AustralianSuper has appointed Stephen Joske to the newly-created position of Asia senior manager to provide a domestic view on investments in the region.
Joske would be based in Beijing and would be responsible for overseeing the fund's strategy for its increasing investments in Asia across all asset classes, the fund said.
"His initial responsibility will be to work on the economic outlook and identify broad areas of investment opportunities," AustralianSuper chief investment officer Mark Delaney said.
"That will interplay with the portfolio managers regarding opportunities in the sectors.
"He will be a part of the macro and asset allocation team. The other teams, property, equities and fixed interest, it will be their responsibility to make the investments.
"His job will be to provide a domestic perspective on these sectors."
Delaney said the appointment should be seen in the light of the growth expectations of the region over the coming years, and AustralianSuper was likely to place more staff on the ground in China in the future.
"You would think with the importance of the Asian region over the next decade, we will be building our investment function in the region," he said.
Joske joins AustralianSuper from The Economist Intelligence Unit, where he was director of the China forecasting service, managing a team of expert economists and econometricians to provide advice to companies on the factors driving structural change within the Chinese economy.
He has also worked at the Australian Embassy in Beijing as the senior Australian Treasury representative to China and represented Treasury at Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation and Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development meetings.
In September last year, government-owned asset manager QIC made a similar move, hiring former Australian ambassador to China Geoff Raby to represent it in the region.
