Robert Scollay spent several years in the private sector, working in an international trading company, before joining the Economics Department at the University of Auckland, where he was also appointed director of the New Zealand APEC Study Centre in 1995.
He has been a visiting scholar at the Institute for International Economics (Washington DC), UNCTAD (Geneva), Institute of Southeast Asian Studies (Singapore), and Korea Institute of International Economic Policy (KIEP), among others. He was international coordinator for the PECC Trade Forum from 2001 to 2005, leading a number of its research projects, including projects undertaken for the APEC Business Advisory Council (ABAC). Recent research and publications have focused on issues relating to regional trade agreements and regional economic integration, especially in the Asia-Pacific region, and to multilateral liberalisation and globalisation. Dr Scollay has undertaken consultancies on trade issues for a number of international organizations, as well as for agencies of the New Zealand and Australian governments.