Dr Fred Amonya PhD CEng FCIHT

Dr Fred D. Amonya

Department of Civil Engineering
Honorary Senior Fellow (Complex Systems and Public Investment)

Contact details

Address
Department of Civil Engineering
School of Engineering
University of Birmingham
Edgbaston
Birmingham
B15 2TT
UK

Dr Amonya sees public investment as a challenge of complex adaptive systems. We must mathematise the interaction of the state, market, and society. The main excitations are climate change and digitalisation. And public-private partnership (PPP) is an imperative. So, he seeks ways to better control (steer) the strongly nonlinear space of public investment to the desires of the people – usually captured in the policies of government (as agent of the state). He has published widely on the subject.

Dr Fred D. Amonya ResearchGate profile

Qualifications

  • Doctoral Research: University of London, PhD Policy Science
  • Thesis: Excitation of a Dynamical System: Public-Private Partnerships (PPP) in the Non Ergodic Uganda
  • University of Birmingham, MSc (Distinction), Road Management and Engineering
  • Harvard University, Graduate Module (Investment Banking and Structured Finance)
  • Makerere University, BSc (Civil Engineering)

Biography

Dr Amonya is a scholar on complexity and public investment. For over two decades, he has taught and advised on infrastructure and public policy across the world. He was Chair, Transport Systems Economics, PIARC, 2016/9. In that role, he led policy makers and academics in attempting to understand transport investment in 122 countries by constructing their policy spaces as dynamical systems. Earlier, he led the governance theme of a UK development programme called Global Transport Knowledge Partnership that sought to bridge the chasm between policymaking and universities of Africa and South-East Asia. He worked for Mott MacDonald (2007/10), advising on PPP around the world. Earlier, he worked for Scott Wilson (now AECOM) in association with the University of Nottingham, guiding infrastructure asset management across the world.

Now, he advises Fortune 500 companies in London and other cities on corporate strategy in the era of net zero. In addition, he is assisting African countries in knitting their post-Covid policies. He also guides dialogue on PPP as a member of UNECE team of PPP experts. He advises on infrastructure and complexity under Lyciar.

He is a Chartered Engineer, Fellow CIHT, and he holds a PhD in policy science. A few of his lectures are captured on Dr Amonya's ResearchGate profile. Please also see his commentary on his LinkedIn profile.

Research

Dr Amonya’s research is strongly interdisciplinary:

  • Public investment on the Hamiltonian frame, and possible abstraction to Shannon entropy (information theory)
  • Public-private partnership (PPP) as a Lagrangian construct – finding paths to efficient management of PPP
  • Cities: mathematicising the heuristics (notably, sustainability and resilience)
  • The interaction of case study and the orthodox hypothetico-deductive (H-D) approach.

Other activities

Professional memberships

  • Chartered Engineer
  • Fellow of Chartered Institution of Highways and Transportation
  • Registered Engineer (Uganda)
  • Member of Uganda Institution of Professional Engineers

International leadership And institutional refor

  • 2023 – Ongoing: Council Member, Chartered Institution of Highways and Transportation
  • 2019 – 2022:  Editorial Board, Journal of Mega Infrastructure and Sustainable Development
  • 2016 – 2019: Chair, Transport Systems Economics, World Road Association, PIARC
  • 2009 – Ongoing: Team of PPP Experts, UN Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE)
  • 2009-15: Technical Secretary, Transport Systems Economics, World Road Association, PIARC
  • 2007-9: Head, Transport Research-Policy Initiative, DFID - Global Transport Knowledge Partnerships, Africa and Asia

Industry-policy interface

  • Reviewer, IPCC Report (Working Group III)
  • Frequent lectures on infrastructure and complexity to graduate schools in the UK and Africa
  • Developing modules on PPP for graduate schools
  • World Bank: Guidance on promoting Applied Sciences, Engineering and Technology in Africa (the PASET project)

Publications

Please see Dr Amonya's ResearchGate profile.