CHARLIER, Jacques

Licencié en géographie de l’Université de Liège (ULg) et docteur en géographie de l’Université Catholique de Louvain (UCLouvain à Louvain-la-Neuve), professeur émérite de l’UCLouvain et past-president de l’Académie Royale des Sciences d’Outre-Mer (2000 et 2012). 
Géographie des transports maritimes et aériens, Afrique

Jacques Charlier is an emeritus professor of geography at the Catholic University of Louvain (UCLouvain) in Louvain-la-Neuve. He holds a MSc in geography from the University of Liège (1973) as well as a Ph.D. in geography from the UClouvain (1981), and for most of his professional career, he was a Research Associate with the Belgian National for Scientific Research. Besides his teaching duties at the UCLouvain, he held visiting positions at the universities of Cotonou and Paris-Sorbonne, as well as the Sorbonne-Abu Dhabi. He is a fellow member of the Royal Academy for Overseas Sciences (RAOS) since 1993 and was its President in 2000 and 2012.    

Jacques Charlier was a junior officer in the Belgian merchant navy and became thereafter a transport geographer, with special interest in maritime transport and port geography, as well as, more recently, in air transport and airport geography. As far as maritime transport is concerned, more specific research topics include maritime canals, port hinterlands, container shipping and cruise shipping. Several of his research projects delt with Africa, where he paid numerous research stays since 1990. He is the (co-)author of more than 100 scientific papers and book chapters, about one-fourth of which were about transport problems in Africa. His very last overseas travels prior to the current COVID-19 pandemy took place in 2019 in South Africa (February) and the Réunion Island (November).

Key publications

Charlier, J. (2020), La géographie aéroportuaire sud-africaine contemporaine entre les dynamiques du marché et les incertitudes du futur, Carnets de Recherches de l’Océan Indien, n° 6, pp.53-82.

Charlier, J. (2019a), L’émergence de Coega et la nouvelle géographie portuaire sud-africaine, Carnets de Recherches de l’Océan Indien, n° 3, pp. 59-88.

Charlier, J. (2019b), Les transports ferroviaires au Congo pendant l’entre-deux-guerres, The Belgian Congo between the Two World Wars, J. Verlinden (ed.), Royal Academy for Overseas Sciences, Brussels, pp. 57-81.

Charlier, J. (2017), Les façades portuaires entre Sahel et Méditerranée, L’Afrique du Sahel et du Sahara à la Méditerranée, B. Dumortier (éd.), A.Colin, Paris, pp. 200-223.

Marei, N. & Charlier, J. (2015), Le canal de Suez à l’heure des conteneurs N. MAREI), Actes du colloque international sur les canaux interocéaniques, J. Charlier et al (éds), Académie Royale des Sciences d’Outre-Mer, Bruxelles, pp. 83-107.