Fran O'Sullivan: Uni gets a balancing voice

Crawford Falconer.

Lincoln University doesn't spring to mind when it comes to internationally ranked "thought leadership" in world trade.

But that will change when former New Zealand senior trade diplomat Crawford Falconer takes up the inaugural Sir Graeme Harrison professorial chair in global value chains and trade in September.

The move can't come soon enough when it comes to instilling new academic leadership in the field of trade negotiations. Finally, an experienced practitioner will be sharing his knowledge with students.

Serious agribusiness exporters know that the "new norm" in international trade really comes down to how well New Zealand companies play in global value chains.

The market access debates of old - such as how big will New Zealand's quota be in particular markets and bringing down punitive tariff rates which put obstacles in the way of particular agricultural products - are still very important.

But having the capital to develop strong brands is also important. And making sure the companies that supply intermediate ingredients into the major global value chains do get access.

This reality frequently gets shunted to one side when it comes to debate on new trade agreements. It's not simply the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) which exercises academics, particularly the omni-present Professor Jane Kelsey from the University of Auckland. But other free trade agreements which contain clauses around Investor State Protection, such as the recent South Korean deal.

It's time for a balancing voice to emerge.

Luckily, one of New Zealand's more accomplished agribusiness leaders has had the foresight to fund a new professorial chair at Lincoln University, which ought to result in a much deeper debate on the new norm for international trade.

On Friday, it was announced that the highly experienced Falconer would take up the chair, which will be housed in Lincoln University's Faculty of Agribusiness and Commerce.

Sir Graeme " who leads Anzco Foods, which is also based in Canterbury " has high hopes that the Falconer appointment will position Lincoln University as a thought-leader in this space. Falconer is current at the OECD in Paris, where he heads up the Services Trade and Global Value Chains/Trade in Value Added (TIVA) projects, overseeing two major research streams on services trade restrictions and the creation of value added in global value chains.

But he also has strong credentials from his prior diplomatic career, where he rose to be Deputy Secretary (trade and economic group) at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade (MFAT). In that role, he managed all NZ trade negotiations between 2009-11 from the TPP through to the WTO and a proliferation of bilateral trade negotiations. He is also a former ambassador to the WTO in Geneva where he also chaired the Doha Round Agriculture Negotiations from 2005 to 2009.

It's another step in the strong change programme that Lincoln University Vice-Chancellor Dr Andrew West has introduced. West expects it will help in a step change in the university's teaching, research and influence in the area of global value chains and trade. For Falconer, who started his career as a junior lecturer, it is also full circle.