Tavneet Suri

Tavneet Suri is a Kenyan development economist currently serving as the Louis E. Seley Professor of Applied Economics at the MIT Sloan School of Management. She is a member of the executive committee of the Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab, and a faculty research associate at the National Bureau of Economic Research.

Biography After growing up in Kenya, Suri received her BA in economics from Trinity College, Cambridge, and her MA and PhD from Yale University.

In 2006, Suri joined the faculty of the MIT Sloan School of Management as an assistant professor. She became involved in J-PAL through work with Rachel Glennerster in Sierra Leone, eventually rising to become the organization's scientific director for Africa.

In line with her research, Suri is co-editor of The Review of Economics and Statistics and co-chair of the J-PAL Digital Agricultural Innovations and Services Initiative. In total, they estimate that the rollout of the scheme lifted 194,000 Kenyan households out of poverty, a 2% reduction.