive, competitive markets. I support AfCFTA implementation by strengthening cross-border trade infrastructure, reducing barriers for small traders and connecting value chain actors to broader markets.
I design programmes that strengthen agri and fisheries value chains — from production to market — with a focus on financing, inclusion and resilience. My work integrates financial solutions with cold chain systems, aggregation models and trade infrastructure to reduce post-harvest losses and improve livelihoods for women and youth in fisheries and agri sectors.
I integrate climate considerations into financial and market systems — not as an add-on, but as a core design principle. I develop climate-smart financial products that improve income stability and risk resilience for farmers and enterprises, and support institutions in embedding green finance into their lending and investment strategies.
Measurable Results
Across financial systems, trade programmes, and market interventions — here is what the work has delivered.
Speaking & Convenings
I speak on development finance, inclusive growth, trade, and climate-aligned market systems across Africa — with a practical focus on how capital, institutions, and partnerships can work better for youth, women, and vulnerable communities.
I do not speak about inclusion as theory. I speak from the lived realities of building financial and market solutions across Africa — from SME and supply chain finance in banking, to women's productive credit, cross-border trade, fisheries, climate-smart finance, and regional market systems.
Shared practical lessons on expanding financial access and strengthening resilience across agricultural value chains. Explored sustainable financing models for smallholder farmers and agri MSMEs.
Represented MicroSave Consulting alongside Mastercard Foundation and TradeMark Africa. Explored finance, digital tools and non-tariff barriers affecting cross-border fish trade for women and youth.
Featured in a live broadcast panel at the AfCFTA Marketplace in Algiers, discussing access to finance and investment pathways for African enterprises at the continent's premier trade forum.
Contributed to aligning development finance institutions on a coordinated financing pathway for the Agri Trade Action Plan — focusing on strategic agri-food value chains and market predictability for farmers and SMEs.
Contributed to sessions on digital trade and financial services in fish markets — how digital insurance solutions reduce logistical risk and expand opportunity for women and youth traders under AfCFTA.
Contributed alongside 80+ stakeholders in Lusaka on investment policy alignment, inclusion of women and youth in fisheries value chains, and translating sector potential into sustainable trade and food security.
Liz Gathu is a development finance professional with over a decade of experience across banking, advisory, and regional market systems work in Africa. She speaks on inclusive finance, trade, MSME growth, and climate-aligned market systems, with a focus on building practical solutions that expand opportunity for youth, women, and vulnerable communities.
Liz Gathu is a development finance leader with over ten years of experience working across commercial banking, advisory, and regional development programmes in Africa. Her work sits at the intersection of inclusive finance, enterprise growth, trade, and climate-aligned market systems. She has worked across SME and supply chain finance, productive credit, women's and youth economic participation, cross-border trade, fisheries and blue economy value chains, and financial sector partnerships.
For keynotes, panels, moderation, workshops, and strategic convenings, get in touch.
Media & Interviews
Conversations, panel discussions and media features on development finance, trade and inclusive investment across Africa.
Liz discusses the key financing challenges facing SMEs, micro-enterprises and startups across Africa — and how catalytic capital can shift the equation.
Listen to Interview ↗On-the-ground engagement with communities and market actors across Africa — where finance meets real people and real markets.
A closer look at programme delivery across Africa — building partnerships, strengthening market systems and unlocking growth for underserved communities.
On-the-ground footage from the AfCFTA Fisheries Value Chain programme — capturing community engagement, market systems work and the voices behind inclusive market access in Zanzibar.
Learnings
Insights, reflections and practical perspectives on development finance, trade, inclusion and climate-aligned markets across Africa.
Articles, reflections and practical perspectives from over 12 years of work across financial inclusion, trade facilitation and climate-aligned investment.
Academic and practitioner publications on inclusive finance, gender-responsive market systems, agri value chains and blended finance structures across Africa.
Photo Album
Moments from convenings, field visits and thought leadership engagements across Africa.