Eng. Dr. Jimmy Byakatonda

Lecturer

Eng. Dr. Byakatonda is a Lecturer and researcher of Irrigation Engineering and Water Management at the department of Biosystems Engineering, Gulu University, Uganda. He currently participates in collaborative research with both community and other research organisations. Currently he is having joint research collaborations with University of Trier in Germany and the University of New South Wales of Australia.

His research mainly focuses on areas of water and wastewater management under scarce conditions, hydrological modelling both at catchment and basin scale, small scale and large-scale irrigation development with reuse systems. He has both national and international experiences having worked on development projects in Malawi, Botswana, Zimbabwe and Netherlands. He supervises both undergraduate and graduate research students. He is a reviewer in a number of journals such as Atmospheric research, Forestry and Agricultural meteorology and Meteorological applications, journal of Physics and Chemistry of the earth etc.

He is a professional engineer registered with the Uganda Institution of Professional Engineers (UIPE) and the Engineers’ registration board of Uganda (ERB). He currently serves on the membership, Education, and Training committee of UIPE that recruits new members and conducts continuous professional development for registered engineers.

Eng. Dr. Jimmy Byakatonda
Lecturer  | Faculty of Agriculture and Environment
j.byakatonda@gu.ac.ug

Qualifications

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Research Interests

Ongoing Research Project

August 2022 – up to 2023. Principal Investigator – “Bioelectricity Production for Wastewater Treatment and Soil Fertility Enhancement (BIO-POWER-PROJECT. The project is sponsoring 2 master’s students. Project funded by National Research and Innovation program- Government of Uganda.

June 2021 – up to 2024. Principal Investigator “Pyrolysis of Sewage Sludge for Bioenergy, Soil Amendment, and Wastewater Treatment (PYROL Project” Project funded by the National Research and Innovation program- Government of Uganda.

May 2020 – up to 2024. Researcher “Zero Emission Concepts for Urban Resilience in Selected African Cities (ZECURA)” Funded by German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF). More information can be obtained from https://zecura.info

Publications

Theresa, N. M., Sempewo, J. I., Tumutungire, M. D., & Byakatonda, J. (2021). Performance evaluation of CFSR, MERRA-2 and TRMM3B42 data sets in simulating river discharge of data-scarce tropical catchments: a case study of Manafwa, Uganda. Journal of Water and Climate Change.
https://doi.org/10.2166/wcc.2021.174

Byakatonda, J., Openy, G., Sempewo, J. I., & Mucunguzi, D. B. (2021). Over a century evidence of historical and recent dryness/wetness in sub-humid areas: A Uganda, East African case. Meteorological Applications, 28 (5), e2028.
https://doi.org/10.1002/met.2028

Byakatonda, J., Parida, B. P., Moalafhi, D. B., Kenabatho, P. K., & Lesolle, D. (2020). Investigating relationship between drought severity in Botswana and ENSO. Natural Hazards, 100(1), 255-278.
https://doi.org/10.1007/s11069-019-03810-1

Byakatonda, J., Parida, B. P., Kenabatho, P. K., Moalafhi, D. B. (2019). Prediction of onset and cessation of austral summer rainfall and dry spell frequency analysis in semiarid Botswana. Theoretical and applied climatology, 135(1-2), 101-117.
https://doi.org/10.1007/s00704-017-2358-4

Byakatonda, J., Parida, B. P., Kenabatho, P. K. (2018). Relating the dynamics of climatological and hydrological droughts in semiarid Botswana. Physics and Chemistry of the Earth, Parts A/B/C, 105, 12-24.
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.pce.2018.02.004

Byakatonda, J., Parida, B. P., Moalafhi, D. B., & Kenabatho, P. K. (2018). Analysis of long term drought severity characteristics and trends across semiarid Botswana using two drought indices. Atmospheric research, 213, 492-508.
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.atmosres.2018.07.002

Byakatonda J, Parida BP, Kenabatho PK, Moalafhi DB (2018) Influence of climate variability and length of rainy season on crop yields in semiarid Botswana. Agricultural and Forest Meteorology 248C:130–144.
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.agrformet.2017.09.016

Byakatonda J, Parida BP, Kenabatho PK, Moalafhi DB (2018) Analysis of rainfall and temperature time series to detect long-term climatic trends and variability over semiarid Botswana, Journal of Earth Systems Science, 127(25).
https://doi.org/10.1007/s12040-018-0926-3

Byakatonda J, Parida BP, Kenabatho PK, Moalafhi DB (2016) Modelling dryness severity using artificial neural networks at the Okavango delta, Botswana, GNEST 18:463-481.

Conferences

Byakatonda J, Parida BP, Kenabatho PK (2016). Aridity changes and its association with drought severity in Botswana; Preceding of the 5th African Higher Education Week and RUFORUM Biennial Conference, Cape Town, South Africa, 17-21 October, 2016.

Byakatonda J, Parida BP, Kenabatho PK (2015) Climate Variability and Trends in Meteorological Time Series in Semi-Arid Botswana, Preceding of the 10th Alexander von Humboldt International Conference Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, 18 – 20 November 2015.

Publications

Openy, G., Nono, D., Byakatonda, J., Labeja, R. L., Nyeko, M. (2025) . (2025) . Application of Geomodeller in Production of Enhanced Lithological Map for Groundwater Exploration . Cureus Journal of Engineering, [online] Volume . Available at: https://www.cureusjournals.com/articles/5364-application-of-geomodeller-in-production-of-enhanced-lithological-map-for-groundwater-exploration#!/

Projects

Bioelectricity production for wastewater treatment and soilfertility enhancement (BIO-POWER-PROJECT)
    Dr. Jimmy Byakatonda(PI), Dr. Alfred Obia(Co-PI)
Pyrolysis of Sewage Sludge for Bioenergy, Soil Amendment, and Wastewater Treatment (PYROL Project)
    Dr. Jimmy Byakatonda(PI), Dr. Alfred Obia(Co-PI), Dr. Emmanuel Menya(Co-PI), Dr. Collins Okello(Co-PI),

Supervision

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