Comments

Looks like Thailand is in fact one of the four countries negotiating for entry. See https://www.pattayamail.com/thailandnews/thailand-warns-public-of-australian-agriculture-visa-program-scams-389040. Not sure what the Thai demand "to lower some of the criteria set by Australian officials" refers to.

Love this piece I'm a huge advocate for housing. Would like to speak to you more about your article as I'm doing a policy called 1 family 1 home policy to address this housing crisis in Port Moresby. My name is Steven Kilage.

Hi Michelle, Congratulations on another great piece. I am glad that you have written this piece to advocate for a better solution to the eviction issue. No doubt very little is given attention to by the courts on the impact of settlement on the livelihood of ordinary Papua New Guineans when it makes it decisions. In addition, I feel that urban authorities and government in general should also push for "resettlement as a mandatory requirement" when it comes to granting "development permit" for developers who are keen on developing UDLs that are already occupied by people. On social media, I can see that the negativity around settlement still persists but there is also a growing number of Papua New Guineans who see that the real underlying problem is the "housing crisis" that successive governments have yet to tackle. I am in the process of putting together a piece on the recent eviction towards the end of 2021 and recently this year. Your piece provides with me some valuable insights. Hopefully I get this published soon. Best Regards, Busa Jeremiah Wenogo

Great take Atiq on what has been a very 'interesting' couple of years for us, international aid workers. I love your last comment, "when life gives you lemons, make lemonade”. I'm typically a 'glass half full' type person too, which is a view that has been very difficult to maintain since March 2020, but I feel very privileged to still have a job in International Development, when so many others have lost their jobs.

Also, the book which contains this research is about to be published. Look out for it "Papua New Guinea: government, economy and society" edited by Howes and Pillai, published by ANU Press.

Isabelle, thanking you for posting. 'From Power to Participation' is an excellent piece of work by the Pacific Women team and an invaluable resource for gender programming in the Pacific, based on findings of almost 10 years of program. Great that the lessons learned can shared (and hopefully adopted) more widely.

Dear Raka, Many thanks for your interest. This seminar is not going to be recorded unfortunately, however, the presentation slides will be available on our <a href="https://crawford.anu.edu.au/news-events/events/19849/have-living-standards-improved-png-over-last-two-decades" rel="nofollow ugc">website</a> after the event. Regards, Arichika

Hello, I would really like to attend but cannot due to work requirements. Would a video on this be posted online? (If so, where). Thank you.

Loved it, thank you! It is a challenge to write up serious research about development and not stray into the realms of satire and to reveal the ridiculous nature of what donors and developers alike do in their work.

Orwell's Burmese Days could be read as a brilliant forerunner to this genre.

Thanks, Julian! I must shamefacedly admit I have never heard of this book. The review on Amazon is very enticing but the price much less so! I'm going to try to hunt it down. Do drop me a line if you know where I can get a hold of it or find out more about Nick Storr himself. Also, this is the second occasion I know where a footballer's name is taken as a pseudonym, the first being Luther Blisset with the exceptional novel 'Q'

Great that you mentioned Tales of the Tikongs. I lived in Tonga for 18 months and went on to a career in international development; the stories are brilliant satire and very 'on point' about the contradictions and many shortcomings of the aid and development industry - and should be required reading for all development studies courses!