The GLOW Movement fosters women’s leadership to address environmental and health challenges in Kenya

By Michal Ruprecht, Stanford Global Health Media Fellow

Most people swat flies away, but Caroline Mbeyu raises them.

“Even though they’re small, they have big impacts on the community,” she said.

At a farm in southern Kenya, the 28-year-old is transforming waste into opportunity. Mbeyu’s regenerative farming operation starts with the black soldier fly, an insect roughly the size of a staple.

When adult flies lay eggs, their larvae feed on organic waste. At the farm, that waste comes from a local hotel. As the fly larvae consume the waste, they leave a residue behind, producing the first key output, a nutrient-rich organic fertilizer used for farming.

The second valuable product is the larvae themselves. When the larvae begin to mature into flies, Mbeyu harvests them and feeds them to chickens. The remaining larvae slowly morph into mature flies, and the cycle repeats.

The initiative is part of the Kenyan Health and Environmental Research Institute (HERI-Kenya), a local nonprofit co-founded in 2021 by Dr. Desiree LaBeaud, the associate dean of global health at Stanford University.

Mbeyu is also part of the Gender Leadership for Our World Movement, known as the GLOW Movement. In January 2025, Mbeyu joined the inaugural GLOW Movement cohort, designed to foster a new generation of women leaders addressing issues related to planetary and human health in Africa.

“Everyone loved Caroline, and so we ended up hiring her to lead the farm,” LaBeaud said.

LaBeaud, the founder of the GLOW Movement, said there were three issues she wanted to address with the farm: the waste crisis, food insecurity and underemployment along the coast of Kenya. Another important factor — and the GLOW Movement’s guiding principle — was women’s empowerment. While women don’t traditionally work in waste management, LaBeaud said it was important to elevate Mbeyu as a leader.

Mbeyu still remembers when she first met LaBeaud. “Meeting Desiree was just like an eye-opener,” Mbeyu said. “I always aspire to be like her. She’s ever jovial, and when I grow up, I want to be like her.”

LaBeaud recalled that Mbeyu was “very quiet and humble” before joining the GLOW Movement cohort and starting her new position.

“As she learned more and more on the farm and realized this was her responsibility, that was very blossoming for her,” LaBeaud explained. “What really encourages women to lead is having the opportunity to do so. They have great ideas, and they can do great things, if given the opportunity.”

What really encourages women to lead is having the opportunity to do so. They have great ideas, and they can do great things, if given the opportunity.

Mbeyu’s new start at the farm was also a turning point in her journey.

“Life has not been easy to me. I come from a family of eight, and I’m the last-born,” Mbeyu said. “By the time you’re finishing high school, your parents are old, so you have to be on your own and start your own life.”

Despite the excitement surrounding her new role, her family was skeptical. But their reservations quickly turned into curiosity.

“When they realized what I was doing, they were so happy,” Mbeyu said. “Most of them have shown interest to come to the farm so that they can learn more about the black soldier fly.”

That sense of buzz also hit Mbeyu. Her work at the farm has diverted waste from landfills, reducing environmental health risks, and she’s able to generate income by selling the organic fertilizer and feed to local farmers.

“When I learned that it was something that I’m contributing to the community, I became really passionate about this,” she said. “I want to be able to help the community and solve these problems.”

LaBeaud said these types of initiatives can help solve the world’s biggest problems.

“Nature has a lot of wisdom to share — two billion years of figuring things out,” she said. “The more we can lean into using nature-based solutions for these climate problems, the better things are going to get.”

While there is more work to be done, Mbeyu is hopeful about the future. Mbeyu and her colleagues at HERI-Kenya plan to scale the black soldier farm operation and continue inspiring other local women.

“Women perceive black soldier farming as something that is not for women,” Mbeyu said. “But with hard work and innovation, they can also take part in projects like this. I’m hopeful that I’m going to impact as many younger generations as possible.”

Acknowledgements:

This project is supported by the Disease Ecology in a Changing World (DECO) program, based at the Center for Human and Planetary Health at Stanford University.