Karen Macours is a chaired professor at the Paris School of Economics (PSE), and senior researcher (directrice de recherche) at the French National Research Institute for Agriculture, Food and Environment (INRAE). Her research focusses on the evaluation of programs addressing households’ productive and human capital investments (early childhood, health, nutrition, education), agricultural productivity and rural poverty reduction in low- and middle-income countries, impact assessment related to agricultural R&D,  and related measurement and methodological questions.

 She is Editor-In-Chief of the Journal of Development Economics, and co-founder of the Virtual Development Economics Seminar Series: VDEV/CEPR/BREAD.

She is a board member of JPAL (Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab) and serves as co-chair of JPAL’s health sector and the Learning for All Initiative, is a member of the board of directors of BREAD (Bureau for Research and Economic Analysis of Development), and a member of the Weiss Fund committee. She is a research fellow of CEPR (Center for Economic Policy Research) and affiliate of EUDN (European Universities Development Network).