Paul Hollwedel is a Senior Program Manager at I4DI, where he manages projects and specializes in living income, responsible supply chains, and sustainable sourcing. He brings a builder’s mindset to everything he does, shaped by nine years of launching and scaling programs across sub-Saharan Africa.
Before joining I4DI, Paul’s career followed an unusual arc — from leading Marines in combat training across Southeast Asia, the Middle East, and the Horn of Africa to building agricultural businesses and health programs from the ground up in some of the world’s toughest operating environments. At One Acre Fund, he launched the organization’s Nigeria pilot from scratch, growing it from 50 to over 1,200 farmers in under two years. In Ethiopia, he led a 230-person team exporting regeneratively grown produce to European and Middle Eastern markets while certifying 250 smallholder farms in EU Organic and sustainability standards — improving their annual revenue by over $1,100 per farmer. As COO of ZzappMalaria, he scaled an AI-driven malaria elimination platform across eight countries, protecting over 100,000 people from malaria and neglected tropical diseases.
What connects the thread is an ability to stand up complex operations in difficult contexts and make them work. Paul holds a B.S. in History from the United States Naval Academy.
