Dr Sevgan Subramanian is a Principal Scientist at icipe who joined in as Head of Environmental Health Theme from January 2021. Dr Subramanian holds a PhD in Agricultural Entomology from Tamil Nadu Agricultural University, India. He has over 14 years of research for development (R4D) experience in Africa.

His significant research contributions are in development of Integrated Pest Management (IPM) strategies for horticultural and staple food crops, biopesticide research and development, thrips and tospovirus management, climate-change impacts and adaptation and Insects for food, feed and other uses. He has published widely, with >150 publications, including book chapters, online thrips identification tools and over 90 peer-reviewed articles in high impact journals. Dr Subramanian is extensively involved in strengthening partnerships and resource mobilization. He has a global network of partners, collaborators and stakeholders across ~40 organizations in 18 countries from 6 continents.

In the Plant Health Theme, icipe, as a Senior Scientist from 2008 – 2016, he successfully led the thrips IPM program with funding from BMZ/GIZ, African Union, BBSRC and USAID-HortCRSP. He played a leading role in East Africa in thrips and tospovirus research and management. Between 2011–2015, Dr. Subramanian coordinated the Work package (WP) 5 of the Finnish Ministry of Foreign Affairs funded “The Climate Change Impacts on Ecosystem Services and Food Security in Eastern Africa” (CHIESA) program. This has led to better understanding of the impact of climate change on key pests and their natural enemies in East Africa. Between 2016 – 2019, Dr Subramanian successfully led the EntoNUTRI project focused on edible insect research supported by BMZ/GIZ. He currently coordinates the Fall armyworm IPM activities at icipe, with support by the European Union, FCDO and USAID. In 2018, he was awarded the “Outstanding Professional Staff of the Year 2017,” by the icipe management.

Dr Subramanian is extremely keen on building African capacity in IPM, climate change and edible insect research, and he has mentored 4 postdoctoral researchers, 12 PhD and 8 Masters degree scholars, and been involved in several undergraduate trainings. Apart from his professional entomology research focus, Dr Subramanian has a keen interest in photo documentation of arthropod and bird biodiversity of East Africa.