6th International
Nutrition & Dietetics
Scientific Conference.

Prof. Martin N. Mwangi is a Public Health Nutritionist and Nutritional Epidemiologist who leads the Healthy Mothers Healthy Babies (HMHB) Consortium as Program Lead & Senior Technical Advisor at the Micronutrient Forum, and serves as Visiting Associate Professor in the Global Nutrition and Health Group at Wageningen University & Research, the Netherlands.

Prof. Mwangiholds a PhD and MSc in Human Nutrition from Wageningen University & Research and a BSc (First Class Honours) from Maseno University, Kenya. Over a 20-year career spanning academia, clinical research and global health leadership, he has led randomized controlled trials on maternal and child nutrition across Kenya, Malawi, Nigeria and the Netherlands, focused on the safety and efficacy of iron interventions in pregnancy and early childhood.

He has authored more than 50 peer-reviewed publications in journals including JAMA, Nature Medicine, and The Lancet Haematology, and has served as an invited technical expert to the World Health Organization, Concept Foundation, among others. His current work centers on advancing antenatal interventions such as multiple micronutrient supplementation (MMS) and Balanced Energy Protein (BEP) supplementation policy globally.

Prof. Mwangiis a Wageningen University Research Award winner, a fellow of the Africa Nutrition Leadership Programme, and an Advisory Council member of the Federation of African Nutrition Societies. He is based in Wageningen, the Netherlands.

Prof Lisanne du Plessis’s field of experience spans three decades of engagement in Public Health Nutrition, of which she spent a decade working for government and the past two decades in academia. She is dually registered with the Health Professions Council of South Africa as dietitian and nutritionist, which reflects her comprehensive skillset in this field.

Prof du Plessis’s early lecturing and research focus was on infant and young child feeding, with emphasis on breastfeeding and complementary feeding. Over time it grew into a broader Public Health Nutrition focus on the environment that affects maternal, infant, and young child nutrition, including policy, governance, advocacy, and leadership issues, as well as nutrition education and promotion.

During the past decade, her research focus has intensified on the “first food environment” which refers to the contexts in which mothers and caregivers make decisions about infant and young child feeding. It encompasses healthcare, retail, workplaces, communities, and households which operate within a broader set of overlapping systems. These systems include health, social, education, urban, economic, and political spheres which need to align and support caregivers comprehensively to enforce policies, programmes, resources, and actions.

Dr Paul Eme Eze is a nutrition scientist and public health researcher whose 12+ year career sits at the intersection of food systems, agriculture, and nutrition impact — the very themes of his keynote address, “Food Systems, Nutrition-Sensitive Agriculture, Food Fortification, Value Addition, and Nutrition Impact.” His research and advisory work have spanned dietary assessments and sustainable food-system evaluations across the Pacific, food product fortification and value-addition studies in Nigeria, and regulatory science linking agricultural practice to nutrition and environmental outcomes.

As an international consultant for UNICEF Pacific and Caritas Aotearoa New Zealand, Dr Eme led dietary intake assessments, mapped locally available foods, and developed context-specific, food-based recommendations across the Cook Islands, Niue, and Kiribati, including field-testing sustainable food-system indicators to support national policy. His earlier research in Nigeria examined the fortification and value addition of local staples — including acha, plantain, moringa, and legume-based foods — to improve nutrient quality and glycaemic outcomes, while his invited 2025 review with Roche in the Journal of Dairy Science examined how pasture composition influences nitrogen outcomes, reflecting his continuing interest in nutrition-sensitive agriculture.

In New Zealand, Dr Eme has held senior food-regulatory and science-advisory roles with Food Standards Australia New Zealand and the Ministry for Primary Industries, advising on health claims, food labelling, and food systems’ contribution to public health and obesity prevention, and serving as a trusted advisor to Chief Science Advisors and senior government decision-makers. He currently serves as Principal Advisor and Co-Lead Evaluator for the National Integrated Youth Services Evaluation at the Ministry of Health, Aotearoa New Zealand.

He holds a PhD in Public Health (Nutrition) from Massey University, New Zealand, and an MSc in Human Nutrition and BSc in Nutrition and Dietetics from the University of Nigeria, Nsukka. Dr Eme is the author of over 46 peer-reviewed journal articles and two book chapters on sustainable diets, indigenous food systems, and agricultural biodiversity, and is an invited keynote speaker and TED Talk presenter (Bangkok, Thailand).

Prof. Silvenus O. Konyole is a Food and Nutrition Scientist and an Associate Professor of Food Science and Nutrition at the School of Public Health, Biomedical Sciences and Technology, Masinde Muliro University of Science and Technology in Kenya. He holds a BSc in Food Science and Technology from the University of Nairobi, Kenya. An MSc in Food Technology and Nutrition from an inter-university program involving Katholieke Universiteit Leuven and Universiteit Ghent in Belgium and a PhD in Human Nutrition from The University of Nairobi, Kenya and the University of Copenhagen in Denmark. He has over 26 years of cumulative experience in Food Science and Nutrition.

He has had collaborative research with Universities in Kenya and abroad touching on maternal and child nutrition, body composition of complementary feeding children and those on treatment from severe acute malnutrition and moderate acute malnutrition, traditional foods, locally available foods for complementary feeding and Insects as food and feed, Food processing and preservation, body composition and gut health studies in humans, micronutrients, Breast milk production and intake and use of stable isotopes for nutrition and health research.

He has also collaborated with the Danish Development Agency (DANIDA), the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the Flemish Inter-University Council (VLIR), Bioversity International and the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) among others with over 65 academic publications, policy briefs and methods.

Prof. Gordon Nguka is a distinguished academician, senior clinical Nutrition and Dietetics research scientist, and regulatory leader in the field of nutritional sciences across Africa. He serves as the Chairperson of the Kenya Nutritionists and Dieticians Institute (KNDI) Council and is an Associate Professor of Nutritional Sciences (Clinical Nutrition and Dietetics) in the department of Nutritional Sciences, School of Public Health Biomedical Sciences and Technology at Masinde Muliro University of Science and Technology (MMUST). With over two decades of experience, Prof. Nguka has been at the forefront of shaping healthcare policy, academic curriculum development, Research and professional licensing standards in Kenya.

Prof. Nguka holds a Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) in Medical Dietetics and Paediatric Physiology. His expansive clinical research focuses on Metabolism and Bioethics: Investigating metabolic diseases and the ethical frameworks governing clinical trials; Paediatric Malnutrition: Authoring foundational texts on the social, economic, and demographic factors driving protein-energy malnutrition in children under five; Emergency Nutrition: Designing intervention guidelines for handling severe acute malnutrition in conflict and vulnerable regions, including Southern Sudan.