Research and Innovation

Prof Jonathan Okonkwo

Rand Water Chair in Organic Chemistry
Primary discipline: Chemical Sciences, Technologies and Applied Sciences (2013 - 2018)

​Prof Jonathan Okonkwo is the Rand Water Research Chair in Organic Chemistry at the Department of Environmental, Water and Earth Sciences, Faculty of Science. The Chair was awarded to the university by the Rand Water. This is an impressive achievement, not only for Prof Okonkwo, but for TUT as well, being the University of Technology awarded with this Research Chair. He is an NRF C1 rated researcher.​

​Professor Jonathan Okonkwo, originally from Nigeria, was appointed in 2002 as Research and Innovation Professor at the Faculty of Science and leader of a focus and niche area research group in Pollution and Waste Management and Water Resources.

He obtained his PhD in 1992 on a project “surface study of uncoated and stearate coated precipitated calcium carbonate” at the Brunel University in the United Kingdom.  

His achievements and acknowledgements received as a result of his outstanding research speak for themselves.  In 2006 he received the TUT Senior Researcher of the Year Award. In 2008 The College of Agriculture and Environmental Science, South Africa, invited Prof Okonkwo to present a memorial lecture entitled The impact of global warming on food security, human environmental health and safety in honour of the late Prof Godfrey Humphrey. He was invited to deliver a keynote address at the 26th African Health Sciences Congress held in Egypt in 2005.  His address was entitled A continent in confusion: Africa’s environmental health problems as related to pollution and waste management. At the Seventh Eurasia Conference on Chemical Sciences that took place in March 2002 in Karachi, Pakistan, Prof Okonkwo chaired a session on Physical and Polymer Chemistry.

In 1999 and 2010 he became a Chartered Chemist (CChem) and a Fellow of Royal Society of Chemistry (FRSC) of Great Britain, respectively. He is a member of the National Research Foundation (NRF) review panel for the Thuthuka programme for Earth Sciences, Engineering and Mathematics and Environmental Science.

In 2011, Prof OJ Okonkwo was among the expert group appointed by the United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO), to compile guidance document for the inventory and the Best Available Techniques (BAT) and Best Environmental Practice (BEP) of the recently Stockholm Convention listed ten new persistent organic pollutants. Furthermore, UNIDO has selected the Environmental/Analytical Research in Chemistry (EARch) laboratory at TUT under the supervision of Prof OJ Okonkwo’s to be the training centre on management of POPs for Africa Least Developed Countries (LDCs) of the COMESA and SADC sub-regions. Prof OJ Okonkwo is currently among the expert group assembled by United Nations Environmental Programme (UNEP) to draft the Best Available Techniques and the Best Environmental Practices for the reduction and control of mercury (Hg) emission under the recently inaugurated Minamata Convention on Mercury.

In 2014 Prof OJ Okonkwo received the TUT Vice Chancellor Researcher of the year Award and in 2016, Prof Okonkwo was awarded Fellow of the Institute of Ecotoxicology and Environmental Science, Kolkata India. This is an award bestowed on researchers that have contributed, in form of publications and conference presentations, to Ecotoxicology and Environmental Science.

His field of expertise and research specialisation includes chemical sciences, technologies and applied sciences with focus on:

  • ​Analytical Chemistry
  • Chemistry
  • Ecology and environmental science
  • Environmental analytical chemistry
  • Organics (persistent organic pollutants, among others), 
  • Trace metals and utilization of wastes of biological origin in adsorption studies.

For more information, contact:
Name: Prof Jonathan Okonkwo
Tel: +27 12 382 6245
Fax: +27 12 382 6354