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Stop press! After eighteen more months the 'nothing' link above - http://www.oktedi.com/reports - still points to nothing, as do the 'Community' and 'Sustainability' links on the web site's reports menu. The 2009 Annual Environmental Report (19 Sep 2009) mentioned by Matt Morris is still the most recent - 2010 anyone? 'Global reporting' and 'GRI' return no hits from the web site, despite Nigels Parker's commitment to start doing GRI reporting aired on EM TV's ResourcePNG, broadcast 28 June 2012 (further comments under https://devpolicy.org/papua-new-guinea-sustainable-development-program-how-is-it-performing/).

Thanks SF!

Thank you for this moderate and well-reasoned article. You moved me outside my left-leaning anti-ex-pat position. Points noted. Good luck with it all.

Global warming is a big threat to human beings. Sometimes to distribute the funds to the people in need is more complex than to acquire the finance.

Further clarification...the SWF legislation was already in its advanced stages with plenty of consulation with Australian treasury before Mekere became Minister; the Lae Port redevelopment also was in its advanced stages; the new fibre optic project (negotiated by the previous IPBC and SOE Ministerial regime) - already in its advanced stages; the draft legislation regarding a infrastructure fund - that too was already in advanced form before Mekere became Minister! We are yet to see any new development programmes initiated by the current IPBC regime which they can claim as their own initiative!

Thanks Terrence for the excellent posts on this topic. As you say, I think we agree far more than we disagree. And where we do disagree, you go far further than merely attributing behaviors in Solomon Islands to “culture”, as if it were some ubiquitous, exogenous, and primordial force. You treat behavior as if it is something that is amenable to analysis, with an important role to be played by rational choice models. So I am happy. I don’t think I have all of the answers. But I know that we need serious analysis (like yours) to find them, rather than outsiders blaming problems of economic development and political governance purely on the ill-defined “culture” of locals. I also agree, though, about where we disagree most – the importance of development partners making greater use of Government systems. I don’t believe that we can expect Government accountability to emerge unless Government can reasonably be held responsible for more of what impacts on Solomon Islanders’ lives. Why would you care about national-level politics when the school has a Taiwan sign on it, and the clinic has an AusAID sign on it, and there are no local roads or public infrastructure, and there are no local businesses operating within formal regulatory or legislative frameworks, and the police visit every three weeks but leave just about everything to village-level dispute resolution systems? Legislation, regulation, policy and Government service delivery do not appear as large parts of your life. Would more budget support change this? I think donors making better use of Government systems and delivering aid through Government agencies and in alignment with Government policy programs would certainly help. It would allow an expansion in the reach of Government services. It would switch some accountability for service delivery and private sector development towards Ministers and away from foreign donors. It would, if provided through appropriate SWAPs or sector budget support, reduce the amount of funding available for the development budget pork-barrel. It would also move the emphasis of donor dialogue, which I believe can be an important motivator for change, away from fragmented projects and implementation issues, towards broader issues of policy. 40% of public expenditure in Solomon Islands is from donors. Most of this money goes straight into project implementation, without hitting the sides of Government systems. Often, Government doesn’t even know what donors are doing or how much has been spent because of the complete inadequacy of reporting systems. Two hundred projects, some of which have marginal linkages to any Government development strategies but are – of course – covered by a National Development Plan that includes everything you can think of. Funds channeled through these projects are anything but “out of the arena of political contestation”. As in most countries, the development budget is a far more active arena of political contestation than the recurrent budget, which is largely absorbed by payroll expenses, inflation adjustments, and rolling over of nationally implemented programs. The recurrent budget provides for far fewer of the short-term, geographically targeted infrastructure, “private sector development”, and community programs that populate the development budget – perfect bite-sized morsels for engaging in clientelist politics. Use of Government systems is widely seen as desirable for many reasons and it is something that donors have already signed up to at Paris, Accra, and Cairns. To me, one of the most important of these is the impact on political governance. Increasing the resources to support recurrent programs will make what central Government does more noticeable. Reducing money through projects will reduce some of the scope for clientelism. A fair amount has been written about the importance of using Government systems for these reasons, especially in fragile contexts (examples here: http://go.worldbank.org/QLKJWJB8X0 and http://scholarworks.umass.edu/econ_workingpaper/42/). Some resources perhaps wouldn’t be used very well. But that’s part of the process and bad spending happens everywhere. Even (don’t tell anyone) under donor projects. But at least if Government is plainly in control of the spending (and under the right constitutional/electoral arrangements) there is some chance the Government or minister responsible will be held accountable for that at the next election. Other than some quibbles, this is the only area where I think we are actually at odds. Look forward to your next post. Tobias

My elder brother broke cartiledge on my neck because he wanted to log our tribal land and I did not agree in a fight. Stop all banking transactions. Logging in Solomon Islands is worse than the ethnic tension.

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Hi Colin, Very interesting piece. I think it also boils down to Landowners' lack of knowledge of their legal rights when signing the lease agreements. Would be really interesting to see the results of the CoI. I'd also like to request a copy of the PNG National Gazette dated July 27 2012- please send this to me as I am interested to know which land areas in Oro Province have been granted SABLs recently. Thanks, Stella Wewak

Very well written.

Dear John, Nate and Aran, Completely and utterly agree with your idea. But I wonder - might this idea even be elevated to a joint, regional unit supported by willing partners in the Asia-Pacific, rather than being housed completely within AusAID? Or is the political landscape in AusAID / DFAT such that 'baby-steps first' approach is warranted before launching into a regional initiative, if only to develop some real and dedicated international/intranational conflict mediation capacity first? I wonder if a parallel or alternative approach could be to develop a civil society 'mediation support' network, comprised of academics and mediation practitioners? Something to build up the capacity whilst AusAID / DFAT are convinced of it's utility, that could be folded into any unit they (hopefully) might create? Just food for thought. Best, Michael Cornish PS. For those having trouble with the link for the "Framework for working in fragile and conflict-affected states: Guidance for Staff", it is missing the colon, and so should be: http://www.ausaid.gov.au/Publications/Documents/aid-fragile-conflict-affected-states-staff-guidance.pdf PPS. Nate, no doubt you have considered this lead already, but Prof. Damien Kingsbury at Deakin University would be a brilliant person to speak to re: your thesis - he was intimately involved in the mediations from the GAM side.

International panels are close relatives of the Australian parliamentary committee and generally about as impactful. Then of course we have the global leader's statement from the G8/G20/General Assembly etc. This usually starts with something like: "We are united in", "We support","We welcome", "We look forward to"; but rarely "We will" or "We commit to" - especially if any significant action or amount of money is involved.