Leader in Australia-Asia relations to visit New Zealand

14 February 2011

A leading expert on Australia’s relationship with Asia will be visiting New Zealand as a guest of the Asia New Zealand Foundation this week.

Jenny McGregor is Group CEO of Asialink and the Executive Director of the Asia Education Foundation. She will be visiting Wellington and Auckland from February 15-18.

Under her leadership, Asialink has become Australia's largest non-government centre for the promotion of Australia-Asia relations with an annual budget of over $A10 million and activities spanning education, the arts, leadership, health and corporate and public programmes.

During her visit, Ms McGregor will have meetings with the Minister of Education Anne Tolley and the Secretary for Education Karen Sewell.

She will also attend the launch of the latest Asia New Zealand Foundation Outlook report Engaging Asia: The Role of the Diaspora on Wednesday, February 16.

The report is the first in a series intended to look at a growing trend – the increase in the numbers of New Zealanders living in Asia. This trend is sure to strengthen in the years ahead, and ways of linking this diaspora with New Zealand will be looked at more closely by the Government and by New Zealand business.

Jenny McGregor will also give a presentation on Australia’s relationship with Asia at the Connecting with Asia Business Leaders lunch hosted by Deloitte in Wellington on Tuesday February 15.

Ms McGregor will also attend the opening night of the Auckland Lantern Festival in Auckland on Friday February 18 to see one of the biggest Asian cultural events in the southern hemisphere.

Jenny McGregor has been a member of the Boards of the APEC Women’s Business Advisory Committee and of the Myer Foundation Beyond Australia Committee. She is currently on the Advisory Boards of the Australian Centre and the Dunlop Asia Awards, a member of the Executive of the Melbourne Confucius Institute and a member of the Board of the Monash Institute for the Study of Global Movements and Australian Volunteers International.

Jenny has overseen the Track II Australia-ASEAN dialogue, the 'Asialink Conversations', from their inception in 2002 in Australia. Together with Professor Tony Milner she has delivered ‘Asialink Conversations’ in Malaysia, Vietnam, Sydney and India.

Apart from taking responsibility for a wide range of Asialink publications, Ms McGregor is active as a media commentator on issues relating to Australia-Asia engagement.

Before taking up her Asialink appointment in 1990, Ms McGregor worked as a political advisor (including the office of the Shadow Minister for Social Welfare) before joining the Commission for the Future to research Australia Asia relations. She has a BA (Hons) and Dip Ed from the University of Melbourne and holds the Peter Brice award for outstanding contribution to teaching and learning about the Asia Pacific region.

ENDS

© Scoop Media