VIVIENNE DAVIES
Programme Director

Vivienne Davies is the Deputy Director Public Finance Management Directorate, in addition to which she is also directly responsible for the division that undertakes Customs and Trade Facilitation projects throughout the world. She has worked for Crown Agents for over 25 years, during which time she has led or supervised many large public sector reform projects in Europe and elsewhere.

While having extensive technical knowledge, she is very experienced in addressing the wider political and strategic issues involved in successfully delivering revenue reform projects.

DAVID SMITH
Programme Manager

David Smith is the Manager of the Programme for Modernisation of Bulgarian Financial Administration. He is a Senior Customs Advisor with Crown Agents and has been working for them since 2001. Previously he was an officer of HM Customs & Excise in the United Kingdom, where he represented the Department on a number of EU Council and Commission committees and working groups, including the Europol Working Group and the Drugs and Organised Crime Working Group. For the last ten years he has been working on projects in Central and Eastern Europe for Crown Agents, Eurocustoms and the European Commission, all related to customs reform and modernisation.

As well as technical knowledge of customs modernisation in the Accession countries, David also has extensive project management experience in Bulgaria and elsewhere, including Russia, Albania, Macedonia, Malawi and the Democratic Republic of Congo.

JOHN BROWN
Team Leader

John is a United Kingdom national with 30 year’s experience working for Her Majesty’s Customs & Excise as a senior manager and auditor. He has worked in a wide range of operational and policy areas, including anti smuggling, excise, warehousing, value added tax control, personnel and training. He also has experience of customs procedures and standards at the European Union level as well as wider justice and law enforcement issues at the national and international level.

John has extensive experience in the management of large-scale international customs projects in Europe and elsewhere. For the last five years he has been working for Crown Agents in a senior capacity in a number of locations including Russia, Indonesia and Jersey. He was the Principal Advisor and Team Leader of the previous Crown Agents Customs Programme in Bulgaria for over three years, between 2002 to 2005. In this capacity he has extensive practical experience of public sector modernisation issues in Bulgaria, the delivery of strategic and operational targets and the management of an international team of experts and local support staff.