Agamuthu Pariatamby FASc

Phone: 6 03 79676756 / Facsimile: 6 03 79674178

Prof. Agamuthu is a Senior Professor at the University of Malaya (UM) and is the President of the Malaysian Society of Waste Management and Environment. He is also the Vice-President/International Advisory Board Member – Society of Solid Waste Management Experts in Asia and Pacific Islands (SWAPI) and an honorary member of the International Solid Waste Management Association (ISWA). He is the Head of the Center for Waste Management Research, UM. He is a Fellow of the Academy of Science, Malaysia and a Fellow of Institute for Global Environmental Strategy, Japan.

He started his career as lecturer at the Faculty of Science since 1989 and was promoted to Professor in 2001. Since 1996, he has supervised over 150 Bachelor and Master of Science Degree students as well as eight doctorate research students. He is currently supervising 25 Master’s degree research projects and nine doctoral degree research projects. 

Prof. Agamuthu is the Editor in Chief of Waste Management & Research Journal, Editor-in-Chief of the Malaysian Journal of Science and was a Senate Member of UM (2005 – 2007). Prof. Agamuthu is an Editorial Board Member of Journal of Material Cycles and Waste Management (Japan), Journal of Safety and Environment (China), reviewer for Journal of Hazardous Wastes (USA), Journal of Environmental Management (USA) and International Journal of Environment and Waste Management etc. He is also the Registered Subject Expert (solid waste management, under Section 34A, Environmental Quality Act, Malaysia). 

Prof. Agamuthu has authored more than 450 scientific publications and several books on Solid Waste. His research interests focus on landfill gas studies and bio-covers, waste characterization, municipal waste management, solidification/stabilization of hazardous wastes, biological treatment of waste, waste minimization and cleaner production, leachate studies and use for agro-irrigation, landfill remediation by chemical and biological methods, water and wastewater treatment, plastic biodegradation studies, Environmental Management Systems, Environmental Impact Assessment and waste management, Life Cycle Analysis in waste management, and value-addition of agricultural and industrial wastes for enzyme production, value-addition of agricultural wastes, material flow analysis (MFA), and bioremediation.

Prof. Agamuthu has carried out more than 70 consultancy/advisory projects. Examples of organizations advised are EPI Environmental Plastics, Australia (2001), the University of the West Indies, Jamaica (2000), MBPJ (on-going to the present), Ministry of Housing and Local Government, Malaysia (2006 to the present) as the National Technical Advisory Board Member, and United Nations Environmental Programme (2007). He is a Senior Advisory Group Expert to Executive Secretary of Basel Convention, Geneva, and UNEP.

He is also involved in International research collaboration with Austria, Japan, Denmark, Sweden, Germany, USA, Korea, China, India, Vietnam, Thailand, Indonesia etc., as in the Integrated Sustainable Solid Waste Management (ISSOWAMA) project involving 26 Asian countries with funding from EU, and the 3R Resources project involving six Asian countries with funding from IGES, Japan.