Advisory, Training & Speaking

The problem

Development agencies, universities, and planning institutions in South Asia and the GCC face a shared capacity constraint: the analytical methods underpinning modern spatial and development economics — GIS-based diagnostics, spatial econometrics, results-based monitoring, and economic geography — are not consistently taught at the postgraduate level in these regions, and are underrepresented in the practitioner communities that most need them. The gap manifests in planning teams that commission spatial analysis without the capacity to evaluate its quality, in graduate researchers who cannot bridge the distance between economic theory and applied quantitative methods, and in policy institutions whose internal analytical capacity lags their mandate.

For event organisers and conference programmes, the parallel challenge is finding speakers who can make rigorous economic analysis genuinely accessible to mixed audiences — combining the credibility of peer-reviewed scholarship with the clarity that practitioners, policymakers, and students require. Technocratic presentation that excludes non-specialist audiences, and populist commentary that sacrifices analytical rigour, both fail the same test: they do not move the people in the room toward better decisions.

Approach

Advisory and training engagements are structured around the specific analytical gap or institutional need rather than a fixed curriculum. Capacity building workshops for planning teams typically combine conceptual grounding in spatial economic methods with hands-on application to the team's own data and policy questions — so that participants leave with outputs they can use, not just frameworks they have heard about. Workshop design draws on 18 years of practitioner experience across government planning agencies, international development organisations, and postgraduate teaching contexts.

Keynote and conference addresses are developed with the specific audience composition and decision context in mind. Presentations for ministerial and senior official audiences prioritise the policy implications of economic evidence and the institutional conditions required to act on it. Presentations for academic and research audiences engage the methodological debates and empirical frontiers of spatial economics, development economics, and economic geography. Presentations for practitioner and civil society audiences translate analytical findings into accessible narratives without sacrificing their evidentiary basis.

Postgraduate supervision is offered in spatial econometrics, regional and urban economics, development economics, and applied quantitative methods. Supervisory engagement is structured around the student's research design from the outset — identifying methodological choices, data constraints, and publication pathways early enough to avoid the structural problems that derail dissertations and delay completion. Expert witness and technical commentary services draw on the same analytical foundations, providing independent assessment of economic claims in regulatory, arbitration, and public policy contexts.

How engagements work

Speaking and keynote engagements are available for conferences, high-level forums, and institutional events in Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, and internationally. Training workshops are typically delivered in one to three-day formats, in-person or hybrid. Advisory retainers are structured on a monthly basis with defined scope. All enquiries are welcome — describe the context, audience, and timing and a response will follow within two working days.