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From Stephen Howes on Transferring HIV treatment to the PNG government: a good idea?
Hi Don,
I am all for studying aid successes. Indeed, my blog was about one. I'm sure there are health infrastructure success stories in PNG, But I don't think building infrastructure should be seen as capacity building. Building clinics (and training health workers) are both just aspects of service delivery - they are no different in this regards to supplying drugs or supporting NGOs to deliver health services. They just support different aspects of the service delivery chain. The capacity building approach is, by contrast, about trying to improve government policy and planning, and is typically approached by Australia by the provision of advisers. This is where there are few successes. I do try to keep any eye out for them. The case of Australia trying to improve the procurement of drugs in PNG is an example of a repeated, and recent failure.
On the issue of booms and busts, I agree that lessons should be learnt. There is a large international literature on this, the main take-way for me is that it is extremely hard to manage a resource-dependent economy. Turning points are notoriously hard to predict; and countries tend to borrow, increase the public-service salary bill, and introduce expensive new policies at the top of the boom. Unfortunately, PNG did all of these. That is the legacy of the resource boom, and it is why, apart from the revenue fall itself, core services are now being cut, and will continue to be underfunded for years to come.
Regards, Stephen
From Garth Luke on Transferring HIV treatment to the PNG government: a good idea?
No there is no strategic advantage for Australia in discontinuing successful programs, but there may be in reducing health aid expenditure if the government hosting your refugee detention centre prefers to have infrastructure funding.
From Don Matheson on Transferring HIV treatment to the PNG government: a good idea?
Stephen,
I also would not argue that “a sustainable funding mechanism” is the only place to start. I would argue that a sustainable funding mechanism is a fundamental pre-requisite for health development in PNG, and has not been achieved to date, partly because the magnitude of the gap has not been recognised. That applies to both donors and government. Either the global community and governments are serious about the health SDG, or we accept your view that “the health sector will remain under-funded for many years.” I believe it is a little too early to write the SDG’s obituary. In PNG and globally there is the potential to do better.
Yours response to my comments on Capacity Building seem to confuse “Technical Assistance” with the broader concept of capacity building. Throughout PNG there are impressive examples of health infrastructure (hospitals, clinics etc) that have been built through Australian aid over the years, and are continuing to operate effectively. My point was not that there needs to be an influx of TA, but a sustained investment in the physical and human resources required to run a health system. For instance PNG produces only 45 doctors a year, while the population grows by over 200,000. Australian aid has put its hand up to a help address the Midwife shortage, the Pharmaceutical system failure etc. I don’t think you should be making these assertions on 6-year-old data. Time you brought your evidence base up to date, since 2010. Successes are worth identifying, though not as publicity worthy as the failures. Some of those success have been Australian Aid inspired, some led by parts of the PNG health sector. Some have even come about by MPs investing their funds in health services.
Finally, your comment about resource booms and busts and “you can’t look to the extractive industry to help solve them for you”. Could not agree more. But third parties, if they are independent of the extractive industry, should be able to assess the extent that the costs and benefits of the operation of the extractive industry weight up in favour of the country’s citizens. The industry, while it negotiates its social licence, does create the impression that it will fill government coffers for years to come. The “surprise” of the revenue crash may partly be due to the lack of financial contingency, and third party scrutiny, of what these deals were likely to deliver, when and to whom. I believe there is a need for better understanding of how this government revenue crash occurred in this resource rich country, and how a more sustainable arrangement could be built based on the bitter experience of the last two years.
From Stephen Howes on Transferring HIV treatment to the PNG government: a good idea?
Thanks for the three sets of comments. I'll only dwell on the ones I disagree with.
Don, I'll start with your last comment. I don't think that looking for a sustainable funding mechanism is the place to start. The health sector will remain under-funded for many years: it's not just the revenue collapse, it is that PNG prioritizes other expenditure more highly, especially MP funds. The aid program should be asking what it can usefully do in this difficult context.
I would welcome any examples of successful Australian government health capacity building. We reviewed the evidence in our 2010 PNG aid review. The quote from an ODE report we used then is telling: "Expenditure of $150 to $200 million on TA has not produced a step improvement in performance or capacity."
Finally, PNG is a resource dependent economy. It is going to be subject to busts and booms. These are difficult to manage, but you can't look to the extractive industry to help solve them for you. (By the way, the Kina needs to fall a lot more.)
John, for all your defence of the aid program, you yourself admit that now is not the right time to hand over responsibilities to the PNG government, given the financial crisis. Australian aid can and does change its priorities, but I would like to see effective aid. As I keep saying, in a difficult environment, when you find something that works, build on it. If the aid program has a new and better model, let them share it with the rest of us.
Garth, I can't see what strategic need is served by discontinuing successful programs, especially when discontinuation means probable failure. Failure is in no-one's interests.
I'm glad the post has generated some discussion, and look forward to more.
Stephen
From Garth Luke on Transferring HIV treatment to the PNG government: a good idea?
Stephen your article and Don's reply highlight for me the problems caused when the Australian government fails to put the on the ground needs of the poor in PNG first and instead focuses on meeting Australia's strategic needs through the aid program.
Regardless of what the Australian government would like in terms of trade, economic development and PNG governance, the reality as both of you point out is that vulnerable people continue to suffer at the present time. The Australian aid program to PNG (and many other countries) is seriously failing these people and also failing the people of Australia who, as surveys tell us, overwhelmingly believe that our aid should be helping the poor and vulnerable.
Our aid program needs greater predictability, reliability and funding, more transparency, and a committed and long-term concentration on meeting the needs of the poor. It needs less ideology, fewer fashionable ideas and less national self-interest.
From John Domyal on Transferring HIV treatment to the PNG government: a good idea?
Thanks Stephen
For putting into perspective health care funding in PNG with Australian Aid over the past years and current while some facts are:
Facts. 1. We understand PNG has poor basic health indicators, less funded by government and resulted in poor health service delivery not only to the remote sites of the country but urban clinics as well.
Facts. 2. Donor funding picked up most of the pressing health issues like HIV & TB which the government cannot adequately address quickly but needs sufficient time to strategically address.
Facts. 3. Australian has been supporting PNG health programs across a broad range of areas through; grants, direct service delivery, TA placements, through contractors, co-funding, institutional and system strengthening, etc.
Facts. 4. PNG government continuous to decrease its actual funding into the health sector than what its budget speaks annually, the free health care policy has no material impact in terms of actual funding.
Facts. 5. Australia Aid funding has specific priorities and interests in health issues of PNG rather than a general funding support to PNG and subject to changes where it sees fit
Facts. 6. Health issues in PNG is supposed to be PNG government responsibility and changes in Australian Aid is at the discretion of Australian government, it should not be seen as an integral budget component for PNG government.
The recent decision by Australian Aid to reduce and eventually re-prioritise health funding, especially to HIV response in PNG is a timely call. Maybe it’s not done at the right time when PNG is faced with financial crisis, but the timing is appropriate after many discussions was held on the future of Australian Aid to PNG and in particular the support to health sector. Many discussions were held with those NGOs affected over the last 3-2 years. The TA placement under the Aid program into PNG departments and agencies has ended last year so this change in the health funding is not a surprise to anyone in PNG and Australia.
The Australian Aid program will come up with a new model to support the PNG health sector which among others will include strategic priorities of Australia like concern for regional health security, getting value for money and success that can be replicated elsewhere with a focus on sustainability, while the level of funding remains the same, decrease or increase as long as PNG remains a strategic partner to Australia in the Pacific Region.
From fazlur on Greening the brick industry in Bangladesh: opportunities for South-South cooperation
yes time is going out very quickly to work together with India specially for producing fly ask brick which will save Bangladesh as well as will contribute significantly to India for maintaining natural environment. ultimately,
From Don Matheson on Transferring HIV treatment to the PNG government: a good idea?
Congratulations on raising the issues of health care funding in PNG. The country is facing a major crisis in healthcare funding, illustrated by the plight of NGO's providing care for people with HIV. Imagine the implications if health care funding by government in Australia were to drop 30% in one year. It would damage the entire sector, and not just a specific , though important, disease.
It is a mistake to assume that the HIV issues are more important than say maternal health, child health, or immunization,or NCDs. HIV is different as its response is largely donor funded, and it has a high political profile internationally. Many other parts of the sector are in equal if not more distress. It is a systemic problem, not one related to a specific disease or a group of NGOs.
The roots of this crisis lie in historic underfunding of the PNG health sector. For most of the last 20 years, the per capita spend on health has been less than the minimum level required to achieve global health goals such as the MDGs - which PNG unsurprisingly failed to reach, as it never had a level of resourcing and capacity that made it possible.
To suggest there is "little to show for the decades of effort and millions of dollars that the Australian aid program has invested in capacity building in PNG" is problematic. The response needs to be far more nuanced - building on success applies as much to Aid Programs as recipients. There is ample evidence of effective, and ineffective Australian health capacity building. Furthermore, Australian Government Aid has been a minority funder of health in PNG for years, the bulk of the resource comes from the PNG government. As noted above, the chronic underfunding has led to huge capacity deficits such as a shortage of 20,000 health workers). The lack of impact of capacity building efforts is because of their size as much as their effectiveness.
You have previously documented the rise and fall of both the Kina and the government revenue and how "surprised" everyone was that this had happened. There has been very little commentary on how the oil and gas revenues extracted from the country have managed to be maintained during the global low prices , targets met and exceeded, while the full impact has been borne by the PNG government with drastically reduced government revenue and its ability to spend on social services such as health and education. It would seem timely to explore how the benefits and risks of these developments have been shared between government and the extractive industry, particularly when times are tough. Your comments about aid predictability apply equally to revenue predictability in terms of its impact on the wider health sector.
Health in PNG desperately needs a sustainable funding mechanism, that gives it a chance of meeting the health SDG. That will need to be a combination of government and donor funding.
From Edith Namba on Women, the workforce, resources and violence: getting PNG companies to respond
Am so pleased to read about what you are doing in terms of dealing with gender based violence.
Am a female nurse in Western Highlands Provincial hospital as a Family support center clinical supervisor.We are also dealing with this issue and we are treating ,providing counselling and doing referral of survivors of GBV .
Every day we are receiving survivors of physical and sexual violence.Every day ,every where ,there is violence taking place whether its in a home,workplace or in town.Our female staff sometimes get sick leave and miss work because of intimate partner violence especially physical assault which affects our work roster for providing three shifts in a day.The statistics that we have at the center are the reported cases but the unreported cases we don't know. There fore ,its a big issue in the country and I agree that our Government has put a lot of effort in making laws and policies to address and reduce violence in the country.
From Stephen Howes on Backpacker exploitation: why Australia should look to the Pacific
We're not arguing against removing the requirement of registration under the SWP. I'm not sure it is sensible to say that all employers who hire backpackers should be registered. But at a minimum, labour-hire companies should all be licensed, regardless of whom they hire.
From Thomas Kevaro on UPNG-ANU academics begin health and education research
Hi Tara / Grant
I'd love to get a copy of your follow up visit (in June this year) after your data analysis later in the year is over and when you publish the research report.
I have a cousin brother who is a standards officer for the Baimuru sub-district (Primary School) and he does a wonderful job, but lacks resources to move around. Another cousin sister is a nursing officer in one of the functioning sub health centres.
Thank you,
From Farida Fleming on ‘Boundless plains to share’: the development impact of migration to Australia