Comments

Hi Bill, thank you for taking interest in our piece and making the connection between our work and the urban land management plan from the 1990s. It’s always important to contextualise our work, which includes earlier efforts to navigate these complex issues. Are you talking about the Vanuatu Land Use Planning Project? If so, we are aware of this but have yet to track down a copy. If you have one, please share it if you can! Were you involved in this work in the 90s? It would be great to understand more about how the land use planning from that era might inform the current situation for current customary tenants. Would love to hear your thoughts either here or over email: sebastian.antoine[at]unimelb.edu.au

Thanks Theo, It's a good point: as well as evaluations, time needs to be made available to to design a project carefully, or at the very least, to make it adaptable if things aren't working. As you say, the superficial political incentives don't seem great. Although, given the PNG's proximity and instability, you'd think a politician not suffering from severe short-termism might want to take action.

Thanks Terence. If you are evaluating a project that has been designed poorly and is fundamentally flawed from the outset - hedged into the impossible four year implementation cycle and crafted by inexperienced consultants - the evaluation is going to follow suit. There are few political incentives within the DFAT apparatus and Australian government to actually invest in long-term change in PNG, or elsewhere for that matter. Not much of a chance for a handover and a Facebook post when you’re involved in the long process of research and consultation to actually design a program with some chance of impact.

Thank you, Stephen and thank you for the example, which is a good example of the challenges of development work.

If your comment is that "the conversation" means consulting with, and listening more to, the average person in PNG, I agree entirely.

Thank you Bryant.

Thanks Maho, It's great to hear that you've been involved in some good evaluations. More broadly with regards to Australian aid evaluations in PNG, some evaluations are great, but I think it fair to say that the quality of the average evaluation would be improved with more planning, time and rigour. I agree with you that it's not Australia's job to "fix" PNG, and that PNG's development trajectory will, for the most part, be influenced foremost by its own domestic political economy. However, Australia should still make its aid as effective as possible. If it does that it can play a meaningful role in assisting PNG with development challenges. Thanks again for the comment.

Hi Louise, I'm about to devour the comprehensive report and data sets you've provided and truly appreciate this (usually thankless) review and republication job. The task itself may be sufficient reward, but thankyou. My late father was in anthropology and sociology around the same era as this work. I myself am familiar with a 40-year time lag for research outputs from when I had to put a literature review together for pig production in PNG, and basically restarted what still appears to be a one-man R&D effort to date. Twenty years later the feed technology my colleagues and I worked on has some utility but a fair way to go for participating in effective pig and poultry value chains. As freelance researcher now in the R&D arena I'm at liberty to ask more questions, although asking the right questions remains a challenge as always. Food deficit in a country of apparent abundance is certainly a phenomenon worth questioning, although my experience is mostly personal observations in the urban setting and more intimate understanding from rural household surveys. Certainly the food deficit is not just about production in the agricultural sector, but also socioeconomic for livelihood options and social networks, value-chain development (not simply market access!) and may be an indication that the local economy has not reached a threshold for productivity gains. My current questioning is directed at finding means to increase poultry meat and eggs supplies to both rural and urban households. I hope to gain a better understanding of the household market dynamics for food and income distribution.

Hello Terence and thank you for your thoughtful article which let’s be honest opens a Pandora’s box. Where do you start? What you have intimated goes to the core of whether Australia has learned anything in seven decades, whether the institutional knowledge it has acquired over that time has informed anything of value. Whether it is serious about social and capital development or whether our efforts are really aimed at keeping certain segments of society compliant. Your contention that knowledge and experience relevant to the development assistance needs of PNG are not nurtured sufficiently within DFAT is not something I can comment on except to say the theories for change that emerge and inform Australian development efforts are about as useful as mammary glands on a bull if basic health, education and economic indicators at end user level are the yard stick. But here is the challenge. The picture that emerges is one of great complexity and nuance that as things stand no government department can solve from an office in Canberra, Port Moresby, provincial or district headquarters. In the end it boils down to who has agency over the issues that people want or need to be addressed. And whether the Westminster system of decision making, governance and delivery is in any way relevant to the ninety percent of the population that lives largely rural subsistence lives. An example might clarify. A corporate entity mindful its business activities had polluted the water supply of thousands of people living along a river decided to install water tanks and rain catchments in affected communities to address the problem. They subsequently informed the communities of their plan, delivered the tanks and associated hardware with a team of tradesmen to erect and commission each installation. Within a short time, the work was completed, and each facility handed over. In another location, no connection to the riverine communities, a small international NGO visited a community and found the local water supply had been contaminated by previous logging activities. The NGO offered to fund the installation of a rainwater tank and catchment if the community would sort out customary matters and install it themselves. In anticipation of rapid implementation, they deposited the funds into the account of a trusted community leader. In this instance what followed was nearly three years of community consultation involving every stakeholder, landowner, partial landowner, non-landowner and other social categories in the community. Meeting by meeting they worked through the traditional protocols of who would have access to the tank and where it should best be located. Once all stakeholders were satisfied the community gathered with traditional leadership to publicly announce their collective agreement. Over the following fortnight the tank was installed, and a grand handover ceremony attended by the local member of parliament and other government dignitaries was held. Three years after both projects were completed an inspection of the water catchment facilities in the riverine communities revealed most were in operative, tap ware stollen and corrugated iron roofing removed. By comparison the community led project worked seamlessly without a hitch. And the donors. How did they rate their success? The large corporate was able to quickly tick off the successful installation of multiple tanks by its tradesmen, signed, sealed and delivered in record time and close the books on it. By comparison as time passed the international NGO that had lodged its funds in good faith for the community project became increasingly convinced its money had been stolen. Three years post implementation which approach was successful. This example may seem trite. But understanding the success of one and failure of the other opens a window on to a myriad of learnings, considerations and opportunities that apply to the delivery of essential health, education and community economic activities that have not been taken or acted upon since before independence. In addition to government agencies, communities offer an untapped but enormously powerful lever to advance progress around the drivers of human development. Our failure to understand how this might be achieved in conjunction with the overarching westernised systems established by us has been a major part of the failures you describe. Like you I believe the to time to go back to the drawing board has arrived.

Thank you for the article penned by both S.W & S.A. Interesting analysis of how Fiji emerged from where it was post Coup 2006 by Bainimarama to 2022 when Rabuka took over as Prime Minister. Thanks too for the link to audio recorded in Dec 2021. Will share link with Fiji Think Team and listen to it. A point of interest for Media in Fiji, that we have monitored during Bainimarama era through to now, as at 2025 and rarely mentioned, who really owns and dictates to these Media outlets in Fiji? In reading the article above and applying the South Pacific | Oceania context, something is amiss! Yes, totally agree Media Freedom ought to be amplified. However, what happens if those same Journalist (s) and media outlets show biases in ones reporting and/or writing? What happens when some play the race-cards as in the case of Fiji? This is the reality in Fiji and sadly so, those whose voices are the loudest are privileged enough to be amongst the ones writing or within the inner circle. Is this Freedom of Media? Or something else?

Thanks Terence, as always, for your insight! Very true: "people in DFAT who understand PNG well, but they are transient...Consolidating and stabilising country expertise will maintain ties and trust with counterparts in PNG" You're right that "Evalutions are often afterthoughts that struggle to extract findings from scant evidence", but the reviews I've been a part of, of DFAT's large economic and governance programs (both mid-term after 2 years and end-of-term reviews) in the last 6 years have yielded very good insight - and DFAT has acted, flexibly changing approaches (even certain program aspects) mid-program, and incorporating lessons in new program design. I've personally found Ian Kemish to be right, it isn't Australia's job to 'fix' PNG. And you see this in spending: although aid from Australia is K1.7 billion (AUD650 million), PNG government's own 2025 budget is K28.4 billion (5% of which is Australia budget support, but PNG has faithfully kept up with repayment of all its foreign debt even when classified as at 'high risk of debt distress' by the IMF). PNG has become its own driver of development, and Australia will have to further accept that its role is complementary, constantly improving on its ability to assist.

Thank you Terry. A very sensible paper. We can only hope that somebody in DFAT reads it and thinks about the subject for more than a few minutes.