Krishna S. Vatsa has worked in the area of disaster risk reduction and recovery for the last 25 years. At present, he serves as the Member, National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA.

Prior to this assignment, Krishna Vatsa worked as Policy Advisor, Disaster Recovery, Bureau for Policy and Programme Support (BPPS), UNDP in New York and Nairobi during 2015-20. He served as the Regional Disaster Reduction Advisor, South & South-West Asia in New Delhi from 2008 to 2014. He joined UNDP in 2007 as Early Recovery Coordinator in the Philippines.

As a career civil servant, Krishna Vatsa joined the Maharashtra Emergency Earthquake Rehabilitation Programme in the state of Maharashtra, India in 1995 and implemented a large-scale earthquake recovery programme during the next four years. He also served as Secretary to the Government of Maharashtra, Relief and Rehabilitation from 2003 to 2006, and then as Secretary, Rural Development & Panchayati Raj from 2006 to 2007. In course of his career, he has extensively consulted for several national and international organizations in the area of disaster risk reduction and recovery.

Krishna Vatsa has a Doctor of Science in Disaster Risk Management from the George Washington University, Washington, DC, and published extensively on the subject.