Before joining the Crawford School, Kaliappa Kalirajan was a Professor of International Economics at the Foundation for Advanced Studies on International Development (FASID) and the National Graduate Institute for Policy Studies (GRIPS) in Tokyo. Before joining FASID and GRIPS, he was Deputy Executive Director to Executive Director, in the Australia South Asia Research Centre at The Australian National University (1994-2000). He was Senior Research Fellow to Senior Fellow (1988-1994) in the Department of Economics, Research School of Pacific and Asian Studies at the Australian National University. He was a lecturer to Senior Lecturer in the Department of Economics at the National University of Singapore from 1981-1987.

From 1970 to 2024, authored, co-authored, or edited 20 books published by reputed international publishers. Published 174 research papers in the referred reputed academic journals, and contributed 50 chapters in edited books. Also, served as guest editor for Journal of Agricultural and Development Economics, 2(1), 2005; The Developing Economies, 2006; and Journal of Social and Economic Development, 23(3), 2021. Produced 2 monographs: From Crisis to Consensus: Economic Reforms in India, (jointly with R.T. Shand), 1996; and Economic Profiles in South Asia: India (jointly with R.T. Shand), 1997.

Invited Special Lectures on Econometric Methods for Economic Policy Analysis

1. “Development project analysis: Theory and Practice”. Invited by Japan International Cooperation Center, Japan to conduct a workshop on project evaluation with the introduction of relevant microeconomic theories at the MILODA Academy of Financial Studies, Ministry of Finance, Government of Sri Lanka, Colombo, 10-12 August 2015.
2. “Microeconomics: Empirical Methodologies”, Invited by the Department of Economics, Indian Institute of Technology, Bhubaneswar to conduct a workshop on important methodologies including stochastic frontier production function used in Microeconomics analysis to selected researchers across India sponsored by the Government of India under a new program titled Global Initiative of Academic Networks (GIAN) in Higher Education aimed at tapping the talent pool of scientists and entrepreneurs, internationally to encourage their engagement with the institutes of Higher Education in India so as to augment the country's existing human capital. The workshop was conducted from 30 May to 8 June, 2016.
3. “Research Methodologies for measuring economic performances”. Invited by the Research and Statistics Division of the Bank of Mongolia to conduct 10 days lectures and workshop to the Bank of Mongolia junior and middle level executives and researchers, 22 June to 3 July 2018, and 20 October to 02 November.
4. "Development Project Analysis" Invited special lecture delivered to PhD students and junior staff at the Institute for Social and Economic Change, Bengaluru, India from 10 June to 19 June 2024.

Currently, serving in the editorial board of the following academic and policy oriented international journals:

1.   The Developing Economies, Institute of Developing Economies, JETRO and Blackwell-Wiley publishers.

2.   Asia and the Pacific Policy Studies, Blackwell-Wiley publishers.

3. Journal of Social and Economic Development, Springer Publications

4. The Journal of Applied Economic Research, Sage Publications.

5. Review of Development and Change, Sage Publications.

6. Journal of Economic and Administrative Sciences, Emerald Publishing.

7. Journal of Asia Pacific Economy, Taylor & Francis.

CONSULTANCIES Undertaken from time to time:1. International Rice Research Institute, Los Banos, Philippines.2. MARGA Institute - Sri Lanka (Sri Lanka Institute for Development), Colombo.3. Economic Planning Unit, Prime Minister's Dept., Malaysian Government, Kuala Lumpur.4. Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, Singapore.5. Singapore Institute of Management, Singapore.6. Commonwealth of Australia, Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, Canberra.7. Western Australian Government, Dept. of Commerce and Industries, Perth.8. World Health Organization, Geneva.9. The World Bank, Washington, D.C.10. UNITAR, Geneva.11. UNESCAP, Bangkok.12. BHP Engineering, Sydney.13. UNDP, Washington, D.C.14. NCAER and Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO), Govt. of India, New Delhi.15. Asian Development Bank, Manila, Philippines.16. Asian Development Bank Institute, Tokyo.17. Bureau of Resources and Energy Economics, Department of Industry, Commonwealth of Australia, Canberra.18. Energy Change Institute, The Australian National University, Canberra.19. Japan International Cooperation Center (JICE), Tokyo, Japan.20. ASEAN-Japan Centre, Tokyo, Japan.21. Economic Research Institute for ASEAN and East Asia (ERIA), Jakarta, Indonesia.

Sources of growth, international trade, micro- and macro-econometric modeling, regional grouping, Low carbon energy systems, Indian economy.