Katar Singh

Katar Singh is currently Honorary (Founder) Chairman, India Natural Resource Economics and Management (INREM) Foundation, Anand, which is a nongovernmental academic organization committed to promoting teaching, training, and reseach in natural resource economics and environment management, and improving natural resource management policies and programs. He holds a PhD in agricultural economics from the University of Illinois, Urbana–Champaign, USA, and has done postdoctoral research and advanced coursework in natural resource economics in the Department of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Oregon State University, Corvallis, USA and in the Workshop in Political Theory and Policy Analysis, Indiana University Bloomington, USA.

He has over 50 years of teaching, training, research, and consulting experience in the areas of agricultural and rural development, and natural resource economics and management. He was the director and RBI Chair Professor in the Institute of Rural Management, Anand (IRMA), India, and also had a short stint as Director, Bankers Institute of Rural Development (BIRD), Lucknow. He has also taught at G. B. Pant University of Agriculture and Technology, Pantnagar, India.

He has coordinated and conducted several research and consultancy projects funded by national and international agencies. A prolific writer, he has published over 120 articles and papers in professional journals of repute and has authored/co-authored nine books, including a textbook, Rural Development: Principles, Policies, and Management, second ed. (SAGE, 1999), and another entitled Environmental Economics: Theory and Applications (SAGE, 2007), coauthored with Dr Anil Shishodia. He has also co-edited three books, namely, Co-operative Management of Natural Resources (SAGE, 1996), Natural Resource Economics: Theory and Application in India (1997), and Designing and Managing Rural Development Organizations (2000).

Professor Singh is a life member of numerous professional bodies, including the Indian Society of Agricultural Economics (ISAE), Indian Society for Ecological Economics, and International Society for Ecological Economics. He is a recipient of several awards and honors, including Rathindra Puraskar 2003, awarded by Visva Bharati University, Santiniketan, in recognition of his significant contribution to education in rural development and Sir Chhotu Ram National Award for the year 1996–97, awarded by CSS Haryana Agriculture University, Hisar, in recognition of his outstanding research work in the field of agriculture and rural development.