Staff

Chairman: Annette Ellis

Annette Ellis is a highly esteemed member of the Federal parliament. Currently, she is the Chair of the Australia – Thai Parliamentary Friendship Group, Deputy Chair of the House of Representatives Standing Committee on Family and Community Affairs, and Deputy Chair of the Caucus Social Policy and Community Development Committee. She is also a member of the National Capital and External Territories Joint Standing Committee of the Federal parliament, and the House Standing Committee on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Island Affairs. In the past, Annette was elected to the seat of Namadgi – and re-elected in the 1998, 2001, 2004 and 2007 elections – and has now been a Federal Member for the Southern Canberra area since 1996.

Annette has had a long-standing association with Thailand. As a public servant for the Department of Foreign Affairs (1974-1980), Annette was posted to many overseas locations, including the Australian Embassy in Bangkok.

Executive Director

Professor Peter Warr [BSc(Sydney), MSc(London), PhD(Stanford), FASSA.]

Professor Peter Warr has been a member of the Economics Division, RSPAS, ANU, since 1980 and held the John Crawford Chair since 1989. He is currently Convenor of the Econmics Division as well as executive Director of the NTSC.

His research interests are the economies of Thailand and Indonesia, especially as regards measurement of poverty incidence, analysis of its causes and the means by which economic policy may be used to reduce poverty incidence.

He is author/editor of 3 books and 120 academic journal articles and book chapters, including:

The Thai Economy in Transition, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1993.
Thailand's Macroeconomic Miracle: Stable Adjustment and Sustained Growth, World Bank, Washington DC and Oxford University Press, Kuala Lumpur, 1996.
Thailand Beyond the Crisis, Routledge, London, 2001.

Career Highlights include being elected Fellow of the Academy of Social Sciences in Australia in 1997; Editorial Board member for several academic journals. Consultant for the Australian Government, the Thai Government, the World Bank, the Asian Development Bank, and the United Nations.

Assistant Director - Ms Chintana Sandilands

Ms Chintana Sandilands [BA, MA (Faculty of Economics, Thammasat University, Bangkok, Thailand), Graduate Diploma in Public Policy, Public Policy Program, ANU]. She was awarded the Australian National University Vice Chancellors Award for Excellence in Teaching (with team) in 1997, an ACT International Women's Day Award in 2008. Presently she is Convenor of the Thai Program and the Year in Asia (Thailand and Lao PDR) Program, in the Southeast Asia Centre and Assistant Director of the National Thai Studies Centre (NTSC), Canberra, Australia.

Ms Chintana Sandilands is a lecturer and tutor with the Southeast Asia Centre and specialises in Thai language and culture, as well as other aspects of Thai studies particularly contemporary political, economic and social issues. She teaches Intermediate and Advanced Thai language courses.

Ms Sandilands undertook collaborative research with Professor John Clark, Department of Art History and Theory, University of Sydney, 2000-2001, on The Economic Base of Thai Artists, funding from the Australian Research Council. She is currently working on Expatriate Thai Perspectives of Australia and The Impacts of Chinese Business Commandments on the Ethical Perceptions of Thai Business People. She is Vice-President of the Thai Community of the ACT Inc., and a member of the Australia-Thailand Association of Canberra.

Nancy Amarat - Administrator

Nancy Amarat works part time as an administrator for the National Thai Studies Centre. She is currently a student at the ANU and in her second year of a combined Asian Studies (Specialist)/Arts degree majoring in Thai language and Security Studies.