Pacific Co-operation

Press, Volume CIX, Issue 32114, 9 October 1969, Page 16

Pacific Co-operation

The meetings this month in New Caledonia of the South Pacific Commission and its offspring, the South Pacific Conference, should focus the attention of New Zealanders on their nearest neighbours to the north. The virtual independence of some of the island groups and the constitutional progress of most of the

remainder emphasise that it is time for a re-evalua-tion of New Zealand’s role in the area; for New Zealand—independent, multi-racial, and relatively well-developed—has a strong claim to be the natural leader in the South Pacific. The Prime Minister and the Leader of the Opposition have been at odds about what New Zealand’s role should be; but the differences appear to be mainly in emphasis. Mr Holyoake urged that the present means of consultation and co-operation be allowed to continue, and to expand at a rate determined by the island peoples. Mr Kirk has proposed a new Pacific council, in which New Zealand would presumably play a leading role, to act as an inter-Parliamentary forum. The best approach would seem to be somewhere between the two. The Government, should seek to make the existing machinery of co-operation more effective and look for ways in which New Zealand might make a bigger contribution to the joint effort In financial terms a great deal has been done already. New Zealand’s continuing aid to those islands where it has a special interest—Western Samoa, the Cook Islands, the Tokelaus, and Niue—is substantial New Zealand contributes 14 per cent of the commission’s annual budget of almost $1 million. Now the islands need help in developing their own political and economic skills. New Zealand should try to foster a sense of community in the region, and between the islands and ourselves. The strategic importance of the area was realised quickly enough during World War II; but the interest generated then, which gave rise to the commission, has largely disappeared. New Zealand should seek to encourage the growth of coherent and unifying institutions amid the patchwork political and economic arrangements of the thousands of islands in the 6000 miles from New Guinea to Pitcairn. If eastern New Guinea, the only substantial land mass in the commission’s orbit, is excluded, the islands have an area of only 36,000 square miles—about a third that of New Zealand. The total population is only 1,300,000; but the density of population is higher than New Zealand’s—and rising.

Since its inception in 1947 the commission has' concentrated on practical projects to assist economies, social services, and education. It was not intended to be a political body, but now, through the conference, it is becoming less an association of the administering authorities and more a directly regional organ for representatives of islands which vary from the independent kingdom of Tonga to remote Pitcairn, with a population of less than 100, administered by the Governor of Fiji. Few of the islands would be viable as fully independent entities. The alternative must be some kind of loose confederation, perhaps along the lines of the Council of Europe. The beginnings for this already exist in the conference, which has emerged as a territorial deliberative assembly with an advisory role over the activities of the commission. It has also become a clearing-house for inter-island opinion, a role which it must extend, for the islands, after independence, can scarcely hope to afford the luxury of a wide exchange of diplomatic representatives. This week the conference is discussing how its powers and influence might be extended. There is no need yet for any new regional body, especially when this one shows healthy powers of evolution, but New Zealand must consider carefully what its part in it is to be. Ethnically, geographically, and historically our stake there is bigger than that of the other foundation members of the commission—the United States, Britain, France, and Australia. New Zealand itself is a Pacific island. The responsibilities, the concerns, and the opportunities there should be New Zealand’s, too.