World Development Report 2026 Team Members

Gaurav Nayyar is the Director of the World Development Report 2026. Prior to that, he served as Lead Economist in the Office of the Chief Economist in the Equitable Growth, Finance, and Institutions Vice Presidency at the World Bank, which he joined as a Young Professional in 2013. Previously, he was an Economics Affairs Officer in the Economic Research Division of the World Trade Organization, where he co-led the World Trade Report 2013, Factors Shaping the Future of World Trade. Gaurav’s research interests lie primarily in the areas of economic growth, structural transformation, trade, industrialization, and firm productivity, and he has published in a variety of academic journals on these issues. His latest book is At Your Service? The Promise of Services-Led Development. Gaurav holds a DPhil in Economics from the University of Oxford, where he was a Dorothy Hodgkin Scholar. His other alma maters include the London School of Economics and Political Science, the University of Cambridge, and St. Stephen’s College, University of Delhi. 

Joyce Antone Ibrahim is the Task Manager of the World Development Report 2026. She also served as the Task Manager for World Development Report 2025: Standards for Development, World Development Report 2024: The Middle-Income Trap, and World Development Report 2023: Migrants, Refugees, and Societies. Prior to that, she spent nearly six years with the Subnational Doing Business Unit, where she led studies to assess the business environment in China, Malaysia, Nigeria and the United Arab Emirates. She also worked with the (former) Doing Business project on various indicators, including leading the dealing with construction permits indicator, as well as on financial inclusion and transparency issues within the World Bank. Joyce holds a Master’s of Arts in International Relations and International Economics from the Johns Hopkins University’s School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS) and a Bachelor’s of Science in Foreign Service from Georgetown University.

Ufuk Akcigit is the Co-Academic Lead for the World Development Report 2026, and the Arnold C. Harberger Professor of Economics and Co-Director of the Growth Academy at the University of Chicago. He is widely recognized for his research on economic growth, innovation, and firm dynamics, and he is regularly consulted by major international institutions on these topics. He served as the Lead Academic for the World Development Report 2024, which examined the middle-income trap. He is also a Lead Academic Advisor and Board Member of the World Bank’s Institute for Economic Development, and a member of the IMF Managing Director’s Advisory Council on Entrepreneurship and Growth.

His contributions have been recognized with several major honors, including the Rahmi M. Koç Medal of Science (2025), the Max Planck–Humboldt Research Award (2021), the Kiel Institute Global Economy Prize (2022), and the National Science Foundation CAREER Research Award (2015), among several others. He is also a Guggenheim Fellow, a Fellow of the Econometric Society, and an elected member of the Turkish Science Academy. Akcigit’s research has appeared in leading journals, shaping current thinking on productivity, innovation policy, economic mobility, and cross-country growth. He earned his PhD in Economics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 2009. Before joining the University of Chicago, he was on the faculty of the University of Pennsylvania.

Susan Athey is the Co-Academic Lead for the World Development Report 2026 and The Economics of Technology Professor at Stanford Graduate School of Business. She received her bachelor’s degree from Duke University and her PhD from Stanford, and she holds an honorary doctorate from Duke University. Her current research focuses on the economics of digitization and the intersection of causal inference and artificial intelligence. She has worked on several application areas, including timber auctions, internet search, online advertising, the news media, labor market transitions, health, and digital technology for social impact.

As one of the first “tech economists,” she served as consulting chief economist for Microsoft Corporation for six years and has served on the boards of multiple private and public technology firms. She also served as a long-term advisor to the British Columbia Ministry of Forests, helping to architect and implement their auction-based pricing system. She was a founding associate director of the Stanford Institute for Human-Centered Artificial Intelligence, where she currently serves as senior fellow, and she is the founding director of the Golub Capital Social Impact Lab at Stanford GSB.

From 2022 to 2024, she took leave from Stanford to serve as Chief Economist at the U.S. Department of Justice Antitrust Division. Professor Athey was the 2023 President of the American Economics Association, where she previously served as vice president and elected member of the Executive Committee.

S Anukriti is a Senior Economist at the World Bank's Development Research Group (DECRG). She is an applied microeconomist, with interests in the fields of development economics, economics of gender and the family, and political economy.  Her research examines the underlying causes of gender inequalities and explores mechanisms that can bring about gender equity. More broadly, she is interested in the role of social norms, formal and informal institutions, and public policy in affecting social change. Dr. Anukriti received a Ph.D. in Economics from Columbia University, an MA in Economics from the Delhi School of Economics, and a BA (Honors) in Economics from St. Stephen’s College, Delhi. She is a Research Fellow at the Institute for Labor Economics (IZA). Prior to joining the World Bank in July 2020, she was an Associate Professor of Economics at Boston College. She currently serves as a Board member for two research initiatives of the BRAC Institute of Governance and Development -- WEE-DiFine and WEE-Connect. She also co-leads the World Bank Center for Research on Women and Jobs (CRWJ) and is a regular contributor to the Development Impact blog.

Sharmista Appaya is a Senior Digital and AI Specialist at the World Bank. She previously established and led the Digital and AI Vertical’s global work on artificial intelligence, and now focuses on AI policy, governance, and digital infrastructure across the East Asia and Pacific (EAP) and South Asia (SAR) regions. Her work supports responsible and inclusive AI adoption, with a particular emphasis on strengthening AI-ready data and compute infrastructure in developing countries. Sharmista brings over fifteen years of experience across data, finance, and digital development. She previously served as a Senior Financial Sector Specialist in the Finance, Competitiveness and Innovation Global Practice, advising on fintech and financial inclusion, and as Head of the Fintech Accelerator at the Bank of England. Her work centers on helping governments manage AI-related risks while enabling innovation that supports equitable and sustainable growth.

Elwyn Davies is a Senior Economist at the World Bank, working on firm dynamics, productivity and innovation in a wide range of countries. Elwyn’s work focuses on constraints to firm growth and productivity as well as on questions related to structural and economic transformation, including the role of services in development. He is an author of the World Bank flagship report At Your Service? The Promise of Services-Led Development, part of the World Bank’s Productivity Project. He has published in Journal of Development Economics, Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, World Bank Research Observer, and Journal of African Economies, among other journals. He holds a DPhil (Ph.D.) and MPhil degree in Economics from the University of Oxford and BSc and BA degrees in Physics and Liberal Arts & Sciences from Utrecht University.

Lelys Dinarte-Diaz is an Economist in the People Research Program of the World Bank's Development Research Group. Her research agenda explores three main questions: (1) Do investments in early childhood yield positive outcomes for both parents and children? (2) What interventions are effective in addressing violent behaviors and promoting the well-being of adolescents? (3) How can educational services be enhanced in settings that are fragile and affected by conflict? To investigate these questions, she conducts both experimental and non-experimental studies in various regions, including Latin America, Eastern Europe, South Asia, and South Saharan Africa. She obtained her Ph.D. and master’s in economics from Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile in 2018 and her B.A. in Economics from ESEN in El Salvador in 2010. She is research fellow at CESifo and research affiliate at the IZA, HiCN, and AMIE networks and at the DECRG's CRWJ and AI/DD research centers and a regular contributor to the Development Impact blog.

Sam Fraiberger is the founder and lead of the AI Lab in the Development Impact Evaluation (DECDI) group at the World Bank and an affiliate researcher in the Computer Science Department at New York University. His work sits at the intersection of AI and global development, with research spanning food security, online violence, and AI-augmented evidence synthesis. He leads the development of AI public-good products derived from this research and used by governments, international organizations, and civil society worldwide. His research has appeared in leading journals and conferences including Science, PNAS, Science Advances, ACL, and EMNLP, and has been featured in The Economist, Washington Post, and Wall Street Journal. He was selected for the inaugural Google.org Generative AI Accelerator and named one of the Top 100 People in AI in Government by Apolitical. He holds a Ph.D. from New York University and an SM in Applied Mathematics from Harvard University.

Yi Jie Gwee is an Economist in the Development Research Group at the World Bank. He is currently on secondment through the World Bank’s Global Secondment Program from the Singapore Ministry of Trade and Industry (Economist Service), where he was previously Senior Lead Economist. He works on a wide range of applied micro and macro topics, often integrating theory and empirics. He also has a keen interest in economic history. His recent research and policy work cover topics in industrial policy, immigration, land use regulations, structural transformation, as well as technological change. He completed his Ph.D. at Columbia University in 2021, and holds Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees from the London School of Economics and Political Science.

Yan Liu is a Senior Economist at the Digital and AI Vertical of the World Bank Group. Her areas of expertise cover economic research and policy advisory related to digital transformation, AI, labor markets, foreign direct investment, firm productivity and innovation, and structural transformation. She has published on several peer-reviewed journals, led and co-authored multiple World Bank flagship reports and books. She recently led and published the Digital Progress and Trends Report 2025: Strengthening AI Foundations, and provided analytical inputs and policy advisory on digital jobs and skills across regions. She holds a Ph.D. in Economics from Peking University.

Bolor Munkhbayar is a Research Analyst for the World Development Report 2026 at the World Bank. She also supported the team in data analysis for World Development Report 2025: Standards for Development. Prior to joining the team, she worked at the Development Impact Measurement Department at the International Finance Corporation, where she contributed to project impact evaluation across Manufacturing and Agribusiness Services, and Financial Institutions Group industries. She holds a Master’s of Public Policy from Georgetown University and a Bachelor of Arts in International Relations from the National University of Mongolia.

Jeremy Ng is a Counsel in the Legal Vice Presidency, where he provides legal, institutional and policy reform advice on AI and the digital economy to World Bank member states and task teams in over 20 countries.  Jeremy leads the Legal department's work on AI and human rights, and has led analytical and operational work on AI and data regulation in collaboration with a range of units at the Bank.  He has also supported the Bank's engagement with various multilateral digital governance processes at the UN. Before the World Bank, Jeremy was an associate in Allen & Overy's London office.  Jeremy holds an LLM from NYU Law (Amirsaleh Family Scholarship, Human Rights Scholar, Salzburg Lloyd N. Cutler Fellow) and a MA (Cantab) in Law from the University of Cambridge (First Class Honors, De Hume Prize). His academic writing on AI, the digital economy and global development has been published in leading journals at NYU Law, Georgetown Law, California Western, and Oxford University Press.

Tiago C. Peixoto is a Senior Digital Specialist and the World Bank’s focal point on Artificial Intelligence and Digital Services for the Western Balkans and Europe. Since joining the institution in 2010, he has worked with governments to design and implement digital solutions that improve public policies and service delivery. Before joining the World Bank, Tiago managed projects and consulted for several organizations, including the European Commission, the OECD, and the United Nations. He has been recognized as one of the 20 Most Innovative People in Democracy and one of the 100 Most Influential People in Digital Government. His work has been featured in both mainstream and specialized media, and he has published in leading academic journals. Tiago holds a Ph.D. and an M.A. in Political and Social Sciences from the European University Institute, as well as an M.A. in Sociology of Organizations from Sciences-Po Paris.

Manuel Ramos-Maqueda is a Governance Specialist in the World Bank’s Governance Global Department. He leads initiatives using data science, digital technologies, and artificial intelligence (AI) to make public institutions more accessible, effective, and accountable. His work spans justice reform, public sector innovation, and institutional design across Latin America, East Africa, and Europe and Central Asia. Previously, Manuel worked at the World Bank’s Development Impact Department (DIME), the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), and Innovations for Poverty Action (IPA). He holds a dual degree in Law and Economics from Universidad Carlos III de Madrid, an M.A. in International Policy from Stanford University, and is completing a Ph.D. at the University of Oxford.

Anja Sautmann is a Senior Economist in the World Bank's Development Research Group and the point person for DECRG's  AI and Digital Development (AI/DD) Research Initiative. Her research asks how individual behavior shapes optimal policy design, with a focus on demand for healthcare and public healthcare provision for children and mothers in West Africa. She has contributed to developing methods for measuring preferences and for selecting optimal policies faster and more accurately based on experimental evidence. Anja is working on several projects in healthcare and in the justice sector that try to understand how machine learning techniques and AI can support better development outcomes. Before joining the World Bank, Anja was an Assistant Professor at Brown University and the Director of Research, Education, and Training at the Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab at MIT. She received her Ph.D. in Economics from New York University.

Katherine Stapleton is a Senior Economist in the World Bank's Economic Policy Global Practice. Her work focuses on international economics, innovation, and economic development. Her research interests and publications cover the topics of AI and automation, international trade, energy and environmental economics, and labor economics.  She completed her Ph.D. in Economics from Oxford University in 2020.

Shu Yu is a Senior Economist in the Prosperity Vertical Chief Economist’s Office at the World Bank. Her research interests include economic development, political economy, informal economy, and how digitalization and artificial intelligence shape jobs and long-term growth. Shu co-edited the book volume, “The Long Shadow of Informality: Challenges and Policies (2022)” and constructed the World Bank Informal Economy Database. Previously, Shu worked as a (Senior) Economist in the World Bank’s Prospects Group and was a postdoctoral research fellow at the University of Rochester. She also interned at the International Monetary Fund and the Conference Board. Shu holds a Ph.D. and M.Phil. in Economics from the University of Groningen, and a B.S. from Fudan University.