Career

The following information has been provided, updated and maintained on behalf of the Greek-New Zealand Community and Hellenes Abroad.

Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development, Paris, France

Vitalis commenced his career working on the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development

Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development

The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development is an international economic organisation of 34 countries founded in 1961 to stimulate economic progress and world trade...

 Multilateral Agreement on Investment (MAI http://www.oecd.org/daf/mai/pdf/ng/ng987r1e.pdf) from 1993-5. His contribution was the preparation of two inter-linked analytical papers which provided the economic analysis in support of the elimination of investment incentives. This analysis, which largely pre-dated the conclusion of the GATT

General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade

The General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade was negotiated during the UN Conference on Trade and Employment and was the outcome of the failure of negotiating governments to create the International Trade Organization . GATT was signed in 1947 and lasted until 1993, when it was replaced by the World...

 Uruguay Round, was highly critical of the TRIMs-related negotiations. Both papers were considered too ambitious, even for the OECD. Neither was taken forward as part of the wider negotiations.

Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade, Wellington, New Zealand

Vitalis subsequently worked for three months in New York as a junior New Zealand Foreign Ministry delegate to the United Nations General Assembly

United Nations General Assembly

For two articles dealing with membership in the General Assembly, see:* General Assembly members* General Assembly observersThe United Nations General Assembly is one of the five principal organs of the United Nations and the only one in which all member nations have equal representation...

 - this was also during the time that New Zealand was a member of the UN Security Council. A posting to the New Zealand Embassy in Moscow

Moscow

Moscow is the capital, the most populous city, and the most populous federal subject of Russia. The city is a major political, economic, cultural, scientific, religious, financial, educational, and transportation centre of Russia and the continent...

 as Second and then First Secretary followed (1997–1999), including a year's language training at the Moscow State Linguistic University (1996).

Russian Ministry of Agriculture, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan

Vitalis then worked for a time at the Russian Ministry of Agriculture as part of a team developing a partial equilibrium model to assess the potential impact of Russia's accession to the World Trade Organization

World Trade Organization

The World Trade Organization is an organization that intends to supervise and liberalize international trade. The organization officially commenced on January 1, 1995 under the Marrakech Agreement, replacing the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade , which commenced in 1948...

 on its agricultural sector (1999–2000). Vitalis was an early advocate of the need to analyse Russia's agricultural policies at the federal and sub-federal level. He suggested that this was the only way to establish the full picture of Russian agricultural subsidisation a point reinforced in a paper he published on the subject http://researcharchive.lincoln.ac.nz/dspace/bitstream/10182/596/3/cd_dp_70.pdf. He also worked briefly during this period in Turkmenistan

Turkmenistan

Turkmenistan , formerly also known as Turkmenia is one of the Turkic states in Central Asia. Until 1991, it was a constituent republic of the Soviet Union, the Turkmen Soviet Socialist Republic . Turkmenistan is one of the six independent Turkic states...

 and Uzbekistan

Uzbekistan

Uzbekistan , officially the Republic of Uzbekistan is a doubly landlocked country in Central Asia and one of the six independent Turkic states. It shares borders with Kazakhstan to the west and to the north, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan to the east, and Afghanistan and Turkmenistan to the south....

 as an adviser to USAID and EUTACIS funded projects to these countries' Ministries of Finance on a range of diverse issues including currency reform and WTO accession.

Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development, Paris, France

From 2001 to 2011, Vitalis worked in various roles at the OECD. Between 2001 and 2004 he worked in Paris

Paris

Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...

 for the OECD Secretariat as a Chief Adviser. In particular, he headed a small unit of economists charged with providing the analytical papers to support the Ministerial-level OECD Round Table on Sustainable Development http://www.oecd.org/pages/0,3417,en_39315735_39312980_1_1_1_1_1,00.html. This influential body was chaired by the former New Zealand Minister for Environment and Associate Minister of Finance, Rt Hon Simon Upton. Ministers from a range of countries participated in Round Table meetings, including from France, the United Kingdom, the United States of America, Sweden, Canada, Italy, Japan, the Netherlands, Brazil and South Africa among others. The unique format of the Round Table also included leading NGOs, such as Greenpeace and WWF, alongside business organisations such as the World Business Council on Sustainable Development, Shell, BP and so on. The team led by Vitalis prepared a number of ground-breaking economic papers on a range of sustainability-related issues http://www.oecd.org/pages/0,3417,en_39315735_39313128_1_1_1_1_1,00.html, including how to measure sustainable development http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/3/57/39370725.pdf, measuring embedded carbon flows (i.e. a consumption flow model) http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/5/45/39360733.pdf and the potential synergies between investment flows and ODA http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/5/45/39360733.pdf. Over this period Vitalis was also an Economic Adviser to the OECD's IUU

Illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing

Illegal fishing takes place where vessels operate in violation of the laws of a fishery. This can apply to fisheries that are under the jurisdiction of a coastal state or to high seas fisheries regulated by regional organisations....

 Ministerial Task Force (2004-5)http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/2/28/39375276.pdf and subsequently chaired the OECD Trade and Environment Committee (2008–12), including the OECD Global Forum on Trade and Climate Change

Climate change

Climate change is a significant and lasting change in the statistical distribution of weather patterns over periods ranging from decades to millions of years. It may be a change in average weather conditions or the distribution of events around that average...

 (2009).

Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade, Wellington, New Zealand

Vitalis rejoined the New Zealand Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade in 2004, though initially there was some concern within the Ministry that he was too over-specialised in trade and economic issues. In any case, Vitalis returned to Wellington

Wellington

Wellington is the capital city and third most populous urban area of New Zealand, although it is likely to have surpassed Christchurch due to the exodus following the Canterbury Earthquake. It is at the southwestern tip of the North Island, between Cook Strait and the Rimutaka Range...

 and worked in the Economics Division of the Ministry as the Head of the Trade and Economic Analysis Unit. He initially worked on a set of papers on international economic issues relevant to New Zealand as a way of informing the development of the Government's Growth and Innovation Framework. It is during this time that Vitalis is believed to have first advocated the development of a customs union between Australia and New Zealand - he is known to have opposed a currency union. He also proposed the establishment of a "Minister for Australia" to take this idea forward as a way to 'refresh' the Closer Economic Relations

Closer Economic Relations

Closer Economic Relations is a free trade agreement between the governments of New Zealand and Australia. It is also known as the Australia New Zealand Closer Economic Relations Trade Agreement and sometimes shortened to...

hip between Australia and New Zealand in time for the twenty-fifth anniversary (in 2008) of the launch of that agreement.

Vitalis also managed the (general equilibrium) modelling work for the Joint Study assessing the potential benefits of the China

China

Chinese civilization may refer to:* China for more general discussion of the country.* Chinese culture* Greater China, the transnational community of ethnic Chinese.* History of China* Sinosphere, the area historically affected by Chinese culture...

-New Zealand Free Trade Agreement (FTA)http://www.mfat.govt.nz/Trade-and-Economic-Relations/2-Trade-Relationships-and-Agreements/China/0-nzchftasummary.php. He then transferred to the Trade Negotiations Division and became the investment chapter lead for the China-New Zealand FTA and the lead New Zealand negotiator for the treaty-status trade & labour, and trade & environment agreements between China and New Zealand, which were negotiated alongside the China-New Zealand FTA (2004-8)http://www.chinafta.govt.nz. New Zealand was the first OECD country to conclude an FTA with China.

It was during this period that Vitalis also contributed a chapter on the impact of OECD countries' trade policies on developing countries for a book edited by Robert Picciotto (former Director-General (Operations Evaluation) of the World Bank http://www.alibris.co.uk/search/books/qwork/16335214/used/Impact%20of%20Rich%20Countries'%20Policies%20on%20Poor%20Countries. He also published articles in The Journal of Integrative Environmental Sciences, including on the linkage between economics, science and sustainability http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/content~db=all~content=a713682452~frm=titlelink?words=vitalis and an assessment of the sustainable development effects of New Zealand's ground breaking agriculture reforms http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/content~db=all~content=a773355954. In 2005, Vitalis contributed a chapter on the intersection between agricultural, trade and environmental policies to a book edited by Thomas Lines of the International Institute for Sustainable Development http://books.google.co.th/books?id=hNCtsF8YAfMC&pg=PA67&lpg=PA67&dq=vangelis+vitalis+trade+agriculture+environment+and+development+win-win-win&source=bl&ots=8SEs6PYHAj&sig=92g5KRbmvKiMue-XzMezhXA9aHc&hl=th&ei=zp70TY2qD8fLrQeV97jPBg&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=4&ved=0CDsQ6AEwAw#v=onepage&q=vangelis%20vitalis%20trade%20agriculture%20environment%20and%20development%20win-win-win&f=false.

Vitalis has been a senior New Zealand WTO negotiator including on trade and environment-related issues (2004-8). In particular, he appears to have played an influential role in the WTO negotiations on environmental goods, chairing the 'Friends of Environmental Goods' process which collectively identified and tabled at the WTO more than 150 specific products as environmental goods (2004-7). The 'Friends' grouping included primarily OECD countries. Vitalis is also believed to have proposed the innovative 'living list' concept also formally tabled at the WTO by New Zealand. Such a 'living' process would enable the regular updating of any list of products agreed at the WTO to ensure that the list keeps pace with the rapid evolution of environmental technologies http://www.mfat.govt.nz/Trade-and-Economic-Relations/NZ-and-the-WTO/Trade-Issues/0-environment-goods-feb-05.php#ref1. At the same time, a series of papers tabled by New Zealand at the WTO and believed to be written by Vitalis proposed the establishment of a Voluntary Consultative Mechanism (later, a Voluntary Consultative Process) as a Pareto optimal way to address the intersection between trade measures contained in Multilateral Environmental Agreements and the WTO Agreements http://www.panda.org/downloads/policy/measwto.pdf. This innovative approach fell short of EU, Swiss and other expectations of the Doha-mandated 31 (i) negotiations, but was considered too ambitious by those WTO members that judged there was no confusion in the inter-relationship between these sets of agreements. It was during this time that Vitalis also produced his analysis of the relationship between trade, innovation and competition in the New Zealand context - a paper subsequently published by the OECD http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/6/17/41077830.pdf.

Vitalis was appointed New Zealand's Chief Negotiator for the ASEAN-Australia-New Zealand Free Trade Agreement (FTA) (AANZFTA; 2008–10) http://www.asean.fta.govt.nz, and simultaneously for the Malaysia-New Zealand FTA (MNZFTA; 2009–10) negotiations which at that time had been stalled for over eighteen months. Vitalis successfully led the New Zealand team which concluded both the AANZFTA http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=newsarchive&sid=aul8rxM98Jg4 and revived the moribund MNZFTA process such that less than six months later the MNZFTA was also concluded http://www.mfat.govt.nz/Trade-and-Economic-Relations/2-Trade-Relationships-and-Agreements/Malaysia/index.php and came into force on 1 August 2009 http://biz.thestar.com.my/news/story.asp?sec=business&file=/2010/7/31/business/6771253. The signing of the agreement with Malaysia took place in Kuala Lumpur and was overseen by the Malaysian and New Zealand Prime Ministers and a sixty-member New Zealand business delegation http://www.beehive.govt.nz/release/pm-welcomes-nz-malaysia-fta-signing.

At the time of the conclusion of the AANZFTA and MNZFTA, ASEAN was New Zealand's third most important trading partner after Australia and China and Malaysia was New Zealand's eighth most important trading partner. The ground-breaking AANZFTA was the first agreement negotiated jointly by Australia and New Zealand. It is characterised by a range of WTO-plus commitments made by ASEAN in areas as diverse as goods, services and intellectual poperty rights. The agreement is also characterised by the innovative use of an 'economic cooperation' chapter explicitly designed to help ASEAN members effectively implement the agreement. In particular, with its 'built-in' agenda, the AANZFTA is a 'living agreement' http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/1/60/46485520.pdf. The deadline for the elimination of tariffs in the AANZFTA mirrors that of the China-New Zealand FTA, i.e. twelve years and is a significant improvement on the existing Thailand-New Zealand Closer Economic Partnership which eliminated tariffs on New Zealand products within twenty years. The Malaysia-New Zealand FTA contains a number of significantly AANZFTA-Plus provisions, not least the elimination of a 15% tariff on kiwifruit and a range of new services commitments ensuring that New Zealand education, engineering and environmental service providers have a 'first mover' advantage over their competitors (http://www.mfat.govt.nz/downloads/trade-agreement/malaysia/mnzfta-key-outcomes.pdf and http://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/news/article.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=10605740). Vitalis' leadership in successfully concluding the AANZFTA was specifically acknowledged by the then New Zealand Minister of Trade, Hon Tim Groser http://www.beehive.govt.nz/speech/speech-asean-australia-new-zealand-free-trade-agreement-seminars and during the New Zealand parliamentary debate on the ratification of the agreement itself http://www.parliament.nz/en-NZ/PB/Debates/Debates/9/7/f/49HansD_20090702_00000883-Tariff-AANZFTA-Amendment-Bill-Customs-and.htm. Vitalis also led the New Zealand AANZFTA 'roadshow' which promoted the opportunities presented by this plurilateral agreement to New Zealand stakeholders in all of the main centres of New Zealand http://www.asean.fta.govt.nz/news-and-updates/?start=5.

New Zealand High Commission, Canberra, Australia

Following the successful conclusion of AANZFTA, Vitalis was appointed the New Zealand Deputy High Commissioner

High Commissioner

High Commissioner is the title of various high-ranking, special executive positions held by a commission of appointment.The English term is also used to render various equivalent titles in other languages.-Bilateral diplomacy:...

 in Canberra

Canberra

Canberra is the capital city of Australia. With a population of over 345,000, it is Australia's largest inland city and the eighth-largest city overall. The city is located at the northern end of the Australian Capital Territory , south-west of Sydney, and north-east of Melbourne...

 from 2009 to 2011, during which time he also completed the Malaysia-New Zealand FTA. The relationship with Australia is New Zealand's most significant and the High Commission is New Zealand's largest globally. Following the retirement of the High Commissioner, Dr John Larkindale, Vitalis was Acting High Commissioner from November 2010 to May 2011. His period as Acting High Commissioner coincided with Australian Prime Minister Gillard's

Julia Gillard

Julia Eileen Gillard is the 27th and current Prime Minister of Australia, in office since June 2010.Gillard was born in Barry, Vale of Glamorgan, Wales and migrated with her family to Adelaide, Australia in 1966, attending Mitcham Demonstration School and Unley High School. In 1982 Gillard moved...

 historic address to the New Zealand Parliament and the Christchurch Earthquake.

In 2009-10, Vitalis was instrumental in the establishment by New Zealand of the Friends of Fossil Fuel Subsidy Reform (FFFSR) grouping. This non-G20 group of countries has two inter-related objectives: to support the G20's ambitions for reform and elimination of fossil fuel subsidies; and to support the need for greater transparency around the data for such subsidies. Vitalis spoke at the launch of the initiative in June 2010 and also at a GSI-UNEP-WTO Conference http://www.globalsubsidies.org/research/gsi-unep-conference-increasing-momentum-fossil-fuel-subsidy-reform-developments-and-opportu on the subject later that year. The FFFSR currently comprises Costa Rica, Denmark, Ethiopia, New Zealand, Norway, Switzerland and Sweden. The grouping has been active at APEC and the UNFCCC to advance its case that reform of fossil fuel subsidies can make a meaningful difference to both economic and environmental outcomes. In this regard, the FFFSR works closely with a leading NGO, the Global Subsidies Initiative based in Geneva http://www.globalsubsidies.org/research/fossil-fuel-subsidies. The initial meetings of the FFFSR were held in Paris to conicide with Vitalis' travel to Paris to chair the OECD Committee on Trade and Environment.

In 2010, Vitalis was invited to Manila by the Asian Development Bank

Asian Development Bank

The Asian Development Bank is a regional development bank established on 22 August 1966 to facilitate economic development of countries in Asia...

 to present a paper as part of its regional economic integration seminar series. The paper essentially argues that preferential trade agreements could in fact be drivers of meaningful liberalisation and thus integration and thus presents an intriguing reference point to the 'stumbling blocks' thesis posited by Bhagwati and others http://www.aric.adb.org/res2.php?section=6&subsection=seminars. He reprised a more elaborate version of this paper at a Boao Forum event in Beijing in December that year http://www.boaoforum.org/html/ac2010/myrcen.asp. There were strong rumours in mid to late 2010 that Vitalis had resigned from the New Zealand Foreign Ministry and had secured a senior role at the Asian Development Bank to help its work on regional economic integration.

New Zealand Embassy, Brussels

In early 2011, however, Vitalis was appointed New Zealand Ambassador

Ambassador

An ambassador is the highest ranking diplomat who represents a nation and is usually accredited to a foreign sovereign or government, or to an international organization....

 to the European Commission

European Commission

The European Commission is the executive body of the European Union. The body is responsible for proposing legislation, implementing decisions, upholding the Union's treaties and the general day-to-day running of the Union....

 in Brussels

Brussels

Brussels , officially the Brussels Region or Brussels-Capital Region , is the capital of Belgium and the de facto capital of the European Union...

, with cross-accreditations as New Zealand Ambassador to NATO, Belgium

Belgium

Belgium , officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a federal state in Western Europe. It is a founding member of the European Union and hosts the EU's headquarters, and those of several other major international organisations such as NATO.Belgium is also a member of, or affiliated to, many...

, Bulgaria

Bulgaria

Bulgaria , officially the Republic of Bulgaria , is a parliamentary democracy within a unitary constitutional republic in Southeast Europe. The country borders Romania to the north, Serbia and Macedonia to the west, Greece and Turkey to the south, as well as the Black Sea to the east...

, Romania

Romania

Romania is a country located at the crossroads of Central and Southeastern Europe, on the Lower Danube, within and outside the Carpathian arch, bordering on the Black Sea...

 and Luxembourg

Luxembourg

Luxembourg , officially the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg , is a landlocked country in western Europe, bordered by Belgium, France, and Germany. It has two principal regions: the Oesling in the North as part of the Ardennes massif, and the Gutland in the south...

.

Education

Vitalis is believed to have attended schools in Greece, Germany (Andreanum, Hannover), Fiji (Veiuto Primary School, Lautoka) and in New Zealand. He studied at Auckland University and Harvard. In 1993 he was co-editor of Craccum

Craccum

Craccum is the weekly magazine produced by the Auckland University Students' Association of the University of Auckland, New Zealand. It was founded in 1927...

, the weekly magazine produced by the Auckland University Students' Association of the University of Auckland.

Personal life

A Greek-New Zealander

Greeks in New Zealand

There is a community of about 4,500 people of Greek descent in New Zealand.Greek New Zealanders have a heavy concentration in Wellington, and to a lesser extent Christchurch and Auckland...

, Vitalis' parents, Antonios and Regina Vitalis, emigrated to New Zealand in 1980. Vitalis is married to Tanya Jurado (a Colombian

Colombian people

Colombian people are from a multiethnic Spanish speaking nation in South America called Colombia. Colombians are predominantly Roman Catholic and are a mixture of Europeans, Africans, and Amerindians.-Demography:...

-New Zealander), a widely-published expert on SME policy development http://jmo.e-contentmanagement.com/archives/vol/17/issue/3/article/3935/the-reality-of-management-development-in-smes-. They have three children. Vitalis speaks Greek

Greek language

Greek is an independent branch of the Indo-European family of languages. Native to the southern Balkans, it has the longest documented history of any Indo-European language, spanning 34 centuries of written records. Its writing system has been the Greek alphabet for the majority of its history;...

, German

German language

German is a West Germanic language, related to and classified alongside English and Dutch. With an estimated 90 – 98 million native speakers, German is one of the world's major languages and is the most widely-spoken first language in the European Union....

, and Russian

Russian language

Russian is a Slavic language used primarily in Russia, Belarus, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan. It is an unofficial but widely spoken language in Ukraine, Moldova, Latvia, Turkmenistan and Estonia and, to a lesser extent, the other countries that were once constituent republics...

 and is a fanatical supporter of the Wellington Phoenix football club, the All Whites, the New Zealand national football team, and Olympiakos Piraeus, the Greek association football club.

External links

• Hellenes Abroad, 4 March 2011