Dr Hema Kesa holds a Doctorate in Food Service Management, specialising in Community Nutrition. In 2018, she participated in the African Nutrition Leadership Programme (ANLP) at North-West University (a local South African organising partner) and Wageningen University, The Netherlands (the responsible agent for the NFP-fellowships).

She is the HoD of Hospitality Management at the School of Tourism and Hospitality (STH), in the College of Business and Economics at the University of Johannesburg, where she supervises postgraduate research projects and lectures on Research Methodologies, Culinary Studies and Nutrition.

Dr Kesa is an Advisory Board Member at the Food Decisions Research Laboratory at Penn State University, where she spent a term in 2015 as a visiting scholar. She is a key contributor in the Research Collaboration between Penn State University and the City of Johannesburg (CoJ) in food service and nutrition.

She was instrumental in the team commission by South Africa national Department of Higher Education and Training (DHET), to develop the Diploma in Hospitality Management at the University of Mpumalanga.

Dr Kesa has recently been appointed as an area consultant representing the Southern African regions of EuroChrie, the official federation for Europe, the Mediterranean basin and Africa of the International Council for Hotel, Restaurant and Institutional Education.

Hema is a proud mother of 2 beautiful children. She’s a mum, home maker, teacher and explorer. Her adventurous spirit thrusted her to successfully summit Africa's mighty mountain, Mount Kilimanjaro in 2014.