Tewodaj Mengistu

Biography

Tewodaj Mengistu is an assistant policy analyst at RAND and a Ph.D. candidate at the Pardee RAND Graduate School (PRGS). She holds an M.A. in international development from the School of International Service at American University and a B.A. in economics from Ohio Wesleyan University. Before coming to PRGS, Mengistu was initially at the World Bank, where she was a consultant for the World Development Report 2005 on improving the investment climate in developing countries. Later, she was a research analyst at the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI), where she worked on a variety of issues around hunger and malnutrition in food insecure countries. At RAND and PRGS, Mengistu's research has focused on infrastructure finance and provision in sub-Saharan Africa, as well as health care both in emerging and developed markets, aid policies, development in fragile states, and post-conflict reconstruction and growth. Mengistu is from Ethiopia; is fluent in English, French, and Amharic; and has working knowledge of Spanish.