Who is Maria Horne?
Maria Horne, is an entrepreneur, climate activist and storyteller. She is the cofounder of BLI Global, GYCAF, BLI Global Capital, and Shop Bloom Fashion. Maria applies her decade of business development, management, and fundraising skills to every project and investment venture she undertakes. She is dedicated to helping clients and businesses achieve financial success and building sustainable wealth management practices.
Over the years, Maria has honed her skills in structuring business deals, identifying partners, and building and maintaining strong and meaningful partnerships. In previous years she has championed the financing of environmental and youth-led projects through the non-profit BLI Global and the Global Youth Climate Action Fund. She champions financial literacy, especially for young women, through her podcast, Lady Maria Horne.
She is also a Managing Partner at BLI Global Capital, an investment management firm and the cofounder of Shop Bloom Fashion an e-commerce company.
Speaker/Moderator Roles
She has attended a number of regional and international conferences promoting economic development transformation of Africa as well as meaningful youth engagement in climate and sustainable development processes. Some of the conferences she has attended include the inaugural launch of the African Transformation Forum with ACET, the UNFCCC Climate Change Conferences (COP24, 25, 26, 27), UNEA4, UNGA, Africa Climate Week, and ECOSOC Youth Forum.
Through her participation, she has spoken on business panels with academic institutions like Uganda Martyrs University under the E4Impact MBA program. She has also spoken at the United Nations Headquarters in New York and at the COP24 UNFCCC in Poland Katowice.
Business Background
Through BLI Global Capital, Maria and Robert Horne are working on developing impact funds with the aim of deploying the capital to startup businesses and projects that match the funds’ criteria. In the past, Maria worked with Africa Food Merchants as the authorized representative overseeing the sale of imported wines under Waterside Wines, a Mauritius based importer.
In 2015 she worked in the tourism industry becoming Marketing Manager and later General Manager of Trek Safaris Uganda. Her consultancy experience with Interface Consulting Limited, an engineering firm opened her mind to the importance of proper project coordination and management. She has broad expertise encompassing renewable energy, agribusiness, education, exportation and importation, fundraising, and networking with potential investment niches.
Her exposure to and activity in the corporate and entrepreneurial world has polished her skills in business strategy, business development, financial inclusion of small and medium enterprises as well as tailoring of investment products and innovative financing for economic growth.
Other business ventures Maria has spearheaded include Shop Bloom Fashion, an online e-commerce platform,
Maria has been featured on Lionesses of Africa, She Leads Africa, Impakter, and writes occasional insights on Africa Business Communities which can be accessed here.
Fellowships/Memberships
She is a Salzburg Global Seminar fellow, a DOT-YEC (Canada-Uganda) fellow, and a Local Pathways fellow as well as an active IUCN CEC member. She was also a member of YOUNGO’s Bottom Lining Team and is actively involved in providing capacity to the Finance and Markets Working Group to advocate for youth meaningful engagement at the UN and with key stakeholders in the ecosystem.
Ventures
Ventures Maria is working on include, Shop Bloom Fashion, MonolithAir, Data4WASH (in partnership with Media for Community Change).
Through BLI Global Capital she also drives finance to businesses that fit the criteria of the fund vehicles within the management company. More news on successful deal closings can be found on the website: www.bliglobalcapital.com
Philanthropy
She is the co-founder of Better Living Initiatives Global (BLI Global) a not-for-profit that works to improve environmental conservation and access to health and education through capacity building. Through BLI Global, Maria and her husband have supported and fundraised for a number of programs around the world promoting climate literacy, environmental conservation and climate action. Particularly, BLI Global initiated the Global Youth Climate Action Fund that finances youth-led projects around the world. She has also supported efforts to provide clean and safe drinking water in developing countries through the Data4WASH program. In prior years she fundraised for IUCN-CEC environmental education campaigns.
Published Works
Maria is fond of writing and believes words play a role in inspiring actions and behaviors for good. She actively sets out to publish a book every year and has released two children’s books in partnership with RESI Africa. Discover more of her written works on amazon. Also visit the Books page to see her growing list of rivetting books.
To keep up to date with her current work, please follow her on the following social media platforms:
linkedin, twitter, Facebook, Instagram