Of Biscuits And Kava

Samantha Magick

There are conflicting reports over whether Vanuatu is reconsidering its ban on biscuits imported from Fiji after Fiji threatened to impose trade bans, particularly on lucrative Vanuatu kava imports. Vanuatu political adviser Maurice Michel told Pacnews in Tuvalu that his country would not want to "damage its ties with the Fiji government." But Vanuatu's Trade Minister James Bule says they won't back down.

In the wider meeting, Forum Economic Ministers committed their countries to halving the time it takes to do business by 2007. This includes the time to start a business, the cost of registration, the time to go through insolvency and the cost of enforcing contracts, and was prompted by among other forces, a World Bank report, "Doing Business in 2005," which rated a number of Pacific Island countries as very average in respect to the costs and ease of doing business.

Finance ministers also heard that there should be closer ties with the private sector through the new Regional Private Sector Organization, which initially will be based in Fiji if funding can be found, and assumedly a clear work plan without duplication of the region's chambers of commerce, trade and investment bureaus, business councils etc can be developed.

It's a little reminiscent of the discussion around the Joint Commercial Commission (JCC) that go back to the early 1990s. Recently there have also been murmurings about the possibility of revitalizing the JCC, set up in 1993 by President George Bush (the first) to increase trade and investment between the U.S. and Pacific Island nations.

The U.S. Ambassador to Fiji, David Lyon, in a public lecture just before departing Fiji, said, "if there had been a strong, full functioning JCC, I am sure Fiji would be now in be in a better trade position on garments."

He was referring to the expired Multi Fibre Agreement (MFA) with the U.S., and the subsequent closure of the Ghim Li factory in Fiji, at the expense of 3,000 workers.

Lyon claims the JCC "very nearly approximates a Trade and Investment Framework Agreement," and as such, is a "very good thing, one not to be ignored." But largely ignored it has been.

Lyon said, "the U.S. will not rebuild the JCC but will be responsive to smart, well organized efforts by Pacific Island states."

It can join a long list of institutions and bureaucracies needing "smart, well organized efforts," such as the Tuna Commission, which has all but stalled over leadership complications (see page 10).

Lyon's solution is to base the JCC bureaucracy in Fiji, while continuing to rotate the chairmanship amongst Pacific Island members. When JCC members met in Hawaii in May, the director of the Pacific Islands Development Program, Dr. Sitiveni Halapua, suggested that the JCC needs to be very specific in its focus, identifying a limited number of goods and services it wishes to promote in the U.S. and identifying policies that need to be put in place and barriers overcome for this trade to be enhanced.

One has to wonder though if the state of the JCC is reflective of the declining interest in the region on the part of the U.S. as that nation grapples with international strategic challenges, and with its relationship to emerging economic powers such as China, and of the pressures a multitude of organizations and regional bureaucracies and agreements is putting on the region, particularly its smaller island states.

For all of these agreements, meetings and bureaucracies, it seems for most Pacific Island countries the compelling issues are the bread and butter, or if you like, biscuit and kava ones, and until these are sorted out, free and open regional trade is but the stuff of meetings and communiqués.