Harish Natarajan

Harish Natarajan

Lead Financial Sector Specialist

Harish is a Lead Financial Sector Specialist with the Payment Systems Development Group, at the World Bank (April 2009 to present). His responsibilities include assisting countries in improving safety, reliability and efficiency of payments, remittances and securities settlement systems; participating in country and regional payment systems diagnostic studies; and supporting countries in implementation of payment systems and payment systems reforms.

He is currently working on projects in these areas in several countries across all World Bank regions. He also represents the World Bank in the retail payments working groups of the Committee on Payment Market Infrastructures at the Bank for International Settlements. He has participated in the Financial Sector Assessment Program (FSAP) in Papua New Guinea, Oman, India, Malaysia, Vietnam, Kazakhstan and Suriname.

Prior to joining the World Bank, Harish worked with VISA Inc, in the South Asia region in various senior level positions in business development, operations and risk management. Prior to VISA, Harish worked in technology and project management roles in Citigroup, Infosys and other technology companies, primarily in the areas of payment systems.

Harish holds an under-graduate degree in Electrical Engineering from Indian Institute of Technology-Madras and a Post Graduate Diploma, from Indian Institute of Management-Calcutta, specializing in IT systems and Finance.