Per Kleppe
Per Andreas Hildhe Kleppe is a Norwegian economist and politician for the Labour Party.
As an elected politician he served in the position of deputy representative to the Norwegian Parliament from Oslo in during the term 1954-1957. On the local level he was a deputy member of Oslo city council from 1951 to 1955.
Kleppe graduated from the University of Oslo with the cand.oecon. degree in 1956. He was appointed State Secretary in the Ministry of Finance from 1957 to 1962. He was the Minister of Trade and Shipping in 1971-1972 during the first cabinet Bratteli, and later headed the Ministry of Finance from 1973 to 1979 during the second cabinet Bratteli and the cabinet Nordli. In 1979 he was replaced by Ulf Sand, but Kleppe returned in 1981 to head the Secretariat for Long-Term Planning.
In 1981 he took over as general secretary of the European Free Trade Association, a position he held until 1988.
