NEED Team Members

Prof Donald Kgathi

 

 

 

 

Institution                 

University of Botswana (UB), Okavango Research Institute (ORI)

Position in NEED

Energy Expert of Work Package 5 "Fossil-Free Wetlands"

About     

Donald Letsholo Kgathi is currently a Professor of sustainable development at the Okavango Research Institute, University of Botswana, where he is mainly involved in research, service (university, community and profession), academic leadership, and supervision of post-graduate students. He has studied economics, development economics and development studies at the Universities of Botswana (Gaborone), Strathclyde (Glasgow), and East Anglia (Norwich). He obtained his PhD in 1992 (from the latter University) and the title of his thesis was “Household response to fuelwood scarcity in south-eastern Botswana: implications for energy policy”. In 1984, he was attached to the Institute for Environmental Studies, Free University, Amsterdam, undertaking research on economics of rural energy and in 1995 he did a short-duration course on environmental economics and policy analysis at the University of Harvard. His research interests include sustainability of the production and use of renewable energy, political economy of access to natural resources, adaptation to climate variability and change, and economic valuation of natural resources. He has over 90 publications in the form of books, referred journal articles, book chapters, monographs and technical reports, mainly in broader field of the economics of sustainable development.  Prof Kgathi has participated in a number of research projects such as the SIDA-funded research project (through the African Energy Research Network) on the impacts of the use of biomass energy (1992-1994) and the EU-funded research project “Water and Ecosystem Resources in Regional Development: Balancing Societal Needs and Wants in and Natural Resources Sustainability in International River Basins (WERRD) (2002 to 2004) and he was also Scientific Coordinator of this research project.