Shakuntala Haraksingh Thilsted is a specialist in nutrition-sensitive approaches to aquatic food systems. She is the Global Lead for Nutrition and Public Health at WorldFish, which is a global CGIAR research centre in Malaysia. Thilsted previously worked in Bangladesh and Cambodia where she examined the nutritional composition of small native fish species. She later worked as an agricultural officer in Tobago, where she was the first and only woman in the ministry of agriculture. Thilsted is also involved with the Global Action Network in mobilizing activities for the UN Decade of Ocean Science for Sustainable Development (2021-2030) and UN Decade of Action on Nutrition (2016-2025). She holds a PhD in Physiology of Nutrition from the Danish Royal Veterinary and Agricultural University. In 2021, Thilsted was the recipient of the World Food Prize.