About Tracey Epps

Tracey Epps is an international lawyer and policy consultant based in Wellington, New Zealand. She works on a broad range of trade- and investment-related issues, in both a legal and policy capacity. This includes treaty negotiations and obligations under the multilateral, regional and bilateral agreements, as well as issues including export controls and sanctions. She advises both governments and the private sector – both in New Zealand and elsewhere – including legal advisory work, legislative drafting, and capacity building for officials. She helps a variety of businesses to engage with government to address issues related to doing business across borders. See a more detailed list of services here.

Tracey has worked across academic, government and private practice. This combined experience gives her a deep understanding of the legal, political and economic aspects of trade that is of value to public and private sector clients, both in New Zealand and internationally.

From 2016 to 2021, Tracey headed the International Trade Law Practice at Chapman Tripp, a leading New Zealand law firm, working for both public and private sector clients.

Before Chapman Tripp, she was a senior legal advisor with the New Zealand Ministry of Foreign Affairs, where she was, from 2010 to 2016, New Zealand’s lead Legal Counsel for the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) negotiations. She was also involved in a wide range of other trade and investment issues, including: working on the appeals phase in the WTO complaint that New Zealand brought against Australia in respect of access for New Zealand apples, and advising on the legal implications of Brexit for New Zealand.

She also worked in the health care consulting practices at PricewaterhouseCoopers and then IBM Business Consulting in Canada, with a focus on strategic planning and evaluation of provincial and federal government programmes.

Tracey has an LLM and SJD from the University of Toronto, and a BA/LLB(Hons) from the University of Auckland. She regularly teaches International Trade Regulation at the University of Otago in New Zealand.

Tracey holds a current practising certificate in New Zealand as a Barrister Sole.