Lydiah Maranga is the Program Officer for the Feed the Future Innovation Lab for Horticulture. She holds an MSc. in International Agricultural Development from UC Davis, with an emphasis on project planning & evaluation, plant pathology, and soil science. She also has a B.A. in International relations from the same institution, focusing on Global Health, Environment, and Natural Resources. 

After her undergraduate degree, Lydiah worked as a Project Coordinator at Imara Technologies, a private IT company, liaising with international collaborators, including the company’s offshore team and the business.  This role exposed her to different application tools for tracking project progress, client relations, and international travel processes. It also allowed her to travel to the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA), sparking her interest in the agricultural sector.  Having been raised in a rural environment in Kenya and witnessing research efforts at the IITA Institute in Nigeria, she decided to proceed to graduate school to study about agriculture and economic development. 

While in graduate school, she took up an internship with the Development In Gardening Organization, which allowed her to interact with various people of the organization from different countries to develop indicators for their monitoring and evaluation process. The coordinating skills helped in her role at Stanford University as a Development Coordinator in the Corporate Relations office. She brings to our team a rich experience in both domestic and international development.