Neeraj is a public policy professional by training and has operational experience of working on environmental and rural livelihood issues. He is skilled in research methods, program and policy evaluation, and economic analysis. He has been working at the GEF Independent Evaluation Office since August 2005. As an evaluator he has covered a wide range of topics including performance of institutional policies; project and program impact; climate change mitigation; and, performance of country portfolios. From 1998 to 2003 Neeraj worked at Seva Mandir, an NGO based in Western India. During this engagement he planned and implemented projects on community forestry, watershed development, pastureland development and agriculture extension, and supervised household surveys. Neeraj holds a Master’s Degree in Public Affairs from Princeton University (2003-05) and a Post Graduate Diploma in Forestry Management from the Indian Institute of Forest Management (1996-98). He is presently pursuing a PhD as a part time student at the School of Public Policy, University of Maryland.