Julian May

Julian May "is a Professor, NRF South African Research Chair in Applied Poverty Assessment. "Between 1994 and 1998, he led the South African Participatory Poverty Assessment funded by the World Bank and the Poverty and Inequality Report commissioned by the Office of the Deputy President of South Africa. He has also worked with a number of South African government departments in the development of poverty reduction policy options and systems for monitoring the impact of policy, including social security and land reform. "Internationally, he has worked on an evaluation of the World Bank’s social fund program in Jamaica, Nicaragua, Zambia and Malawi, bio-diversity studies in Mozambique and Namibia, poverty reduction strategy in Lesotho, poverty monitoring in Mauritius, Maldives, Namibia, Swaziland and Zimbabwe, and the Information & Communication Technology/poverty nexus in Kenya, Rwanda, Tanzania and Uganda. In 1999, he was appointed by the UNDP to an evaluation team to examine the impact of their $20 million Poverty Strategy Initiative, and undertook research in Uganda, Zambia, Lesotho and Maldives. "He is the principal research for the KwaZulu-Natal Income Dynamics Survey (KIDS), a ten year quantitative and qualitative panel study of poverty dynamics in the KwaZulu-Natal province of South Africa. Currently he is the co-researcher on an ESRC/DFID funded project: Aids, Demographic and Poverty Trends (ADAPT) being undertaken in collaboration with Prof Ian Timæus of the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. "He has edited 3 books, published over 55 papers in books and academic journals, and produced more than 120 working papers, research reports and other publications. He is a member of the South African Statistics Council, and an Associate Researcher at the International Food Policy Research Institute, Washington DC and at the Department of Social Policy, Oxford University. In 2002, he was a visiting Professor at the Centre for International Poverty Research, University of Bergen." CV


 * Advisory Board (2007), Centre for Civil Society

RESEARCH FUNDING (SINCE 1997)
2008: Statistics South Africa grant for technical advice on the National Living Conditions Survey ($100 000); 2007: Co-awardee, South African-Norwegian Programme for Research Co-operation for projects on land reform and the poverty/ICT nexus ($500 000); 2006: Co- awardee IDRC grant for Poverty and ICT in Eastern Africa (£594 200); 2006: Co-awardee Joint Department for International Development –Economic and Social Research Council Scheme for Research on International Poverty Reduction (£395 200); 2003: DFID grant provided through the South African Department of Social Development for the “Strengthening Analytical Capacity for Evidence Based Decision Making” program (£771 000); 2002: South African-Norwegian Programme for Research Co-operation (£77 000); 2000: Team member for Evaluating the Global Poverty Strategy Initiative for the UNDP (£35 000); 1999: Co-awardee of a MacArthur Foundation Collaborative Research Grant competition (£105 000); 1997, 2001, 2004: Mellon Foundation grant for research and training in population studies (£910 000); 1997: DFID & UNDP grant provided through the Office of the President, Poverty and Inequality in South Africa (£400 000); 1997: USAID/BASIS grant for the KwaZulu-Natal Income Dynamics Study ($47 500); 1997: Ford Foundation Grant for the KwaZulu-Natal Income Dynamics Study ($52 000)." CV

Edited Books

 * 2000: May, J., 2000. Poverty and Inequality in South Africa: Meeting the Challenge, David Phillip and Zed Press, Cape Town and London (304p).
 * 1999: Ogunrinade, A., Oniang’o, R., & May, J., 1999. Not by Bread Alone: Food Security and Governance in Africa, University of the Witwatersrand Press, Braamfontein (318p).
 * 1998: May, J., 1998. The Experience and Perception of Poverty in South Africa, Praxis Publishing, Durban (140p).