Comments

It is amazing the amount of resources being pulled out of the budget to start yet another QUANGO to oversee the basic responsibility of our MPs. There will be people getting paid for working for the IDA, but will the roads and bridges etc get fixed? Why do we have to even talk about it Mr PM? Why can't you fix the problem? You and your predecessors have had the mandate to do so over the years, but what have you done except talk about what you are going to do. You wanted to fix the problem that is why you put your hand up for the PM's post. May I suggest you deploy the army to build the country if you are not going to send them to fight terror in the Middle East. As a Southern Highlander, you know about the benefits of having the engineering battalion of the Australian Defence Force stationed in Mendi to build roads and bridges etc in the province. Do that again and this time attach many of our own PNG soldiers to the foreign army to rebuild the infrastructure while learning new skills at the same time. We all know that safer roads and infrastructure are key to rural development, new markets and job opportunities and sustainability. I have travelled by coaches/buses around Asia and Australia as a tourist. I wish I could do the same in my own home country. If the Philippines and Thailand can do it, so can PNG because we have more resources than them. Prove to the people that you are a leader who puts the taxpayers money where it should be - where people need it most so that they can live sustainable lifestyles in the comforts of their own traditional heritage.

I would also just like to acknowledge that this research was undertaken with the support of MFAT, which demonstrates the effort that is already going into building the evidence base called for in the blog.

Appreciate the insights here. Rick, I do like the steps you outlined on <a href="http://globalanticorruptionblog.com/2014/09/03/how-australia-can-help-curb-corrpution-in-papua-new-guinea/" rel="nofollow">your blog</a> and I think it could be the first concrete step forward. Yes corruption is a big issue and as Grant pointed out, a holistic approach is needed from Australia but first, Australia must work on what it can really control/have the upper hand and that is the aid money and how it is used. Investing a good number of years cracking down on its trail and who is responsible for its misuse will, among other things, create expertise and assist in drafting a more elaborate approach. In the wake of the resource boom, corruption is undoubtedly here to stay. Australia need not plan grand strategy or articulate superficial approaches it cannot fully manage. Instead, it must work on small tangible strategies where it can control and effectively enforce if necessary. That said, Grant reminds us that one should be doubtful as to the extent of seriousness on the part of Australia given its current interests in the country. Australia must be prepared to make some sacrifices if the anti-corruption movement in PNG is to progress. But is Australia prepared for that?

Hi Priya Your interesting piece makes reference to the 2013 MDG Tracking Report; readers might also be interested to know that the 2014 MDG Tracking report, with updated statistics and a narrative summary, <a href="http://www.forumsec.org/resources/uploads/attachments/documents/2014_Pacific_Regional_MDGs_Tracking_Report.pdf" rel="nofollow">is now available</a> [pdf]. It provides the following update on the Leaders' Gender Equality Declaration: "Overall, the pace of progress reported on the six areas of the Declaration has been slow, although there were few positive developments over the year, particularly to address violence against women. Kiribati established a new Ministry for women, while Tonga, RMI, Nauru, Niue and Tuvalu completed national gender policies. Key challenges in progressing the Declaration at the national level is absence of accountability measures towards implementation and monitoring of the Declaration by relevant government ministries." (All Forum member countries, except FSM, Niue, PNG and Tuvalu, reported against their progress on the Pacific Leaders Gender Equality Declaration in 2014. Nauru, Palau and Vanuatu provided their recently completed Beijing+20 Reports for this purpose. Australia and New Zealand’s reports are included in Annex 2 of the Report, while the Forum Island Countries’ progress reports are included as part of the Country MDG Profiles in Annex 3). Unfortunately, this information doesn't brighten the picture much, but it does provide some more recent reference points. Cheers Seini

I couldn't agree more with the current mess of the DFAT website. To add to this, I gather that DFAT is trying to stop the aid-funded projects setting up their own websites. Up until now, even though DFAT's own website has been increasingly bad at providing information, there have been some good and informative project sites managed by the managing contractors on which reports and news updates are available. If it is true that these are now being discouraged, it is a serious concern and major step backwards for transparency in the aid program.

Thanks for the insights Rick! For those interested in viewing Rick's blog, which discusses Australia's response to corruption in PNG, go to: http://globalanticorruptionblog.com/2014/09/03/how-australia-can-help-curb-corrpution-in-papua-new-guinea/

Why aren't the people, who were responsible for the AusAid updates, still doing this work? Isn't it the same people who were in AusAid, now DFAT employees, who are responsible for feeding this information in? Is there a restructure going on by DFAT (former DFAT) employees? Why is this happening. This doesn't explain the cause?

Dear Ms Blunck - thank you for this review. I'm sorry that you were not persuaded. If you are still interested and at ANU next year, I invite you to visit my class 'Courts Justice & Development', so we can discuss - or debate - the argument further. It has importance. I'd like to try to persuade you. best, Livingston

One other point which I think is important (and which we do cover in the paper) is that, once we include a control variable for Greens support in the regressions (both for support for ODA and donations), the negative association between religion and these types of support for aid disappears (it doesn't become positive but ceases to be different from zero in a statistical sense). To my mind this suggests that it is perhaps not religiosity per se that is negatively associated with support for ODA but rather a particular conservative type of religious belief, which is also strongly negatively associated with Green party support (quite a strong conservatism it should be noted, strong enough to not be positively associated with Coalition support on first preferences). At least that's my thinking thus far, although I'd like to do some more work in this area.

Jo Spratt, thanks a lot for your insightful comments. Today, undernutrition and overnutrition (overweight and obesity) increasingly coexist, especially in emerging economies. In fact, evidence shows that there is a higher risk of adult obesity when undernutrition is present in childhood. While these two phenomena are different, some of the underlying causes are linked. Rapid urbanization and dietary changes towards meat products, for example, can put pressure on food systems (demand more water, land and energy) thereby adding to the burden of undernutrition (higher prices of nutritious foods like fruits and vegetables). These global trends can also lead to overweight and obesity and subsequently to non-communicable diseases such as hypertension, which takes competing public resources away from addressing undernutrition challenges. Solutions for these types of complexly-intertwined challenges that we face today certainly need to be guided by a multi-sectoral framework that aims to achieve multiple goals.

Stephen, thanks so much for your feedback. Obesity is a growing global concern, shared by developed and developing countries. A recent Lancet article reports that obesity is not just increasing, but there have been no national success stories in tackling obesity in the last 33 years. Also, the Copenhagen Consensus Center recently noted that projections on the elimination of overweight and obesity are uncertain due to sparse evidence on the implementation and effectiveness of interventions to address these growing challenges. It is certainly a complex issue that requires urgent attention and more effort. To solve the obesity problem, education and information campaigns are important, but labeling and proper regulation of the fast-food industry in both developed and emerging middle-income countries are also critical. Re-prioritizing investments and rethinking policies (as I mentioned in my response to Michael Wulfsohn) will also help address the obesity issue.

Michael, thanks very much for your comment. One way to re-prioritize investments to end hunger and malnutrition is for governments to reduce subsidies on the production of staple grains (as well as water, electricity, and fertilizers). Those savings could then support the production of more nutrient-dense crops, including fruits and vegetables, via investments in R&D, improving the marketing chains of these more perishable crops. But increased investment is not the only answer. It is equally important to change policies. For example, it is essential to re-shape the agriculture sector for improved nutrition and health, but that can only occur if ministries of agriculture are made responsible for nutrition outcomes.