Nat Quansah is a

botanist Botany, also called , plant biology or phytology, is the science of plant life and a branch of biology. A botanist, plant scientist or phytologist is a scientist who specialises in this field. The term "botany" comes from the Ancient Greek wo ...

from

Ghana Ghana (; tw, Gaana, ee, Gana), officially the Republic of Ghana, is a country in West Africa. It abuts the Gulf of Guinea and the Atlantic Ocean to the south, sharing borders with Ivory Coast in the west, Burkina Faso in the north, and To ...

, and earned a

doctorate A doctorate (from Latin ''docere'', "to teach"), doctor's degree (from Latin ''doctor'', "teacher"), or doctoral degree is an academic degree awarded by universities and some other educational institutions, derived from the ancient formalism ''li ...

philosophy Philosophy (from , ) is the systematized study of general and fundamental questions, such as those about existence, reason, knowledge, values, mind, and language. Such questions are often posed as problems to be studied or resolved. Some ...

in pteridology from the University of London, Goldsmiths College. He received a master's degree in botany at the University of Cape Coast, Ghana. He has taught courses on ethnobotany at the

University of Antananarivo University of Antananarivo (french: Université d'Antananarivo) is the primary public university of Madagascar, located in the capital Antananarivo. History The university traces its founding to 16 December 1955 and the formation of the Instit ...

. Since 2008 he has served as the academic director for the Madagascar: Traditional Medicine and healthcare Systems summer program. From 2013 to 2014, he served as academic director for the School for International Training (SIT) program Tanzania: Zanzibar — Coastal Ecology and Natural Resource Management. He was awarded the

Goldman Environmental Prize The Goldman Environmental Prize is a prize awarded annually to grassroots environmental activists, one from each of the world's six geographic regions: Africa, Asia, Europe, Islands and Island Nations, North America, and South and Central America. ...

in 2000, for his works on health care, cultural tradition and forest conservation, based in Ambodisakoana, Madagascar. He founded a healthcare clinic in Ambodisakoana, Madagascar in 1994 that developed and implemented the Integrated Health Care and Conservation Program. The program integrates the diverse health, economic, biological, cultural backgrounds of local people to simultaneously address healthcare and conservation needs. The work of the clinic has been done in cooperation with the

World Wide Fund for Nature The World Wide Fund for Nature Inc. (WWF) is an international non-governmental organization founded in 1961 that works in the field of wilderness preservation and the reduction of human impact on the environment. It was formerly named the Wor ...

and treated thousands of patients-many with native and threatened medicinal plants.

References

Year of birth missing (living people) Living people 20th-century Ghanaian botanists Ghanaian environmentalists Ghanaian expatriates in Madagascar Philosophy academics Goldman Environmental Prize awardees {{environmentalist-stub