Comments

I will take this opportunity to highlight two programs that connected PNG and indigenous Australian creators. The first was the Ninti One work on indigenous/creative intellectual property, mentioned in this article. The second was Laikim Sista, a women-led SME program facilitated by The Difference Incubator that connected indigenous businesswomen with PNG businesswomen. It was a truly fantastic program, and long-term relationships were built. We now have one woman-led coffee company supplying coffee to an indigenous Australian retailer, and other connections continue. These were wonderful programs and show just a fraction of what could be done with more indigenous participation in development cooperation.

I am samuel Toroitich from hardwork 32 years of age married with two twins and looking for work. I have a bit of an idea on farming - plz help get a job there.

Congratulations on your review of this very important initiative. As part of the research team on the Western Sydney Uni (Whitlam Institute) research, the perspective of Pacific islanders from Fiji, Solomon Islands and Vanuatu on the absent relationship between themselves and Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people was an eye-opener for us. It's been similar for lots of people to whom we have presented the research. It is notable that no-one among our 150 research participants (representing a cross-section of government, private sector, civil society and grassroots) seemed to be aware of the IPP, despite the fact that many felt deeply the dissonance between Australia's white face and what they know of its Indigenous population. Especially in Solomon Islands and Vanuatu there is a strong sense of kinship across the Coral Sea that does not find expression in our bilateral relations. So there is clearly huge potential for the IPP. If it were better known in the region I suspect there would be a strong demand for it, both with Indigenous led assistance, and mandating significant Indigenous representation in the design and delivery of programs. Expansion beyond the aid program to other commercial and cultural relationships would also be welcome. Among all of the rhetoric of the Step-up this could be a valuable contribution to deeper and more respectful relationships between Australia and its Pacific island neighbours. Our Pacific Perspectives research found that Pacific islanders don't think that Australians are very good at negotiating the cultural gaps between us. A prominent Indigenous presence can only help.

Grant you have put a beautiful and worthy of consideration caveat to it drawing from your experiences and thankyou so much.

Hi Elias, A very good piece and suggestion to address crime. The informal built settlement around Garden Hills estate is providing a safe haven for the petty criminals. I resided in the informal built settlement for 2 years, 2016-17, when working for the National Research Institute. There were other lower to medium income earners living in the area, and it is still providing affordable homes for many Papua New Guineans. The first impression I got after walking from Moni Plus building was the great divide between the formal built settlement on the right and informal built settlement on the left. The disparity is so obvious as you go further up the hills and toward the informal built settlement. The road leading to the settlement is impassable at times and water supply runs in particular locations with only few households fortunate to have full access. Another thing that struck me was, Foreigners were renting and operating trade stores and engaging locals. I wondered why the locals are not doing it themselves and I realised people from the same clan, tribe, origin tend to live together and it is hard to resist when they ask for dinau (credit). Moreover, the cultural expectations dictates that well-to-do people contribute more, which leaves them vulnerable to make losses. There are a handful who basically live on a hand-to-mouth basis and sometimes they sacrifice meals to allow their children to go to school. There are very resilient people who are actually making ends meet, however the overwhelming conditions outweigh positive initiatives to address crime. My landlord is a church elder who advocates for peace and so I was sheltered safely under his care. But, I often go out of my way to spare the child a candy, the drunkard a cigar or buy greens from the mama, though it is sold at a marked up price. Sometimes, I hoped the Internal Revenue Commission should factor the cultural/social obligation to lower the salary and wage tax as we are paying double. However, there is no guarantee that bad things will not happen to good people. This is where the police must beef up operations at the bus stops, especially in the morning and afternoon to ensure smooth transition of commuters. In the long term, the informal built settlement must be properly arranged so that people who can live in the city must be allowed to live.

Hi Grant, A worthy piece of advice from your experience which speaks volumes about PNG as a human society. No society is immune to crime, POM is no exception. But the rate and manner in which it has happened painted a bad image on the society and its people. The rate can be described in the context of where there is no police. The ratio of police to person is alarmingly big, 1:1500 person compared to the recommended 1:500 person. Even if a case is reported and suspect apprehended, the chances of seeing it to completion is very low. This points to the challenge of arresting crime where there is no police, jungle justice often creeps in. This leads to the second point on the manner of crime. The victims of crime are often targeted on certain people only. In a complex society as PNG, retaliation attacks are common and people do not attack and harass anybody. When I went to high school, one of my teachers used this common phrase when we got into trouble: "be at the right place, at the right time, doing the right thing". I think this holds true and the fact that we continue to live as a country speaks a lot about the very minimal police service we have and the same is quite true for other basic services where there is no doctor, nurse, teacher...

In my own work, I’ve generally found that the confidence often demanded in designing assistance must be matched by the humility of all the unknowns: https://www.adb.org/sites/default/files/publication/27518/strengthening-pacific-fragile-states.pdf And you’ve probably come across the arguments for iterative design: https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2102794

Dear Gordon, you make a number of good points. At the same time, current policy settings in the Australian aid program combined with contractual and accountability requirements inevitably results in preprogrammed projects. To try and break out of this impasse, I wonder if we need to be considering the political economy of adaptive management. Government and managing contractors are both benefiting from the status quo. Regards Scott

Hi Ryan, Good comment, as always. I agree there is considerable scope for greater use of quantitative experimental and quasi experimental methods in evaluating components of governance work (with governance just being one of many examples). My main point of difference would be that -- even when there such methods aren't feasible -- the work may well still be worth doing. All significant work should be evaluated independently and rigourously of course, but at times qualitative approaches may be more helpful. And, at times, even with the full tool kit of quant and qual approaches there will still be some uncertainty. Still - "more and better evaluations" is a slogan I could happily march to. Terence

"For the PICs, PACER Plus represents a squandered opportunity to address the real development needs of the region and a waste of time and significant resources. The focus should be on assisting PIC exporters to meet quarantine standards in Australia and New Zealand (ANZ), supporting the emergence of new PIC industries, promoting the diversification of PIC economies and ensuring that the traditional systems and cultural practices in the Pacific aren’t displaced by Western-style investments. None of this requires PACER Plus to be in force." I believe this is what Australian and New Zealand governments are already providing as a commitment to the PACER Plus PICs. Think there is a need for curve out on a commitment towards liberalising industrial sector for the vulnerable PICs, that would pull in PNG and Vanuatu. There is a small margin or zero impact of ANZ exports of like products to the Pacific if PICs imposes high tariffs. It means the agreement allows PICs to retain the right to impose high tariffs to protect local infant industries. Invariable, offer market access to those PICs industries that meet the ANZ standards to export to these two markets. Second, ANZ to offer market access on services sectors to the PICs in areas they may have competitive advantages. In this regard, financial and real estate sectors, for some, they could be allowed to establish branches/agents in ANZ markets. One notable bank in PNG, BSP, could be establishing branches in ANZ noting its positive reputation of rolling out its banks presence in the Pacific countries. This is where PNG could directly benefit from the dollars from ANZ Market. Third, about mobility, there needs to be binding commitments for semi and formal skilled persons to work in ANZ and vice versa.

Hi Lucille and Terence, A recent piece on overheads you might both be interested in: https://www.latimes.com/opinion/op-ed/la-oe-karlan-charitable-giving-20141218-story.html I agree with most of your points, as well as Terence's below. But while it is quite clear that not every single use of aid can be subject to experimental or at least quasi-experimental evaluations, at the same time it is clear that much more Australian aid can and should be, crucially including governance aid, labour mobility, and infrastructure. You would be surprised by the list of things that people have found clever ways to experimentally evaluate over the last 20 years, and some of the surprising results they've delivered. Best, Ryan

I thank the three contributors, Adam Wolfenden, Jim Redden and Wesley Morgan for pointing to some of the negative and positive contributions of the PACER Plus agreement. Although aspects of the trade provisions have attracted comment there has been no insightful discussion of the investment provision. In my view the PACER Plus investment provisions (Chapter 9) make no positive contribution to the agreement. No investor will be reassured by Chapter 9. The Chapter does not include investor-state dispute resolution rules. Chapter 9, using the common language of many bilateral investment treaties, describes investment protection standards and requirements in some detail. In the event that a state breaches these international law standards and requirements an investor must seek a remedy in the state’s courts under domestic law. If the legal processes of the host state have been exhausted without such a remedy an investor may then petition its home state to take up its cause under the legal fiction that an injury to a foreign national is an injury to that person’s state. Taking up the investor’s grievance at this diplomatic level is known as ‘espousal’. To advance a claim for espousal an investor must gain the attention, support and advocacy of both politicians and bureaucrats. If a state decides to adopt and espouse the investor’s claim then the issue may be resolved or arbitrated as a state-state dispute, or never resolved. PACER Plus Chapter 14 provides some guidance as to how state-state disputes may be resolved. In the context of the politics of state to state relations such investor claims may be great irritants. Because of this and many other reasons most or all investment treaties that make provision for investor-state dispute settlement explicitly rule out the use of diplomacy (‘espousal’) for resolution of investor-state disputes. Vailala