Joost would describe himself as ‘multidisciplinary economist’: although economist by training, his work experience is in diverse fields, such as water resources management and modelling, spatial planning and geographical information technology, and systems engineering. In the past years, his thematic focus has been on water and natural resources management.
Joost has carried out numerous research projects and published in several high-impact journals. His extensive consultancy experience includes projects funded by international organisations for governments in South-east Asia and environmental consulting for the private sector in Singapore. In addition, he managed large research projects and was Assistant Director managing the administration team of the Singapore-Delft Water Alliance, a successful collaboration between the National University of Singapore and Dutch research institute Deltares.
Throughout his career he has been involved in education and training. At the VU University he taught and co-developed one of the first international GIS Master programmes fully delivered through distance learning, in Vietnam he was guest lecturer and thesis supervisor for the Vietnamese-Netherlands Master of Development Economics programme at University of Economics in Ho Chi Minh City and the National Economics University in Hanoi, and at the National University of Singapore he taught the undergraduate module Natural Resource and Energy Economics and contributes to the graduate module Hydroinformatics. In addition, he was involved in numerous workshops and training programmes for professionals.
Joost obtained his Masters and PhD in Economics from the VU University Amsterdam, where he spent his initial working years at the Department of Spatial Economics. After working five years in Vietnam on consulting and applied research projects in the field of water management, including three years for Deltares, he moved to Singapore, where he worked for a private consulting company and the National University of Singapore. He is currently senior research fellow at the Institute of Water Policy, Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy.
Research Interests:
Flood and Drought Risk Management
Climate Change Adaptation
Planning and Decision Making Under Uncertainty
Economic Valuation and Cost Benefit Analysis
Spatial Dimensions of Water
