CEO & FounderBOMA Project
Kathleen Colson is a former refugee worker and safari guide who wanted to a see a long-term solution to drought and famine in the drylands of Africa. After decades of traveling and working in Africa, Kathleen invested two years of extended visits to northern Kenya to understand the unique challenges facing women and children.
Driven by a desire to disrupt the status quo—the repeated cycles of drought, chronic hunger, dependence on humanitarian aid, and extreme poverty—Kathleen’s quest has been to develop a holistic, evidence based approach to ending extreme poverty in the arid lands of Africa (40% of the African continent). The result is BOMA’s Rural Entrepreneur Access Project (REAP). REAP is an innovative, evidence-based, gender-focused, data-driven poverty graduation program that invests in and empowers women to break the cycle of extreme poverty and build resilient households.
Under Kathleen’s leadership, BOMA has reached over 94,000 women and children. BOMA is now scaling their graduation model through government adoption (Kenya) and partnerships with humanitarian organizations with a goal of reaching 1 million women and children by 2022. Ultimately, Kathleen’s vision is to see an end to extreme poverty for women and children in the drylands of Africa in her lifetime.
Kathleen is the recipient of the Sol Feinstone Humanitarian Award and Cordes and Rainer Arnhold Fellowships. BOMA has received a Lighthouse Activity Award by the United Nations Climate Change Conference, one of six organizations recognized globally for their work with women impacted by climate change, and a Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation Grand Challenge Award. Kathleen is also a regular panelist and speaker at conferences and events, including SEEP, the World Bank, the Foreign Policy Association and the London School of Economics.