12 January 2009 Professor's contribution to trade economics recognised with New Year Honour

Lincoln University’s Professor of Trade and Environmental Economics, Caroline Saunders, has become the third Lincoln University professor within six months to be made an Officer of the New Zealand Order of Merit.

Professor Saunders, was appointed ONZM in the New Year Honours List for services to agricultural research. Last June, in the Queen’s Birthday List, Lincoln University soil scientists Professor Keith Cameron and Professor Hong Di also received ONZM awards for agricultural research.

Professor Saunders, an economist and 2007 winner of the New Zealand Institute of Economic Research’s Economics Award, is probably best known for her work on “Food Miles” – a term expressing the energy cost of producing food products and delivering them to consumer markets. In 2006 she was the lead author of a landmark report that attracted considerable international attention – “Food Miles – Comparative Energy/Emissions Performance of New Zealand’s Agricultural Industry”. In 2007 she co-authored a follow-up report, “Comparative Energy and Greenhouse Gas Emissions of New Zealand’s and the UK’s Dairy Industry”. Both have withstood close scrutiny from a wide range of overseas academic and government bodies and have been widely cited.

Born in the United Kingdom and brought up at St Anne’s, near Blackpool, Professor Saunders holds an honours degree in Agriculture and Agricultural Economics from the University College of North Wales University and a  PhD in Agricultural Economics from the University of Newcastle. In the UK she worked as an academic and also in regional economic development centered on agriculture and the environment. In 1996 she came to New Zealand with her family to take up a senior lectureship in Economics at Lincoln University.

Among her work at Lincoln University Professor Saunders developed the Lincoln Trade and Environment Model (LTEM). This model simulates the impact on trade and the environment of policy changes for New Zealand and its main competitors. The model allows policy makers to address a wide range of “What if?” questions related to the country’s international trade and the policy directions of its trading partners.

“With a third of New Zealand’s income derived from trading activities, trade is fundamental to our economic and social well-being,” says Professor Saunders, “and we need to be alert to all the potential ‘What ifs?’ related to that trade.”

Appointed Professor of Trade and Environmental Economics in 2001, Professor Saunders took up the Directorship of Lincoln University’s influential Agribusiness and Economics Research Unit the following year.

She is widely published in the field of international trade and has undertaken research for a wide range of private and public bodies including the European Union (EU) Commission, the WTO, MAF, MFAT, Treasury, MFE, MED, NZTE, Fonterra, the Meat Industry and various other sector groups.

Professor Saunders is a member of the Council of the Royal Society of New Zealand and chairs the society’s Social Sciences Committee. She is an Advisory Board member of the National Centre on Research on Europe and a past Director of AgriQuality New Zealand.

Professor Saunders says she is delighted with the ONZM award, particularly for the recognition it gives to Economics, Trade and the Environment and to Lincoln University’s AERU team.

“I am delighted for the recognition it brings to the unit I have the good fortune to head, and I also believe it acknowledges the important work carried out by the Royal Society, another body with which I have the good fortune to be associated.”