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Seriously the bulk of the population who live in the rural areas require more time to register otherwise communication in PNG will worsen. In addition, phone companies should take the responsibility of the costs incurred during the registration process and ensure that their subscribers are registered.

Hi John, as you know dealing with the informal economy in its entirety is a difficult proposition. Even the development of a law and policy has been found to be wanting, particularly in terms of engaging the government to make available adequate investment to support the growth of the sector. During the review of the Informal Sector Development & Control Act the Constitutional Law Reform Commission (CLRC) concluded that lack of government ownership was one of the major set-backs in implementing both the law and policy. The Department for Community Development & Religion stated that they were not 'clear' on what role they were to play (until the creation of the Informal Economy Section) in implementing the ‘public Goods & Services’ arm of the strategy. If it was stated it was found to be ambiguous. So the strategy in itself is an attempt to assist in refining the role of the Department towards implementing the National Informal Economy Policy. To this end the role of the Department is to coordinate, facilitate and network with the informal economy participants through their respective associations to design programs and interventions to assist with their development. The Department is to work with key government departments/agencies, private sector, development partners and CSOs to assist in delivering these programs. The Department will take lead in setting up these associations, building the capacity of its leaders and membership and monitoring its progress. The Informal Economy Associations proposed in the strategy have no limitations. In fact, the strategy advocates that associations can be registered based on the type of activity or geography i.e. where the informal economy participants conduct their activities. While it would be in the best interest of the large PNG informal economy that we take a broader outlook, we have to be mindful and realistic of how government support (in terms of funding and training) will be delivered to participants. At present such support is not coordinated and is delivered (by a myriad of partners) on an ad-hoc basis, and the government is unable to report on the progress that has been made against its goals articulated in its policies such as the National Informal Economy Policy and its Medium Term Development Plans. Such progressive report and monitoring is crucial in the event the National Informal Economy Policy is to be reviewed. At an initial stage of the implementation of the strategy, formal markets will be targeted (because they are within government control and regulations and some work have already taken place in the case of the UN Women/NCDC Safe Cities Market Project on registering vendors into associations/financial inclusion, financial literacy training etc) and then gradually the focus will move beyond the markets to incorporate peddlers, mobile traders, street sellers, home based workers, etc. So as you can see the introduction of the strategy is in no way an attempt to defeat the aspiration of the National Informal Economy Policy but it is aimed at complementing the policy because our end goal is the same and that is "to establish the position of the informal economy as the grassroots expression of private enterprise, and to see the informal economy acknowledged as the full and legitimate partner of the formal economy in the economic system of PNG". This entails diversifying the PNG informal economy. In fact this vision is also the vision of the strategy. Nevertheless, we realise to achieve this high level vision the informal economy in PNG needs be 'coordinated and organised', with the government taking an active role. Lacking these we have a messy informal economy that is suffering from negative government and public perception. A very important step towards achieving the vision of the policy and strategy is the creation of the 'Informal Economy Section' with the Ministry of Community Development & Religion. The section is headed by an Assistant Secretary (Program Manager) who has a team of about five officers dealing with various key initiatives such as 'financial inclusion', national audit of informal economic activities, informal sector development & control act and stakeholder engagement. The section will take carriage of the Strategy once it is endorsed by the National Government. When the review of the Informal Sector Development & Control Act got underway we (CIMC and DFCDR) felt that it was important that some provision(s) is made in the new law to connect the strategy. What is proposed (section 17A) is what CLRC has suggested would be the best approach after we consulted them on our proposal. The advice from CLRC is that the law can only propose for a 'committee' to be set-up rather than an association because the latter operates under a separate piece of law called the 'Association Incorporation Act'. Our original intention was for the law to explicitly create provision(s) whereby representatives from peak informal economy associations can become members of the existing committees of the government at the National, Provincial & LLGs such as the District Development Authority, the Provincial Coordination & Monitoring Committee (PCMC) or Joint Provincial Planning & Budget Committee (JPPBC) to directly contribute to the decision making process. Subsequently, we hope that the informal economy can feature prominently in the policy and planning process. This is a long term measure but one that can work if the government through the Department for Community Development & Religion sustains its focus, effort and drive. While the Minister is entrusted with the powers to create this committee, it will only do so per the advice from the Secretary for the Department for Community Development & Religion. Furthermore, the composition of the committee is explicitly stated in the Bill: that there is very little room to appoint 'political cronies' to the committee. Having the Minister involved in the creation of these committee may also be a "blessing in disguise" as it will bring the informal economy agenda into the government spotlight, something that the informal economy really needs. Whilst the strategy advocates for the formation of Informal Economy Associations and the need for government to take ownership; it also realises that the success of these associations depends on its ability to represent the interest of its members without any form of bias. The end goal of the Strategy is making sure that these informal economy associations are able to stand up and raise concerns affecting their membership, which means these organisations are essentially CSOs in nature.

Busa, I see a potential flaw in the way this initiative is set up. The Minister is asked to approve a link mechanism to give voice to informal economy 'vendors'. I'm sure your intention is not to restrict access to this consultative mechanism simply to those selling goods ('vendors') outside the formal sector. What about the emerging (and as yet ill-developed) informal service sector? Hair-dressers, beauticians, car mechanics and other tradespeople, and so on. An important objective of informal economy policy should be to widen the scope and increase the depth of informal economy activities.

Hi Dr Amanda Watson Thank-you for your insight and research in to the SIM card registration in PNG. Unfortunately many of us have registered our SIM card numbers with our ID's taken and some of our personal information which offers some risk if used by some unauthorised agents or organization. The government may have good intentions in legislating the SIM card registration but its true impact is yet to be realized. I hope the government will make the correct decision if the SIM registration exercise does not produce the outcome it was intended for.

Thanks for sharing your experience of the Seasonal Workers Program. I have travelled to the Solomons many times volunteering with medical & education projects. We treat the locals like family as they respect us, work hard & appreciate anything we do & any skills they pick up while working with us. They appreciate every opportunity & most help their fellow man by sharing the knowledge learnt. We are always happy to help our northern neighbours who are no different to us except that they were born in a different place with less opportunities. Do you know if Days for Girls have been into the area your Workers come from? I am sure you would be able to approach a local sewing team or chapter (possibly Toowoomba?) to supply kits. If you plan on going back they would talk you through distributing the kits for all the students at the local schools. I have distributed them in the Western Province & Guadalcanal & they are prized possessions to all who were lucky enough to receive one.

Thanks Dr. Watson for the probing research done Just a concern citizen here; first the notion of sim card registration must be legally binding for all citizens and foreigners leaving in PNG. if there is no law enacted to enforce the course of sim registration then it can be challenged by our sovereign laws. Because privacy and secrecy are of paramount concern to individuals and our sovereign nation. And it is right that needs to be respected regardless of our predetermine background variables such as ethnic minorities, gender and or social standing in the community. Therefore, it must first be legally binding to allow is implementation Thanks

I am in support of the Seasonal Worker Program that in general benefited a lot of Solomon Islanders. Our development organization, the Rinaoli Perpetual Development Association really wanted to be an Agency in Solomon Islands. We have tried out organic farming by setting up demonstration farms and then each farmer applying the techniques in their own farms. We concentrated mainly with yams and taro organic farms. We have identified capable farmers that are able to join the SWP but we need to link with farmers in Australia and this is the advice from Jack Waneoroa, an officer in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and External Trade. Hence we are now appealing to the Australian Farmers so that we can link up with, to send our capable and disciplined farmers. We will meet all required costs to come to Australia, such as, visa, air ticket, medical check etc. Please email to us using the email; ptaloble@gmail.com. Cheers, Patrick Taloboe

A very interesting piece Dr Watson. Thank you for sharing the link with Divine Word University Alumni Association through Dominic Tulo.

Hi Albert and all, Amanda has made very good observation and I supposed anything that should happen in a country is based on law and mobile phone companies I hope are registering SIMS as required under law. if there is no law people have right to complain. However if there is a written law people have no choice but laws must be enforced and people have to comply. I hope mobile phone companies are adhering to requirements of the law. regards john

Thank you for this article Dr. Watson, it shares a lot of the same questions I've raised but also gives good examples of how this process has worked or has been changed to better suit the needs and capability of a country. It would have been interesting to have some how brought together the NID process and sim registration exercise if it were possible, some sort of link, looking at the amount of detail being given to service providers such as Digicel.

Thanks for the rich insights about the complexities of the SIM card registration system. It's a good summary of issues that need to be addressed if the system is to work fairly and effectively.

I guess Telikom registers its users when they purchase a SIM card (I registered before I bought one). Rwanda deactivated 485,000 SIM cards after extending due dates for registration, and I wrote to The National newspaper arguing that January 20 would not work for rural communities. As you point out, SIM Card registration doesn't reduce crime. There's no empirical evidence. When revoking the mandatory SIM card registration in three years later the report from Mexican authorities stated that registration of SIM card did not help in "investigation and or prosecution of associated crimes." United Kingdom, the Czech Republic, Romania and New Zealand have considered mandating SIM card registration but opted against. I am not surprised by PNG government's haphazard decision to make SIM card registration mandatory. The government has a reputation of initiating ambitious projects without proper research. NID is only popular with working class population in urban areas because of threats like "No NID, No Pay" announcement by Minister for National Planning (and for identification purpose for obtaining travel doc or banks requirements for the new birth certificates issued with NID) Instead of making registration mandatory, the government should be improving services (e-Commerce/m-Commerce) that require use of mobile phone services. This would encourage SIM card holders to voluntarily register. https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/sim-card-registration-png-should-adopt-global-best-practice-kabuni/?published=t