Ross Garnaut

Ross Gregory Garnaut (born 28 July 1946, Perth ) is an Australian economist, currently serving as a vice-chancellor's fellow and professorial fellow of economics at the University of Melbourne.

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.

He attained a Bachelor of Arts in 1967 and a PhD in 1972 as a student of Peter Drysdale.

Throughout his career Garnaut held a number of influential political and economic positions as: senior economic adviser to Prime Minister Bob Hawke (1983–1985), Australia's ambassador to China (1985–1988), chairman of the Primary Industry Bank of Australia (1989–1994), chairman of Bankwest (1988–1995), head of division in the Papua New Guinea Department of Finance (1975–1976) and chairman of Lihir Gold.

Notable positions include Principal Economic Adviser to Prime Minister Bob Hawke (1983–1985); Australian Ambassador to China (1985–1988); First Assistant Secretary (Head of the Division of General Financial and Economic Policy), Papua New Guinea Department of Finance in the years straddling independence in 1975; and Member of the Advisory Council to the Australian Minister for Foreign Affairs (1997–2002).

He was previously distinguished Professor of Economics at the Australian National University (1989–2008), Head of Economics Department at ANU (1989–1998) and the Director of the ANU Asia Pacific School of Economics and Management.

He retired from ANU before moving to the University of Melbourne.

He was Deputy Chairman and Member of the Australia-China Council (1990–1994); and author of the 1989 Report to the Australian Prime Minister and Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade, 1989, Australia and the Northeast Asian Ascendency, (Australian Parliament Publicity Service, Canberra, 1989).

Garnaut has held a number of government and corporate board positions, while maintaining an academic profile as an economist.

He was chairman of Lihir Gold from 1995 until the merger with Newcrest in 2010 and he was a trustee (2003 to 2010) and then chairman of the International Food Policy Research Institute (2006 to 2010).

For example, he was chairman of the Papua New Guinea Sustainable Development Program from 2002 to 2012, but resigned after Prime Minister Peter O'Neill's government banned Garnaut from entering Papua New Guinea due to a dispute with BHP Billiton.

On 30 April 2007 the state and territory governments of Australia, at the request of Kevin Rudd, then leader of the Australian Labor Party and Leader of the Opposition, appointed Garnaut to examine the impacts of climate change on the Australian economy and recommend medium to long-term policies and policy frameworks to improve the prospects for sustainable prosperity.

The Garnaut Climate Change Review was commissioned by former Prime Minister of Australia, Kevin Rudd, and by the Australia's state and territory governments on 30 April 2007.

After his election on 24 November 2007 the Rudd, confirmed the participation of the Commonwealth Government in the review.

The Garnaut Climate Change Review was finalised on 30 September 2008, with a finalised update being released on 31 May 2011.

The final report was released on 30 September 2008 and recommended that Australia should indicate at an early date its preparedness to play its full, proportionate part in an effective global agreement that 'adds up' to either a 450 or a 550 emissions concentrations scenario, or to a corresponding point between.

In 2008, Garnaut was of the opinion that nuclear was not obviously necessary in Australia's low carbon energy future.

He told the media: "Nuclear energy is an important part of the global response to a low-carbon economy, but under Australian circumstances, it is not obvious that nuclear is an important part of our answer."

If there is no comprehensive global agreement at Copenhagen in 2009, Australia, in the context of an agreement among developed countries only, should commit to reduce its emissions by 5 per cent (25 per cent per capita) from 2000 levels by 2020, or 13 per cent from the Kyoto compliance 2008–2012 period.

The report's recommendations in terms of policy, apart from a Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme which included forestry and agriculture, centred heavily on hoping that carbon capture and storage and other coal pollution mitigation technologies would be available on a wide scale within the next twenty years.

The report was criticised by the Australian Chamber of Commerce & Industry for the economic impact that reducing greenhouse gas emissions would have.

It was also heavily criticised by environmental organisations, including Friends of the Earth and Rising Tide Australia.

The Australian Conservation Foundation praised the report for advocating a 450 ppm target.

Clive Hamilton was heavily critical of the report, arguing that it reduced global expectations of what should be aimed for, naively exposed Australia's negotiating tactics to the international diplomatic sphere, alienates both the Australian public and the international community, misjudges the time frames necessary to avoid dangerous climate change, gives Australia numerous special deals, and would be rejected by the international community.

Responses from political parties were mixed.

Australian Greens leader Bob Brown showed that the report demonstrated that reducing greenhouse gas emissions would not come at the expense of Australia's economic growth.

Climate Change Minister Penny Wong did not comment directly on the report but said that economic responsibility needed to be considered in responding to the report, and that the Government would wait before Treasury modelling on climate change mitigation before responding.

In November 2010 the Minister for Climate Change and Energy Efficiency commissioned Professor Garnaut to update his 2008 Garnaut Climate Change Review.

In September 2010, Professor Garnaut was appointed as an independent expert advisor to the Multi-Party Climate Change Committee.

The committee will explore options for the implementation of a carbon price and will help to build consensus on how Australia will tackle the challenge of climate change.

Garnaut concluded his role as climate change advisor for the Australian Government on 30 June 2011.

Garnaut attended Perth Modern School and then the Australian National University.

Garnaut commented after Cyclone Yasi affected Queensland in 2011 that the extensive body of climate science suggested that "cyclonic events will be more intense in a hotter world".

He further noted that if there were an intensification of extreme weather events with less than one degree of warming experienced and, if strong emissions growth was expected from many rapidly growing developing countries, then "you ain’t seen nothing yet" in terms of the intensification of extreme weather events.

Recent studies by Australian scientists have detected a long-term shift towards wet extremes and hot extremes occurring at the same time, consistent with changes as a result of increased concentrations in greenhouse gases.

Eight papers were released in February and March 2011 and the final report of the Garnaut Climate Change Review Update 2011 was presented to the Government on 31 May 2011.

Australia’s full part for 2020 in a 450 scenario would be a reduction of 25 per cent in emissions entitlements from 2000 levels.

For 2050, reductions would be 90 per cent from 2000 levels (95 per cent per capita).

Australia’s full part for 2020 in a 550 scenario would be a reduction in entitlements of 10 per cent from 2000 levels.

For 2050, reductions would be 80 per cent from 2000 levels or 90 per cent per capita.