OECD Trade Leader Joins Lincoln Team

OECD Trade Leader Joins Lincoln Team

Lincoln University today announced the appointment of Crawford Falconer to the inaugural Sir Graeme Harrison Professorial Chair in Global Value Chains and Trade.

Mr Falconer is currently leader of the OECD Services Trade and Global Value Chains/Trade in Value Added (TIVA) projects, where he is overseeing two major research streams on services trade restrictions and the creation of value added in global value chains.

Sir Graeme Harrison, Founder and Chairman of ANZCO Foods, is personally funding the Professorial Chair at Lincoln. “I am delighted that the University has secured someone of Crawford Falconer’s calibre for this position. Crawford comes with many years’ experience in trade negotiations and this experience will be invaluable when it comes to repositioning Lincoln as a thought leader in world trade,” says Sir Graeme.

Mr Falconer was formerly the Deputy Secretary of the Trade and Economic Group of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade (MFAT). As New Zealand’s senior trade official, he managed all trade negotiations between 2009 and 2011 - including WTO, TPP, Korea, Indian, GCC, ACTA, AFTA/CER – and all bilateral trade and economic matters. Prior to that he was New Zealand Ambassador to the WTO in Geneva where he also chaired the Doha Round Agriculture Negotiations from 2005 to 2009.

Lincoln University’s Vice-Chancellor Dr Andrew West describes Sir Graeme’s support of the University in this way as “an extraordinarily visionary and generous act” adding that the appointment of Crawford Falconer to the Sir Graeme Harrison Professorial Chair “will enable the University to make a step change in our teaching, research and influence in the area of global value chains and trade.”

Crawford Falconer is currently domiciled in Paris with the OECD and will join the University in September 2015. “This is in some ways a return to my early career days when I was a junior lecturer, but I can now bring the experience I have gained in negotiations and trade policy over the years to provide far wider insight for students and the University as a whole. It is a privilege to be able to now come back to New Zealand in a role that has the potential to influence the education of the students and also to enable change within the land-based sectors and the way New Zealand businesses trade on the world stage,” says Mr Falconer.

The Sir Graeme Harrison Professorial Chair in Global Value Chains and Trade will be housed in Lincoln University’s Faculty of Agribusiness and Commerce.

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