Dr. Mandana Arabi

Dr. Mandana Arabi serves as Smile Train’s Chief Impact Officer of and is a member of the organization’s executive leadership team. In this role, she oversees Smile Train’s global programs and leads efforts to expand the organization’s impact and strengthen strategic results across their global network. Mandana works with regional and headquarters teams to strengthen alignment, advance programmatic excellence and impact, and support the implementation of Smile Train’s strategy.

Prior to joining Smile Train, Mandana served as Vice President of Global Services and R&D and Chief Technical Adviser at Nutrition International, where she was a member of the executive leadership team and oversaw technical quality across a multi-country program portfolio in Africa and Asia.

She brings more than 20 years of experience in global health, public health nutrition, and international development, and has previously held leadership and technical roles at UNICEF, Save the Children, the Global Alliance for Improved Nutrition (GAIN), and the New York Academy of Sciences.

Mandana has led global health research and programmatic guidance initiatives with organizations including WHO and UNICEF and has contributed to normative global guidance, including the UNICEF Nutrition Programming Guide, the WHO Indicators for Infant and Young Child Feeding, and WHO/FAO Food Fortification Guidelines.  

She has authored more than 50 peer-reviewed publications, including in The Lancet Global Health, Nature Medicine, The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, and Journal of the American Heart Association. She has spoken at more than 50 global convenings, including the United Nations General Assembly and the African Union Commission, and currently chairs the Programmatic Working Group of the WHO/UNICEF Alliance for Anemia Actions.

Mandana holds an MD from Tehran University of Medical Sciences and a PhD in Nutritional Sciences from Cornell University.