Professor Garnaut is a Professor of Economics at The University of Melbourne. He was previously a Distinguished Professor of Economics at the Australian National University, the Director of the ANU Asia Pacific School of Economics and Management and was the longstanding Head of the Department of Economics. He is the author of numerous publications in scholarly journals on international economics, public finance and economic development, particularly in relation to East Asia and the Southwest Pacific. Recent books include The Great Crash of 2008 (with David Llewellyn-Smith, 2009); Dog Days: Australia After the Boom (2013); Forty Years of Reform and Development in China (2018), Superpower: Australia’s low carbon opportunity (2019), Reset: Restoring Australia after the Pandemic Recession (2021) and The Superpower Transformation: Making Australia’s zero-carbon future. He is a Distinguished Fellow of the Australian Economic Society, Distinguished Fellow of the Australian Agricultural and Resources Economic Society, Fellow of the Australian Academy of Social Sciences and Honorary Professor of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences. Professor Garnaut has held a longstanding senior role as a policy advisor, diplomat, and businessman. He was the senior economic policy official in Papua New Guinea’s Department of Finance in the years straddling Independence in 1975, principal economic adviser to Australian Prime Minister Bob Hawke 1983- 1985, and Australian Ambassador to China 1985-1988.
He is the author of a number of influential reports to the Australian Government, including Australia and the Northeast Asian Ascendancy, 1989, The Review of Federal State Financial Relations (with Vince Fitzgerald) 2002; The Garnaut Climate Change Review 2008; and The Garnaut Review 2011: Australia and the Global Response to Climate Change. Professor Garnaut has chaired the boards of major Australian and International companies since 1988, including Lihir Gold Ltd (1995 – 2010); Bank of Western Australia Ltd (1988 – 1995); Primary Industry Bank of Australia Ltd (1989 – 1994); Papua New Guinea Sustainable Development Limited Pty Ltd (2002 – 2012) and its subsidiary OK Tedi Mining.
Ltd; Lonely Planet Pty Ltd; Aluminium Smelters of Victoria Ltd; ZEN Energy Technologies Pty Ltd. He is currently the Director of ZEN Energy and Chairman of Sunshot Energy. Professor Garnaut was made Officer of the Order of Australia (AO) in 1991 for service to education and
International relations and a Companion of the Order of Australia (AC) in 2017 for service on climate change and energy.