Shameran Abed

Executive Director of BRAC International

Strategy

Shameran Abed is the Executive Director of BRAC International (BI), one of the leading humanitarian and development organizations in the world.

Shameran joined BRAC Bangladesh in 2009 and BRAC International in 2012, and has been instrumental in bringing BRAC’s flagship programs of microfinance and ultra-poor graduation to global scale. Under his leadership, BI’s microfinance portfolio has seen impressive growth and a renewed focus on client impact. Since 2016, Shameran has also led BRAC’s ultra-poor Graduation work and played an instrumental role in setting up BRAC Ultra-Poor Graduation Initiative to spearhead global advocacy and provide technical assistance to governments and other organizations.

Shameran has significant Board experience on several non-profit and corporate entities, chairing the board of bKash, BRAC Bank’s mobile financial services subsidiary and one of the world’s largest mobile money providers, and serving on the boards of several institutions including BRAC Bank, BRAC Uganda Bank, and the Global Alliance for Banking on Values (GABV).

Shameran is also the chairman of the Microfinance Network and is a member of the Steering Committee of the Partnership for Economic Inclusion at the World Bank. Shameran holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Economics from Hamilton College in the United States and is a qualified Barrister in the UK.