Marinah Embiricos

Throughout her career, she has been very active in several businesses and foundations in England, the Bahamas, Switzerland and Malaysia. Having established several private public partnerships initiatives, she has worked on sustainable development projects involving collaboration between local communities, governments Non- governmental organization and the private sector.

In 1993 she became a board member of BREEF, the Bahamian Educational and Environmental Foundation. The foundation’s goals were to provide a teacher at every Bahamian school with the necessary certification along with toolkit offering environmental education to every child in the Bahamas.

In 2003 Marinah founded the Borneo Tropical Rainforest Foundation, (BTRF) a member of IUCN, (International World Conservation of the United Nations) monitored by the Swiss ministry of Finance based in Geneva, Switzerland.

BTRF was established to lobby the REDD (Reduction of Carbon Dioxide Emission through avoided Deforestation and Degradation), global program. The program aimed to provide monetary incentives to governments to conserve their forest. At the United Nations Conference of parties (UNFCC) COP13 2007, BTRF launched and showcased the first REDD PPP program for the Malinau Province, Kalimantan, Indonesia.

In 2008 Marinah became a special advisor to the Governors’ of West Kalimantan and East Kalimantan, provinces of Indonesia and advised the forestry department of the Sabah Government on REDD. In 2009, Marinah was elected as the interim coordinator for Indonesia for the Governors Climate Forest Task Force (GCFFT) as an executive operating with the state governments of the US, Amazonas and Mexico. Working closely with all the member governors of GCFFT member states she advised on REDD as 

well as low carbon economy strategies.

In 2011, she founded and presided the Botza Association, encouraging sustainable development in mountain communities. Through the cooperation of the Commune de Bagnes, Business Valais, Swiss Development Cooperation through the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, UNEP and several foundations, academic institutions, private sector as well as local residents she chaired and launched the Verbier Green Pioneering Summit in 2012 to create an action plan for sustainable development in the Commune de Bagnes.

This initiative connected key mountain ranges including the Andes, the Himalayas, the Rockies and the Alpes, instigating the launch of the first World Mountain Forum in Verbier, Switzerland in 2012, addressing challenges on sustainable mountain development including issues caused by climate change.

In 2013, Marinah moved to Malaysia and established Gaya Naturals Sdn Bhd focusing on the plantation and production of essential oils. She took a modern, transparent approach to the marketing and production of natural products for both business-to-business and business-to-consumer distribution, advocating complete transparency, sustainable and risk averse supply chain practices that increased value for traceable and certified products.

Gaya Naturals (GN) was the largest single producer of patchouli oil in the world. In 2015 GN won global recognition in Paris, France, awarded through her global client. GN received BIONEXUS status in recognition by the Malaysian Government through BIOTECH Corp as a pioneering company.

In 2014, she founded the project NOW (No more plastics in our Waters), collaborating with Ministry of Education, Environment and Culture, DBKK, Sabah Parks, EAC, Bluelife, as well as other academic and private institutions. NOW are providing solutions and resources to secure private and public action in cleaning and managing our coastline.

In 2015, Marinah established a property development company Gaya Belian Sdn Bhd (GB) and was awarded contracts to design and build 620 affordable landed homes in Sabah.

Understanding the scale of affordable housing necessary for successful economic development of Sabah and the ASEAN region and the fundamental requirement to value engineer and utilize appropriate Industrial Building Systems, Marinah established a construction company and a factory manufacturing bespoke IBS engineering solutions and components as part of an initiative to upskill and upscale the construction industry in Sabah.

In 2017 Marinah received the State of Sabah Woman’s Entrepreneur Icon award.

In 2018 as CEO she received the Highest award for the Malaysian Industry in the construction.

In 2021 Gaya Belian was awarded a solar project in Sabah.

Marinah’s global business experience has enabled her to launch a variety of commercial and charitable enterprises providing economic development, industrial innovation and the transfer of technologies directly leading to the creation of sustainable employment for local communities and wide ranging improvements and benefits to the environment.

She is a cofounder GER AG and is currently working on developing nature based solutions project in Brazil, Indonesia and Sabah.

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