Pacific to figure prominently in NZ foreign policy

Opinion

LAST month I wrote about the incoming Labour-led government’s policies for the Pacific Island community living in New Zealand. New Foreign Minister Phil Goff has since wasted no time in making it clear that the Pacific region will have no less a priority in the coalition’s external policy thinking.

Goff did not wait to get behind his desk in Wellington’s Beehive Parliamentary executive building before directing foreign affairs staff to draw up an itinerary for travel to the region in the new year.

He even decided to take his family to the Cook Islands for a holiday soon after Christmas - a private trip he described as “part of my learning experience in the Pacific,” but he included a working session by scheduling a meeting with the Prime Minister and some key colleagues. By the time you are reading this, he will have made a five day trip to East Timor, where New Zealand has nearly 1000 troops serving in the Australian-led United Nations peace keeping force, and made inaugural visits to Samoa and Fiji.

With that level of military commitment - the biggest overseas deployment of New Zealand forces since the Korean War in the 1950 s - East Timor is, not unnaturally, at the forefront of the government’s international concerns. That Goff should then (after meeting Alexander Downer, his counterpart in New Zealand’s closest ally, Australia) head for the South Pacific on his first official trip only a few weeks after being sworn in, and at the peak of New Zealand’s annual holiday season, augurs well for warm relations with the region.

Not that it indicates any radical change of policy or outlook. Goff’s National Party predecessor Don McKinnon also signalled his priorities early on by heading into the Pacific in the first few weeks of his stewardship nine years ago.

But it must be comforting to leaders and their officials throughout the region to be reassured of the new government’s rapid commitment to its neighbourhood. All the signs are that Goff will be an ardent exponent of the Labour Party’s election manifesto that vowed to ensure New Zealand “plays a major role in regional advocacy and as a leader in sustainable regional development and democratic governance in the South Pacific.”

He will be well supported by his ministry that a few weeks before the election upgraded its Pacific coverage, creating a new senior executive position with responsibility for the region.

Gordon Shroff, previously director of the ministry’s development cooperation division, was appointed a deputy secretary and charged with the oversight and coordination of Nbw Zealand’s relations with the South Pacific and administration of the $225 million overseas aid

programme.

Shroff is a former head of the South Pacific division and his appointment reflected the importance new chief executive officer Neil Walter (himself an old Pacific hand, having been the official secretary for Tokelau, based in Apia in the 19705) attaches to ties with the region.

While it is too soon to think about any major boost in aid levels, it is significant that the Labour Party made a bold commitment to measures to help eradicate poverty in its pre-election overseas

assistance policy.

About 60 per cent of New Zealand’s total aid goes to the Pacific and the policy called for an inquiry into the relationship with the region, noting that many changes were taking place in development theory and practice and there was a need to establish how the needs could best be met.

New Zealand’s aid, it said, should comply with the principles of the Rio Declaration on Environment and Development, support sustainable industries such as eco-tourism and place particular emphasis on institutional development as well as technical assistance and training.

Goff told PIM the focus of the government’s inquiry would be to review the effectiveness of the aid programme to see that it suited recipient countries’ development needs.

With its accent on alleviating poverty, the government pledged to increase progressively the percentage of Gross National Product devoted to overseas aid development, from last year’s 0.27 per cent to the international target of 0.7 per cent.

That will be a big call for a government under pressure from its left-wing supporters to do more at home to ease the plight of its own disadvantaged and under-privileged.

And although this offers hope of more money eventually going into the regional assistance programme, Labour has issued a subtle warning to Pacific leaders in policy reference to “democratic governance”. The pledge to assess all development projects in terms of their contribution to reducing poverty was accompanied by the promise of additional assessments in terms of inequality and

promoting human rights.

This should be viewed by aid recipient countries in the light of their own domestic policies towards women, minority groups and press freedom.

“We work with other governments to promote the values we think are important,” Goff told PIM. “One of them is free speech and freedom of the Press. While we do not dictate to other countries, we would want to work alongside them to promote these values.”

There was a natural tendency for governments to want the media to act as a public relations agency for them, he said. It was not limited to the Pacific as it occurred internationally, but it was undesirable.

Goff’s initial foray into the Pacific is likely to be followed up this month by a visit to Papua New Guinea, and perhaps to Bougainville and the Solomon Islands. He has also invited the premier of Niue, Sani Lakatani, to visit New Zealand for talks. ■

David Barber