Tightening Ties

Pacific Islands Forum Secretary General Greg Urwin says the Forum’s relationship with China is quickening and intensifying.

 

He made the comments as six Pacific Island leaders prepared to meet Taiwan’s President, Chen Shiu-bian in Palau.

 

Urwin visited China recently to follow-up on a number of Chinese initiatives announced over the past year.

 

He says a number of Forum members are very interested in Chinese offers to provide loans to private sector organizations, but the necessary guarantee arrangements are still to be worked out. Urwin says there has also been “some movement on debt relief offers.”

 

Urwin says Taiwan-China competition in the region is not on the agenda of the Forum Leaders meeting in Fiji in October – at least as yet.

 

“Our hope is that China is developing some longer term strategic goals,” Urwin says. “The extent that that gets us away from this very raw competition, that type of long term cooperative relationship, with stronger linkages to the region--that’s all good.”

One issue sure to be on the agenda is labor market access, and Urwin says it is time for the Pacific to move beyond very general arguments on labor mobilization.

Urwin believes there has been a lot of progress on the issue since the leaders met in Port Moresby last year, through work such as the World Bank’s recent report on labor market access and the ongoing Australian Senate enquiry into the issue. He expects the later to provide some very specific recommendations.

“We need to come up with very specific proposals,” Urwin says.  Some at the World Bank have advocated bilateral rather than regional negotiations on labor market access but Urwin says he is “loath to concede that at this stage. It has been presented as a regional issue.”

He says regional officials have also discussed this issue in the context of the Pacific Agreement on Closer Economic Relations (PACER) with Australia and New Zealand, and the possibility of adding trade in services (labor) as part of what he calls “PACER PLUS”.

Meanwhile Urwin has signaled that the Australian government will come to the Fiji forum with a revamped model for improving vocational training and skills in the region. Last year Australian Prime Minister John Howard somewhat controversially announced that Australia will fund a regional vocational training center. That proposal has changed, and in its newest form will now be about “making use of existing institutions; bolstering them and their standards,” says Urwin.

One of the logistical issues sure to feature in leaders’ discussions is possible reorganization of some regional institutions.

 

A recent review of the Council of Regional Organizations (CROP) (see http://www.forumsec.org/index.cfm?go=main.resources&cmd=forumview&cbegin=368&uid=newsroom001&catuuid=F082D999-CF43-E090-B761BA94E58BDAFA&cid=364) has recommended:

- existing CROP agencies should be reorganized into a regional institutional framework that is based on three pillars (a political and general policy institution; a sector-focused technical institution; and academic and training institutions);

 

-the Pacific Islands Forum Secretariat should assimilate the current political and international legal functions of the Forum Fisheries Agency (FFA) within two years;

 

-The Pacific Community Secretariat (SPC) should integrate the current work programs of the South Pacific Applied Geoscience Commission, Secretariat of the Pacific Regional Environment Agency, South Pacific Board for Educational Assessment, Secretariat for the Pacific Community and FFA’s technical functions within two years;

 

-The South Pacific Tourism Organization should be integrated into the Pacific Community Secretariat once membership issues are resolved that make this feasible;

 

-governance and management arrangements of the academic and training institutions shouldn’t be changed.

 

The review also recommended that the SPC should provide the governance arrangements and legal framework for the new organization based in New Caledonia, and that the Fiji Government should, as a matter of urgency, pursue the project to construct a “Pacific Village” in Suva to house the Suva-based regional programs of the new organization.

  

Urwin likens this model in part to the new Small Island States unit in the Forum Secretariat, which he says is about “making it possible for small island states to take full advantage of the full range of services.

 

“It is very difficult for them to get a coherent picture of what’s on offer, not just from the Forum, but from the whole range of regional institutions.”

 

He say the Forum is also negotiating to put a Forum representative on the ground  in Solomon Islands because as the RAMSI effort moves into a more civilian phase, the Solomon Islands will benefit from better access to regional resources.

 

When leaders meet in Fiji, they will also discuss leadership of the organization. Urwin says he is ready to stand for another term as Secretary General if “that is the leader’s wish”. Urwin says there has been a “story going around” that the agreement was for him to stand for one term only then step aside, but that that was never the case.

 

He says under his term the Forum has got “a lot of things started, and I feel a responsibility to continue on with them.”

Urwin says he feels “ok” about progress to date. “I won’t hide the fact that there have been a lot of challenges—and it often goes back to making sense and balancing national priorities and regional agendas.”

He lists among the areas where there has been good progress: ombudsman’s, auditing and statistical functions, a regional energy framework, bulk-purchasing and joint dealings with oil companies (particularly in Micronesia), disaster preparedness and response, the establishment of the Regional Private Sector Organization, the regional tourism marketing plan and sports scholarships and support, particularly around the University of the South Pacific.

“The Pacific Plan will build up, will gain strength. Something wonderful is not just going to drop out of the sky,” Urwin says.