Embracing The Expat

Samantha Magick

I met an old friend at a Pacific Islands function in Australia recently who told me that in the course of the day he had been called a "traitor" by compatriots more than a couple of times. His crime? To move with his family to Australia.

While those who called him "traitor" did so in jest, it does indicate I think some latent feeling about how Pacific Islanders who leave home are perceived and how fraught and complex those feelings can be. I should declare my interests before continuing. I am sitting at a desk in Sydney. The view out of my window is more gum tree than palm tree.

In those countries where more than half the population lives abroad, the issue of perception is not as important as the reality of their economic contribution. Expatriate Pacific Islanders are the mainstay of many island economies through the remittances they send home. Take that contribution away, and a number of the smaller economies would have significant holes in revenue to fill.

It somewhat undermines the argument that Pacific Islanders are slow to respond to globalization, if mobile labor markets are, as they say, a hallmark of that economic order. Tell that to the many Samoan and Tongan nurses, Fijian soldiers and caregivers and Kiribati fishermen working away from home.

In many respects, the main impediment to this form of "globalization in action" is the immigration policies of countries like Australia. What has happened to the recommendation of the Australian Senate committee into relations with the Pacific that Australia open up its labor market to seasonal workers? In all the recent funding and "good governance" initiatives recently announced between Pacific states and Australia, this important recommendation hasn't rated much of a mention, apart from the Pacific Island leaders still lobbying hard for it.

Of course, Pacific Island citizens who do stay at home, particularly during times of great difficulty such as political coups or civil disturbance (whether through choice or necessity), should be recognized. Ric Hou of the Solomon Islands Reserve Bank was quick to do this recently, as Mary Louise O'Callaghan reported in Pacific Magazine's August issue, when he "praised…ordinary Solomon Islanders who have stuck it out during the worst of the downturn precipitated by the coup of 2000."

But there is also room for opportunity for those who leave, whether temporarily or permanently. There are reams and reams of studies and research about the importance and sustainability of remittances to Pacific Island nations. Some of them suggest that investment and economics, as much as altruism, motivates those who regularly send money home.

In late September, businesspeople from all over the U.S. were scheduled to attend the U.S. Department of Interior's Business Opportunities Conference to hear about investment opportunities in Guam, CNMI, American Samoa, Palau, Marshall Islands, and the Federated States of Micronesia (and the Virgin Islands). The conference is sensibly aimed squarely at foreign (i.e. U.S.) investors.

But what could be done to induce expat islanders from these states and their counterparts from the South Pacific, to further invest their money and skills at "home?" Perhaps it is time to revisit specific inducements for these communities such as tax incentives and even dual citizenship, to think of them less as "traitor" and more as "partner."

The writer, Managing Editor of Pacific Magazine, is a Fiji citizen who lives in Sydney, Australia.