Nov 12 2014

Bougainville Development News: Arrival of MV Chebu sees Bougainvilleans united to embrace development in region

“Our unity is what makes us strong and this same spirit can makes us realize our aspirations and reach our ultimate destination, So I believe that if we can work together and address the issue of self-determination in the same manner we will achieve that which we so crave,”

President Momis speaking at the welcome about the importance of ventures like MV Chebu to the people on Bougainville

Buka Town came to a standstill as the people of the Autonomous Region of Bougainville gave the MV Chebu a rousing welcome amidst much fanfare and celebration as the vessel steamed into Buka Wharf on Tuesday.

Story by Anthony Kaybing/photograph’s were taken by Simon Jaintong

Bougainvilleans braved the sweltering heat of the humid day which eventually turned into a tumultuous storm to bear witness to a historic event, the arrival of a vessel suitably defined to cater for their maritime needs.

It was also a an emotionally charged affair for those who remembered the ill-fated Rabual Queen which sank off the Morobean Coast on the 2^nd of February 2012 and resulted in the loss of over two hundred Bougainvillean lives along with many Papua New Guineans.

But the many who flocked to the wharf to welcome MV Chebu into Bougainville shores shared a feeling of hope and optimism to see the evidence of Bougainville’s rise from the ashes and its journey into progress and development after suffering from the bloodiest conflict in the South Pacific second only to World War II.

It was a time when Bougainvilleans with a mutual feeling of heartiness and pride took ownership of a new development and feverishly swarmed into the wharf to take a look at the new vessel.

On hand to welcome the MV Chebu’s maiden voyage into Bougainville were leaders from the Autonomous Bougainville Government including President Chief Dr John Momis and several of the members and ministers of the Bougainville House of Representatives and senior bureaucrats with chiefs from the clans in the North Bougainville area.

Local PNG businessman and philanthropist Sir Henry Chow who is involved with the ABG in the joint venture that has seen the formation of the Chebu Shipping Company, was also present to witness the event.

Sir Henry and his son Fabian were initiated into Nakas and Amara clans respectively as chieftains of these clans as a sign of respect and gratitude by the people of Bougainville.

An emotional Sir Henry said he was happy and proud to see the support Bougainvilleans have shown in welcoming MV Chebu into Bougainville and him and his son the honor to being initiated as chiefs.

“Bougainville has always been a significant place in my family’s history, and I am certainly not new to place,” said the knight.

The Chow family has had a long history with Bougainville spanning three quarters of a century with members of Sir Henry’s family owning property and businesses in Bougainville.

Just prior to the Bougainville Crises the Chow Family had numerous vessels operating in Bougainville, losing one as a result of the conflict.

Despite the losses suffered by the Chow Family during the Crises they continued to help in whatever way they could over the years.

Their help would continue on till the ill-fated Rabaul Queen disaster that cost more than 300 hundred lives, most of whom were students travelling back to their respective schools to begin the academic year.

Sir Henry said the idea to enter into a joint venture with the ABG and the Chow Family business arm Hakau Investments came about after the Rabaul Queen disaster in early 2012 when ABG President Chief Dr John Momis discussed the need for safe and efficient vessels to provide for the people along the New Guinea Islands maritime route.

During the disaster Sir Henry Chow was the first respondent to help the ABG organize food, shelter as well as providing funds for the survivors.

It was also during the disaster that initial discussions over the joint venture started and blossomed over the next three years and saw the creation of the Chebu Shipping Company which will now manage the joint venture between the ABG and Hakau Investment.

Over the next three years the vessel’s design was done be according to specifications that would meet the maritime needs of the New Guinea Islands and for two years MV Chebu was being constructed at the Shunhai Ship Building Company Shipyard in China.

The vessel has been christened MV Chebu in homage to the iconic Chebu stone near Sohano Island and old folklore suggest it was responsible for creating the Buka Passage.

ABG President Chief Dr John Momis Paid tribute to those who worked hard to seeing the joint venture a reality and he especially thanked the Chow Family for their willingness to invest in Bougainville.

Dr Momis also expressed his happiness in seeing Bougainvilleans united to embrace development in the region

“Our unity is what makes us strong and this same spirit can makes us realize our aspirations and reach our ultimate destination,” the President said.

“So I believe that if we can work together and address the issue of self-determination in the same manner we will achieve that which we so crave,” he said.

“Self-determination is rejecting, corruption, self-determination is rejecting violence and the negative aspects of life that cause disunity and instability,” President Momis.

The President’s remarks urged Bougainvilleans to use their intellect and will to work in union to enable Bougainville to realize its political self-determination.

The President expressed his gratitude to the Chow family for their endeavoring efforts in seeing the vessel through its completion a month and for having the faith to reinvest in Bougainville after the Bougainville Crises.

MV Chebu left Bougainville on its first commercial run taking Team Bougainville athletes to Lae for the PNG Games on Wednesday 12^th November 2014.

The vessel has a total capacity of 370 passengers that includes 22 passengers, a top speed of 12 knots and a gross tonnage of 1152 tonnes.

Nov 11 2014

Bougainville Tourism News : Does Bougainville have a 5 year tourism plan ?

Above: Bougainville’s tourism future ( 2015-2019 ) was recently represented for the first time at an International Tourism Expo in Port Moresby (September 2014) by Zhon Bosco from Bougainville Experience Tours (website ) and his international support team Colin Cowell, Simon Pentanu and James Tanis.

But does Bougainville have a plan to take advantage of the South Pacific tourism opportunities that may occur over the next 5 years ?

In this report from Radio New Zealand opportunities are explored that will effect Bougainville ?

The South Pacific Tourism Organisation is seeking donor and development partnerships to help it implement a five year regional tourism strategy.

Download the strategy and more information

The plan which was approved at the Pacific Tourism Ministers Council meeting last week in Nuku’alofa aims to guide the promotion and development of the industry in the 16 member countries of the SPTO.

Its Chief Executive, Ilisoni Vuidreketi, spoke with Koroi Hawkins about the contents of the new strategy.

ILISONI VUIDREKETI: We are looking at how we can improve air access and route development, another issue is the cruise ship sector development and we are looking at also, how we can strengthen our marketing program to create more of that Pacific Island visibility in the long haul markets. The other areas that we have looked at is investment in Tourism and product development, research and statistics and of course sustainable tourism planning.

KOROI HAWKINS: In terms of the Cruise Shipping in the Pacific, why is this emerging now? What are the trends that we are seeing?

IV: Yea, we are seeing at the global level, the number of ships that are coming out of the docks, new ships, new cruise vessels, its increasing every year and the ships are getting bigger and bigger. We have cruise liners coming into the Pacific that carry up to 2,000 passengers or 500, 300 for the smaller vessels. No we are looking at ships that are having capacity of up to 4,000 passengers. Now that is certainly something that we cannot accommodate here in the Pacific. But we are looking at the redeployment of the middle sized ships to the other parts of the world and also the trend that we have seen for cruise liners to be looking for new destinations.

Cruise ship of Pok Pok Island recently

KH: In terms of funding the Pacific Tourism Strategy, where is the money coming from and how much is it?

IV: Sorry I don’t have that figure right now with me. But the programme sets out it is very clear we will certainly be needing the support of development partners. And so the funding that we are looking for is firstly from the contribution of our member governments, which is quite limited when we come to think about this, this big plans for the Pacific. So we are looking at other development partners. That is why we spoke with New Zealand as one of the best options. Also we will be looking at other countries like, perhaps Australia, China and others who may want to be part of this. We are also looking at other donor agencies like the European Union to also pitch in. So it is a collective effort with those, key stakeholders that we have identified.

Nov 10 2014

Bougainville News: “Large-scale Mining and Risks of Conflict Recurrence ” new research

Abstract Research on conflict resolution suggests that the significant risk of conflict recurrence in intra-state conflicts is much reduced by political settlements that ‘resolve the issues at stake’ between parties to the conflict, and that in conflicts involving grievances about distribution of natural resource revenues, such settlements should include natural resource wealth-sharing arrangements.

DOWNLOAD: Bougainville :Large-scale Mining and Risks of Conflict Recurrence here ANU Regan Bougainville Research

Author: Anthony J. Regan (see Bio Below)

This article shows that the Bougainville conflict origins involved far more complexity than natural resource revenue distribution grievances, and that the conflict itself then generated new sources of division and conflict, the same being true of both the peace process and the process to implement the Bougainville Peace Agreement (BPA).

As a result, the BPA addresses many more issues than natural resource-related grievances. Such considerations make it difficult to attribute lack of conflict recurrence to particular factors in the BPA.

While the BPA provisions on wealth-sharing address relations between the Papua New Guinea National Government and Bougainville, moves by the Autonomous Bougainville Government to explore possible resumption of large-scale mining has generated a new political economy in Bougainville, contributing to new tensions amongst Bougainvilleans.

Research Conclusion

On the basis of this case study of Bougainville, I conclude that natural resource distribution issues were a significant factor, amongst many others, in the origins of the conflict. In addition, it was a factor that aggravated many other factors.

Moreover, many other divisions, sources of conflict and actual conflicts developed as a consequence of the dynamics of not only the conflict itself, but also of the peace process, and the process of implementing the BPA. Indeed, the tensions developing over mining related issues since 2005 are emerging as part of the dynamics generated by implementing the BPA.

These are largely tensions internal to Bougainville. As a result, there is limited utility in the natural resource revenue distribution arrangements in the BPA, developed mainly to respond to the contribution of natural resource distribution issues to conflict between Bougainville and PNG. On the other hand, natural resource distributions certainly were a significant source of conflict both between PNG and Bougainville, and amongst Bougainvilleans.

It was entirely reasonable for those negotiating for the BPA to include provisions intended to respond to the issues that had divided PNG and Bougainville in the 1980s, by giving the ABG power to determine mining policy and law for Bougainville, and to receive the major part of mining revenues. But it was too difficult for them to tailor arrangements in 2001 that could realistically respond to natural resource distribution issues that had divided Bougainvilleans in the 1980s (mainly issues related to the inequitable distribution of the limited natural resources revenues then available to Bougainvilleans).

In giving effect to its new right to make mining policy and law, the ABG has inadvertently helped generate a new political economy in Bougainville, where new outside interests in alliances with significant Bougainvillean interests, are engaging in a struggle for a significant degree of control over resource revenues and mining powers. These developments have ensured that the main divisive issues relating to natural resource distribution are no longer between PNG and Bougainville, but are instead between Bougainvilleans (as even the outside interests have no leverage without Bougainville partners).

The Bougainvillean negotiators for BPA did not include provision on dealing with such new sources of internal Bougainville tensions related to natural resource distribution, not only because they were not anticipated, but also because it would have been virtually impossible to do that at the time.

Rather, their key assumption was that by establishing a strong and legitimate autonomous government, thereby empowering “Bougainvilleans to solve their own problems, manage their own affairs and realize their own aspirations”, and with “sufficient personnel and financial resources … to exercise its powers and functions effectively”,41 there would be a Bougainville government body capable of developing policy broadly acceptable to all interests, and of dealing with disputes between Bougainville interests when they do arise.

But at present, the ABG still has limited capacity, and developing appropriate mining policy and law takes time and resources, and implementing it effectively takes more. Some of those attacking the ABG have strong interests in the ABG remaining weak. Their increasingly strident attacks on the ABG are being made for the clear purpose of getting control of revenue and power.

There is a real political and economic struggle taking place, and the eventual outcomes are as yet far from clear. One irony here is that the ABG is seeking mining revenue in order to build the capacity needed to achieve either real autonomy or independence, when there are now risks of serious tensions and disunity that could undermine Bougainville’s prospects for achieving either goal. There are particular risks here given the ongoing presence of armed factions in Bougainville. In these circumstances, there is an urgent need for the international community and the activist community to recognise where the real tensions and dangers of conflict lie.

Whilst the current tensions concerning natural resource distribution are mainly within Bougainville, there are still possible sources of dispute between PNG and Bougainville. One concerns possible difficulties in negotiating distribution of mining and other tax revenues additional to the recurrent grant should any future large-scale mining project result in those revenues being sustainably higher than the amount of the grant. In relation to issues about the Panguna mine’s future, tensions could arise over various issues if in fact BCL were to be permitted to return, including over any move by PNG to expropriate Rio Tinto’s majority equity in BCL, and over any difference that might occur over the ABG’s entitlement to have the PNG 19.3 per cent equity transferred.

Turning, finally, to the risk of conflict recurrence in Bougainville, we can clearly set to one side the BPA provisions on mining. The real questions now concern whether a strong and legitimate ABG can emerge that can manage the many sources of tension and conflict inherent in the circumstances of post-conflict Bougainville, including those internal tensions concerning mining.

The difficulties for the ABG in managing such tensions are not small. They include, in particular, the situation of marginalised youth, as we have seen, in so many ways so similar to the situation in Bougainville in the late 1980s. The history of the conflict from 1988 demonstrates that sources of anger in such a significant marginalised group can be unleashed in unexpected ways, especially where contributed to, or aggravated, by natural resource distribution issues. Discussing two natural resource related insurgencies in Nigeria, political geographer Michael J. Watts said:

The energies unleashed among a generation of marginalized youth is astonishing; the reservoirs of anger is [sic] now very deep having been filled by the waters of resentment over many decades. That the resentments can and have been channelled into all manner of claims, aspirations and practices (complex mixtures of greed and grievance) the borders among which are labile and porous should surprise nobody.

If the struggle over control of mining in Bougainville continues, without the ABG’s authority being accepted, the outcomes will be unpredictable. All points of tension and conflict involved in or arising from this struggle are likely to be intensified by the approach of first, the ABG general election, and second the referendum on independence, and by the intersections between the political and economic struggles associated with those processes, on the one hand, with the struggles over mining.

About the Author Anthony Regan is a constitutional lawyer who specialises in constitutional development as part of conflict resolution. He has worked as a lawyer, policy adviser and researcher in Papua New Guinea for over thirty years, and is currently a Fellow with the State, Society and Melanesia program at the Australian National University. Formerly an adviser to Bougainville parties during the Bougainville peace process, Anthony is now an adviser to the Autonomous Government of Bougainville. anthony.regan@anu.edu.au

Nov 9 2014

Bougainville Cultural Tourism News: Buin’s Tuiruma cultural festival ends on a high

By Aloysius Laukai

Additional photos Bougainville Travel

The first ever three-days TUIRUMA FESTIVAL ENDS IN HIGH NOTEthat was held last week in Buin ended in high note with participants and the public wanting a permanent date set to attract more local and overseas tourists to visit the show in future.

The show was officially closed by the ABG member for BABA, WILLIAM SILAMAI who called on all participants and the people of Buin to maintain the good example they set during the festival to show unity of all Bougainvilleans.

MR. SILAMAI said that the smiles in all the participants faces only indicate one thing that is all were happy to be part of the three- days show.

MR. SILAMAI said that as declared by the co sponsor and member for South Bougainville, STEVEN KAMMA PIRIKA to rotate the venue they would prepare for the next show to be held in Siwai in 2015 and BANA in 2016.

The Show has 44 cultural groups, Arts, Crafts and carvers who were also excited to be part of the first TUIRUMA Festival.

In his opening remarks the ABG President, Chief DR. JOHN MOMIS said that cultural festivals is one sure way of uniting the people of Bougainville and his government will continue to support them in the future.

The Member for South Bougainville, STEVEN KAMMA PIRIKA also pledged ONE MILLION KINA in the next five years.

The Regional member for Bougainville, JOE LERA also contributed funds towards the staging of the TUIRUMA Festival and said that he was also committed to fund the Tuiruma festival and other festivals throughout the region.

Meanwhile, New Dawn FM managed to talked to several people regarding the three-days Tuiruma festival.

Police Commander for South Bougainville, Commander JOHN POPUI praised the people for maintaining peace throughout the festival.

He told New Dawn FM in Buin that 46 police personnel were engaged to look after the festival with the support of the South Bougainville Veterans Association.

One church worker said that the festival made it possible for their group to meet many people and a Businessman said that he had made extra monies during the festival.

For International visitors you can book your 2015 Bougainville Festival Tour here

Nov 5 2014

Bougainville News: Six tonnes of unexploded munitions cleared from a World War II Bougainville battle site

Australian soldiers have cleared more than six tonnes of unexploded hand grenades and mortars from a World War II battle site on the island of Bougainville, east of Papua New Guinea.

Watch the Australian Department of Defence VIDEO Here

The huge haul of munitions came in just the first week of Operation Render Safe 2014.

Report from Liam Cochrane ABC network Australia

Photo from the Australian High Commission PNG

The Australian-led international mission is clearing potentially deadly munitions from the villages and food gardens around Torokina, on the west coast of Bougainville.

The Australian Army said the sheer amount of rusty old munitions surprised even seasoned explosive ordnance disposal (EOD) experts.

“They are mostly two-inch-high explosive mortars and hand grenades, in varying conditions, left in place after the war,” EOD operator Warrant Officer Class Two David Austin said.

An Allied air base was built at Torokina by the US in 1943 and was the launching place for Australian ground attacks against the Japanese in 1944-1945.

More than 500 Australians died and 1,500 were injured in the Bougainville campaign.

Seventy years later, the Australian army has returned to clean up the deadly remnants of war.

More than 500 Australian military personnel are involved in Operation Render Safe 2014, with support from HMAS Choules, an MRH90 helicopter, landing craft and amphibious vehicles.

With little infrastructure at Torokina, soldiers have landed vehicles on the beach and trekked into the jungle to look for unexploded ordinance.

Despite five months of awareness-building activities, there were criticisms of the munitions clearance by some former combatants in the more recent conflict on Bougainville.

Australia’s role on Bougainville is still a sensitive issue due to the civil war in the 1990s, sparked by disputes over the Panguna mine, operated by Rio Tinto subsidiary Bougainville Copper Limited.

“Former combatants have said that this operation is a breach of the Bougainville Peace Agreement, but I had explained to them that the operation… enhances the peace that the people of Torokina want,” said Patrick Nisira, vice-president of the autonomous government of Bougainville.

Local police help soldiers locate storage pits

Australian army personnel said the reception on the ground had been friendly.

“The people of Bougainville have been most welcoming and we have been working very closely with them to identify explosive remnants of war which pose a threat to local communities,” operation commander Captain Jay Bannister said.

Members of the Bougainville Police Service and locals have helped soldiers locate the munitions storage pits, with assistance from explosives experts from the US, UK, Canada, News Zealand and Solomon Islands.

“As well as helping the community, this is a great training opportunity for the younger EOD guys,” Mr Austin said.

“For the past 10 years we have been focused on the Middle East region but this gets us back to the grass roots fundamentals of our job.”

The mortars and hand grenades were stacked in pits and destroyed by a controlled blast.

Operation Render Safe 2014 will end on 8 November.

Previous Operation Render Safe missions have removed unexploded ordnance from Solomon Islands and Rabaul in Papua New Guinea.

Nov 5 2014

Bougainville Shipping News: MV Chebu has entered PNG waters bound for Buka

THE long awaited and much talked about MV Cebu, the Bougainville flag carrier, will soon be berthing at the Buka wharf

Latest update on status of MV Chebu it has entered PNG waters ahead of time:

Arrival date Simpsons Harbour, Rabaul. ENB is 6 November 2014.
7-10 Nov 2014 Customs formalities;
11 Nov 2014 set sail for Buka for launching;
13 Nov 2014 departs for Lae with Team Bougainville Cintingent to the PNG Games.

MV Cebu is also funded under the Special intervention Fund (SIF) and will be serving mainly the Atolls of the Autonomous Region of Bougainville.

Chief Secretary ABG briefed the MV Chebu crew in Port Moresby before their travel to Shanghai to take delivery of the AROB flagship.

It is a major project the government has aimed at getting out of the way and it has now truly happened.

Atolls spokesman and Chairman of the Nuguria Council of Elders Teika Posiri praised the government and officers involved for their hard work.

“We can now breathe a sigh of relief from all our suffering and from the long wait after MV Sankamap 2 decommissioned itself,’’ he said.

“On behalf of the people of the Atolls I would like to convey my sincere thanks to the Autonomous Bougainville Government and its administration for their hard work and for listening to our cries from long ago.”

More particularly Chief Secretary Chris Siriosi who is working so hard and who just farewelled the crew in Port Moresby.

“My appeal now is that the management has to be up to standard and we must manage this vessel professionally and transparently. The same that happened to Sankamap 1 and 2 mustn’t happen to this one,’’ he said.

– See more at: http://www.pngloop.com/2014/10/29/bougainville-awaits-newest-flagship-mv-cebu/#sthash.ZZQ5Qtqt.dpuf November entered PNG waters

Nov 3 2014

Bougainville Media News: Bougainville’s first mobile community radio station launched

By Aloysius Laukai

The Autonomous Bougainville Government’s Bureau of Media and Communications has bought a Suitcase radio that will be used to carry out awareness throughout Bougainville.
This is despite the ABG signing an MOU for a 60/40 Content agreement with the National Broadcasting Corporation at the beginning of this year to carry out awareness on the NBC Bougainville network.…

Following this MOU a support grant of FOUR MILLION KINA was pledged to support NBC Buka to reach the entire region.

The FM radio similar to the one used by the Bougainville Revolutionary Army, Radio Free Bougainville during the height of the Bougainville conflict will be moved from locations to locations to carry their awareness program.

According to reports gathered by New Dawn FM this is funded with TWO MILLION KINA by Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (AUSAID) (DFAT).
The new radio CALLED “Radio PLES LAIN” will be launched at the BEL ISI PARK on November 6 and 7th, 2014.
They have been testing their signals in Buka on 98.6 Megahertz on the FM BAND.

Meanwhile New Dawn FM a local radio operating from Buka since 2008 has signed a grant deed agreement with the Australian Broadcasting Corporation to Produce, screen and distribute six awareness videos in Tok Pidgin language to raise awareness about missing persons, war widows, government corruption and the three pillars of the Bougainville Peace Agreement

Nov 2 2014

Bougainville News : A lost decade? Service delivery and reforms in Papua New Guinea

“The positive results revealed by the survey not only show that progress in service delivery is possible in Papua New Guinea, but also show how progress can be made. A large chunk of the report is devoted to understanding the impact (or lack of impact) of recent reforms, such as free health and education, and the reasons for the differences and trends that we observe.”

The full report, a summary, and a two-page overview are available here.

A report based on two surveys ten years apart and two years of analysis has been by a team of researchers from the National Research Institute (NRI) and The Australian National University (ANU).

In 2002, the Papua New Guinea National Research Institute (NRI), in collaboration with the World Bank, surveyed some 330 primary schools and health clinics across the country, from the national capital to the most remote districts. In 2012, NRI, this time in collaboration with the Development Policy Centre at ANU, went back to many of the same primary schools and health clinics in the same eight provinces, this time surveying a total of about 360 facilities.

The end-product is a data set of unprecedented detail and depth in relation to service delivery in PNG. Indeed, very few countries around the world can boast of a panel survey of facilities of this type which enables comparisons to be made over time.

The NRI-ANU research team has spent the last two years analysing the data sets, and today released their results at the report launch at the NRI campus in Port Moresby.

The report, A lost decade? Service delivery and reforms in Papua New Guinea, shows that PNG’s primary schools have expanded rapidly over the last decade, but that fewer services are now provided by its health clinics.

Since the difficulties of service delivery in PNG are already well-known, what is perhaps more interesting are the areas of progress shown in the report. There were 89 per cent more children enrolled in the average PNG primary school in 2012 compared to 2001. Whereas there used to be one girl at primary school for every two boys, now there is almost one girl for every boy. The number of teachers has grown by a third over the decade, and the share of female teachers has grown from a quarter to a half. The number of ghost teachers (teachers claiming pay but not actually working) has fallen dramatically. The average school has more and better classrooms, teacher houses and textbooks. More have drinking water and electricity.

Of course, PNG’s primary schools and – to a much greater extent – health clinics still face many challenges. A third of classrooms require rebuilding: the same share as in 2002. Class sizes have increased a lot, and there are broader concerns about the quality of education on offer. Though the number of children in school has certainly increased, absenteeism has risen.

Nevertheless, the positive results revealed by the survey not only show that progress in service delivery is possible in Papua New Guinea, but also show how progress can be made. A large chunk of the report is devoted to understanding the impact (or lack of impact) of recent reforms, such as free health and education, and the reasons for the differences and trends that we observe.

Getting finances to the service delivery front-line stands out as critical. A lot more funds are reaching schools today than health clinics. About 40 per cent of health clinics receive no external support at all (in cash or in kind), whereas nearly all schools receive the twice-yearly subsidy payments. And schools receive more than twice as much funding than they did ten years ago, even after inflation. What they have lost in school fees they have more than made up for through generous government support.

Local governance and supervision also matter. Schools have mature and increasingly powerful Boards of Management which provide local oversight. They receive community support through P&C Committees. And most schools are inspected.

Resolving workforce issues is also key. The Education Department has been able to hire new teachers, whereas many retired health workers continue in place since there is no-one to replace them. Significantly, about half the health workers we interviewed felt they were not being paid at the correct grade. That was true of teachers ten years ago, but now it is only 10 per cent. Again, progress is possible.

In summary, getting funding to the front line, providing community and administrative oversight, and sorting out human resource problems seems to be the secret for the success of PNG’s primary schools. It is a recipe that could be applied more to primary health care, perhaps starting at the bigger district-level facilities.

Regular monitoring of basic data across PNG is critical for understanding what is working, what isn’t working, and why. Without it, we will be in the dark about service delivery. We look forward to the discussion that we hope our report will generate. In our next phase of research, we’ll be going back into the field to undertake more detailed case studies to better understand the conditions required for service delivery success. And perhaps in another five years or so we’ll be able to further develop this unique data set by undertaking another nationwide facility survey.

Professor Stephen Howes is Director of the Development Policy Centre. Andrew Anton Mako was a Research Fellow at NRI for most of the duration of this project. Dr Grant Walton and Dr Anthony Swan are Research Fellows at the Development Policy Centre. Dr Thomas Webster is the Director of the National Research Institute. Colin Wiltshire is the Project Manager for the PEPE project at the Development Policy Centre.

The NRI-ANU PNG Promoting Effective Public Expenditure (PEPE) project aims to understand how Papua New Guinea allocates its public funds and how these funds are provided to and used by those responsible for delivering basic services. PEPE is supported by the Australian aid program through the Economic and Public Sector Program (EPSP).

The full report, a summary, and a two-page overview are available here.

Our previous blog posts on PEPE research are collected here.

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Monthly Archives: November 2014