You reap what you sow

All forms of gardening are rewarding and satisfying.

But vegetable gardening, largely because the gardener can be in charge of the whole operation from seed collection to consumption, is possibly the most-rewarding.

In addition, well-grown home-produced vegetables cannot be matched for flavour and nutritional value.

And with care, considerable savings – especially in a city like Port Moresby – in the family’s food budget are possible.

Port Moresby, unlike a place like Goroka – where you can grow all types of succulent, mouth watering vegetables – has an arid year round climate.

(This is apart from a brief respite during the December to March period, when the rain comes down in buckets and vegetables – especially corn – abound all over the capital city.)

An old Chimbu man living in the capital is disproving this by growing pak choi (Chinese cabbage), tomatoes, pumpkins, taro, bananas, pawpaw, sugar cane, beans, shallots, aibika, corn, tapioca, yams and pineapple, among others.

All this from a swampy, stinky, grass-covered piece of land just past the Stop and Shop supermarket at Rainbow, Gerehu.

Miuge Opi, from Nombuna village in Kerowagi, Chimbu province, is also making a killing when he sells his fresh vegetables at market.

And mind you, he doesn’t use fertiliser from the shops, rather, dry leaves from nearby trees as compost and mulch.

My daughter and I met him recently while walking down from the supermarket, and as I admired his vegetables, we got into a chinwag and he gave me two free samples of pak choi to try out for lunch.

Necessity, in a city like Port Moresby where the cost of living is very high, made Mr Opi turn to the land.

He was left high and dry in Port Moresby a couple of years ago when he came with his sister to collect his late brother-in-law’s final entitlements.

His sister, Mr Opi says, squandered up the money and he had no means of surviving in Port Moresby.

His respite, fortunately, came in the form of this vacant piece of land beside a smelly drain.

“I have 12 children and two wives back home in Chimbu,” Mr Opi confides.

“I was worried about how I could get back home when no-one could help me to buy an airline ticket.

“I saw that the answer was on the land, government land, covered in swamp and grass.

“I cleaned it up and started to make a garden.

“I planted Chinese cabbages, tomatoes, pumpkins, taro, bananas, pawpaw and others.

“I saw that there was good money in this and was a means for me to earn money honestly and through hard work to travel home.”

Every day, Mr Opi walks down from Gerehu Stage Two, works the land until late, and if his vegetables are ready for harvest, he takes them straight to market.

“I work in the morning and in the afternoon I sell my vegetables,” he says.

“Many people like my fresh garden produce.

“I make K60-K70 a day on good days, while on slow days, I make K30 or K40.

“Don’t be idle, you must work the land.

“Money is in the land.

“I have tried this out and I already have a lot of money, more than enough to travel home for Christmas.”

Next time you’re driving to Gerehu, past the Stop and Shop supermarket, slow down and take a look at the drain to your left.

Chances are, you’ll Miuge Opi amidst his admirable vegetable patch, and you might even be able to pick and buy fresh-from-the-garden veggies.

Advanced Communication Skills Training

Facilitators:    Joys Eggins & Patrick Matbob

Dates:             November 10 - 14, 2008

 

Who is it for?

This training is designed for people working in community development, those seeking to undertake development work, those in private or public sector work that have limited experience in communication activities, working with the media, or publicity. Participants will develop basic skills and understanding that will prove useful in a range of roles, including communications officers, community development workers, community education officers, human resource managers, salespeople.

 

Prerequisite: Participants must be fluent in speaking and writing English and be computer literate.

 

Course description:

The practical orientation of the training uses participants’ own experiences and situations to assist them to develop skills in writing effectively, promoting an organisation, writing a funding proposal, and writing a media release. To further strengthen their practical skills, participants will complete a communication project for their organisation or an organisation of their choice.

 

Topics to be covered include:

·        Writing a media release

·        Layout and design

·        Writing a project proposal

·        Promoting your organization

·        Report Writing

 

Outcomes:  

Upon completion of this training you will be able to;

1. Write effectively
2. Promote your organisation
3. Assist with writing a project proposal
4. Write a report
5. Develop communications suitable for a community awareness campaign
6. Write a media release

 

Facilitator’s Profile:

Prior to coming to Divine Word University, Patrick Matbob worked as a journalist with the Word Publishing Company (Wantok & Times of PNG newspapers) and the Post-Courier. He has experience in a wide area of news reporting and editing through which he honed his news writing and reporting skills. Seeking to share his experience as a journalist with others, Mr. Matbob came to Divine Word University in 2000. He has facilitated a course in basic news writing for CIS media officers. He obtained his Masters Degree in Journalism Studies in England and has a broader, global understanding of media and how it can be done most effectively both in the PNG and the global context.

 

Joys Eggins has practical media experience, having worked for the Religious Television Association. She also has a Bachelor of Communication Arts from Divine Word University. Early this year Joys facilitated a Project Management and Proposal Writing workshop for the World Bank Tingim Yut Kompetisen project. She has twice facilitated the Advance Communication Skills training in 2007.

 

Training Fees:            K870

Training fees include course materials, lunch, tea and access to computer laboratories. All course fees are inclusive of GST. Limited accommodation is available on the Divine Word University (DWU) campus. Should a participant require accommodation and other meals (breakfast and dinner), these services would be in addition to the course fee.

 

Venue:

Divine Word University

Madang

Papua New Guinea

 

Dates: November 10 – 14, 2008

 

Registration:

Contact Diwai Pacific Limited for more information:

 

Catherine Jude

Diwai Pacific Ltd.

DIWAI PO Box 59, MADANG

Madang Province

Papua New Guinea

Phone: (675) 854 1807

Fax: (675) 852 3138

Email: cjude@dwu.ac.pg or smoriarty@dwu.ac.pg

Web: www.diwaipacific.com.pg

 

 

 

 

Pink Ribbons

Hi all
October is recognised as the month to promote breast cancer awareness worldwide.
I am selling Pink Ribbons on behalf of the cancer society.
The ribbons are selling at K2 for the big ones & K1 for the small ones .
'Remember breast cancer has the potential to affect someone you know'

Christine Pakakota
Assistant News Editor
The National
Pacific Star Limited
Phones: (675) 324 6731
Facsimile: (675) 324 6868
Post: PO Box 6817 Boroko, NCD
Papua New Guinea
Email: cbpakakota@thenational.com.pg

Bulolo website

I’ve found one of the most-beautiful websites on Papua New Guinea, one on Bulolo, http://www.freewebs.com/bulolo_png/.

It belongs to former Bulolo resident, Ronald Delvalle, who was born in Lae in 1981.

“Bulolo is a small town found in the mountains of Morobe Province, almost two hours drive from Lae City,” he writes on his Home page.

“Most people who will find this page, have actually lived in Bulolo and have been searching for pictures from the place which at one time or another they called home, as I have.

“Lucky for you I went back to Bulolo recently in April-May of 2007, where I managed to take hundreds of pictures of Bulolo, including the surroundings, as well as Zenag, Wau, and Lae.

“I had included a short photo album of pictures which scanned from my family album of pictures taken at Bulolo International Primary School - unfortunately if you did not already know, the school was burnt down sometime in 2002.

“S0 it was impossible to get my hands on pictures of the school.

“So if you happen to have any pictures of the school, please feel free to email them to me at brada_81@yahoo.com.au.

“Hope you enjoy strolling down memory lane, as I did, when I took these pictures.

“Feel free to leave a message, for anybody you maybe looking to get in touch with and please don't forget to sign the guestbook!”

 

 

Massive changes in Wau-Bulolo: Governor

Morobe Governor Luther Wenge says the current mining and prospecting going on in Bulolo district will bring about massive changes to the historical mining towns of Wau and Bulolo.

He said they have been nominated by the Morobe provincial government as among the growth centres of the province,

“All I can say is Hidden Valley and Wafi mines will no doubt bring substantial change to the face of Bulolo and Wau towns,” Mr Wenge said today (Monday, October 20, 2008).

“In fact, we have a 15-year plan starting from 1997-2012, and in the plan, among other things, there will be growth centres in Morobe province.

“We’ve nominated Wau, Bulolo, Finschhafen and Mutzing.

“These centres will provide services like banks, hospitals, education, factories and others.

“At the moment, everyone is coming to Lae for these services.

“It costs the people money to come to Lae.

“When we develop the growth centres, people will stay back and develop these areas

“Wau and Bulolo will also serve parts of the Huon Golf; Finschhafen will serve Tewai/Siassi and Kabwum; while Mutzing will serve the Markham Valley, Nawaeb and parts of the Highlands.

“These growth centres will help in the implementation of this Morobe provincial government policy.”

 

Wau-Bulolo to receive 50% of Hidden Valley royalties

Morobe Governor Luther Wenge says Bulolo district will receive 50% of royalties from the Hidden Valley gold mine when it starts pouring gold next year.

He revealed this in an interview today (Monday, October 20, 2008) after weeks of the Morobe provincial government being locked in a row with the Bulolo district over royalties from Hidden Valley.

Bulolo MP Sam Basil wants 50% of those royalties to be set aside for his district, particularly to develop street lighting and water supply in Wau and Bulolo, and his argument with Mr Wenge over this has made international headlines.

The Morobe government is set to get 36% of royalties, amounting to about K12 million a year, when Hidden Valley starts pouring gold next year.

Mr Wenge said that the Morobe provincial joint budget & priorities committee, made up of all 10 Morobe MPs, met last Friday and resolved that half of Hidden Valley royalties coming to the Morobe government should be given to Bulolo district.

“What we’ve decided is to split the royalties 50/50,” he said.

“Fifty per cent will go for towards the development of Wau and Bulolo towns.

“We don’t want to see Wau and Bulolo having a repeat of what happened in the colonial days when they were left with nothing after the miners left.

“We want good hospitals and good services in Wau and Bulolo.

“They will be growth centres.

“The remaining 50% coming to the Morobe provincial government will be used to invest in education for our future generations and also in agriculture.

“There are exciting times ahead but we have to be wise in our decision-making.

“I challenge the people to invest their money in sustainable developments like agriculture.”

MrWenge also admitted that provincial capital Lae was undergoing massive development as a direct result of ongoing mining and prospecting in the province.

“Lae City is out of land right now,” he said.

“There is a lot of property development going on, especially in residential and commercial.”

Pictures of the Hidden Valley Gold Mine Project

Captions: 1. Giant trucks and other equipment, operated solely by landowner villagers including women, at Hidden Valley. Picture by SIMON ANAKAPU of NOROBE MINING JOINT VENTURES. 2. Visitors being shown around the Hidden Valley gold mine project.3. An aerial view of the Hidden Valley Mine Project area stretching down to Hamata. Picture by SIMON ANAKAPU of MOROBE MINING JOINT VENTURES.

Arrows of Eldorado - how the Wau-Bulolo goldrush all began

In the early part of last century it was almost as if bowmen were guarding the gold that lay on the edge of their country more richly than anywhere else in the whole Pacific.

Fierce fighters lived along the Markham, the big river flowing into the Huon Gulf.

The Markham’s big tributary we call the Watut – and that was the river that led to the new gold, the new Eldorado.

The story is that Watut gold was discovered by a German prospector, Wilhelm Dammkohler, and that he was killed by the Kukukukus.

American prospector Arthur Darling, in 1910, apparently did go up the Watut and into its tributary, the Bulolo.

There he found gold, rich gold

However, Darling and his team of Orokaiva boys were attacked by the local tribemen and had to exit.

When he recovered he went across to the new Lakekamu goldfield to try to win enough gold to outfit himself again.

On the Lakekamu field Darling spent a lot of time talking and mapping and planning with William Park, who was called “Sharkeye”.

Darling was at Samarai preparing to go up the Waria, when he collapsed, and soon afterwards died.

He had left Sharkeye Park knowing enough.

Somewhere right up the Watut was the source of gold that coloured the sands of the lower Markham, and the way to reach it was not to go right around by the rivers but to cut in overland from the coast.

However, it was a foreign country, and although the Governor, Hahl, the best of the German administrators, did (about 1910) actually encourage Australian prospectors to come in and apply for permits to prospect, a man still needed more gold than Sharkeye had, to outfit himself for a months-long trip.

Before he had enough gold the war with Germany came.

It was a war that ended German rule in north-east New Guinea and the Bismarck Archipelago in six weeks, with little shooting.

When the military administration ended and the Australian Mandate started, in May 1921, Sharkeye Park was already going in and out of Morobe on the New Guinea side.

Now he headed up the Francisco River, looking for a way, through a mountain range that peaks up to nearly 10,000 feet, to the rivers that flowed on the other side.

He came back sick, broke, and not knowing what to do next time…

William Park was called “Sharkeye” because he had a twist or a squint in one eye.

Park was, apparently, an Australian who had been a miner most of his life, was hard-faced and in his fifties, could “work like a tiger”, was jungle-wise and native-wise, hated to owe a penny, had more bouts of fever that he could count, suffered from piles, had his last tooth removed by Jack Nettleton, drank anything, and although it is untrue to say that he never wore boots, he often worked without them. (He died, a very rich man, in Vancouver in 1940)

In 1922 he needed a partner for two good reasons: he was broke and he had lost his permit to employ native labour when he flung a whiskey bottle out of his tent and it struck a native on the head and killed him.

He was staying with Jack Nettleton, who had a trade store on the coast and was good to Park, and who had some money and a permit to work natives.

Park told Nettleton what he knew.

Nettleton, an English-born rover who had been everything from a salmon-fisher in Canada to a freight-clerk in New York, by way of jobs ion Seattle, in Portland (Oregon) and Idaho, had stayed on in New Guinea after being a warrant-officer in the Army during the war.

In August 1922 Park and Nettleton struck inland and crossed the heavily jungled rivers of the Kuper Range beyond which lay the Bulolo River, forking off the Watut, and more gold, fantastically more gold, than anywhere else in Papua-New Guinea,

They found it where Koranga Creek and Edie Creek come into Bulolo – gold that was to give them each a fortune; and when they had taken all they wanted, there was enough left for the six-million-dollar company, Bulolo Gold Dredging Ltd, to win, in the 30 years following, 56 tonnes of gold, then worth 28 million pounds.

This was October 1922 and according to new issue Australian mining ordinances no claims could be worked until 1^st April 1923.

April came and soon the richest parts of the Bulolo River were locked up in leases granted to the first-comers, including Morobe District Officer Cecil J. Levien. J. Levien.

April 1923 came, and soon the richest parts of the Bulolo River were locked up in leases granted to the first-comers, including Levien.

Late arrivals had to look elsewhere.

This is what Bill (W.G.) Royal and Dick (R.M.) Glasson were doing in 1926, trying to find the source of the Bulolo’s gold, when they came into Edie Creek and decided to go to the head of it.

What showed in the dishes they panned in these streams was gold in unbelievable concentration – if it was gold.

At first glance – according to Bill Money, who was in partnership with Royal, Glasson, F. Chisholm and Joe Sloane – it looked too dark.

The Edie gold, alloyed with silver, was heavily stained with manganese but rubbed shiny and was the real stuff of Eldorado.

Joe Sloane said to his mate who was running his sluice box at 11.30am: “Y’d better clean up Bill. The bloody gold’s running outa the box.”

That day they got 272 ounces.

Where the Bulolo was rich big-scale dredging, this was incredibly smaller-scale sluicing.

About six million pounds worth of gold was won from the top of Edie Creek.

The Edie “Big Six” – Bill Money, Bill Royal, Dick Glasson, F. Chisholm, Joe Sloane and Albert Royal – all became rich men.

More and more white miners came and, again, the late-comers had to look elsewhere.

There was gold in the Watut as well as in the Bulolo.

Where was the source of the Watut’s gold?

Men who dreamed of finding another Edie Creek began to look for it.

They began to look for it on the other side of the Watut.

 

 

 

 

 

Bulolo Golf Club is the oldest in Papua New Guinea

Caption: 1. View from the 4^th green to the 5^th tee. 2. Bulolo Golf Club, the first golf club to be built in Papua New Guinea in 1947. 3. Inside the Bulolo Golf Club

Bulolo Golf Club, the eldest in the country, held its 60^th anniversary and reunion from June 8-10 in 2007.

Currently, it has members from Bulolo-Watut and even Lae and Wau, and usually has a competition on Saturday afternoons.

 The course is a nine-hole course, which goes up and down hills, challenging players and at the same time allowing them to enjoy the surroundings and course layout.

Given Bulolo's rich and colourful history and characters, it is a great opportunity to meet old friends, and the usual Bulolo hospitality will be on offer.

"Bulolo Golf Club is the oldest Golf club in the Country still on the same location as it started,” said president Brian Boustridge.

"Port Moresby Golf Club is older but their golf course was moved to a different site from the original at some stage."

 

PUBLIC AFFAIRS with SUSUVE LAUMAEA

One of Papua New Guinea’s top newspaper columnists, Susuve Laumaea, who writes for the weekly Sunday Chronicle, will now contribute regularly the same column to this blog, or at least until he gets his own blog up and running. Veteran journalist Susuve’s writing is absorbing and is essential reading for all Papua New Guineans with a concern for our beloved country, as well as as Papua New Guinea watchers from all around the world. Susuve’s contact details are below his column so that you can get in touch with him directly. Enjoy…MALUM

National affairs need more attention

THERE are a great many national affairs issues that aren’t getting the type of prominence from government as they deserve.

Responsible leaders are not keeping a thorough watch.

Too many crucial issues are hibernating on the back-burner.

First up politicians, unionists and commentators of all shapes and forms like to knock the public service for being a stumbling block to implementation and delivery of public goods, services and the nation’s annual development budgets.

Don’t just criticise the bureaucracy’s cumbersomeness.

Do something to improve it and make it responsive and efficient.

Do not retire experienced public servants at the mandatory retirement age of 60 years unless they are total no hopers.

Disband the various reform think tanks and create in-house training programs for all the departments and provincial administrations.

At least apply some practical hands-on approach to human resource rejuvenation, refocusing and service culture redevelopment – not the crappy untried academic tomes that are generated week in and week out or the seminars and workshops that are quickly becoming local tourism junkets.

Rejuvenating and refocusing the public service to develop a new culture of worth ethics is not a mean ask.

Some of the systems, conditions and terms of services and participation are archaic and need to be harmonised and modernised to provide for the times that have changed and are changing.

Public servants deployed in crucial economic and social sectors of the public sector workforce need to be properly remunerated.

These are the special interest groups within the public sector workforce – represented by public sector unions -- who feel they are badly done by and deserve pay rises. If that pay increment does not eventuate then they’d go on strike and stop work even if it meant sick patients would go without attention from nurses and doctors or school children miss out on classes.

Readers who have followed current affairs in the media will know that PNG teachers are a very frustrated bunch who needs to be looked after.

And why shouldn’t they be?

They are an impoverished and marginalised workforce.

Infact they and other frontline workers such as policemen and women, nurses, medical orderlies and doctors deserve to be awarded the most attractive pay and conditions package among all public servants.

Health, law enforcement and education workers are the most important group of workers in PNG.

They operate in the engine rooms that can make or break this nation.

Teachers and medical workers deal with the human resource of this country.

Politicians can sing and dance about political stability and windfall monetary gains but the real determining factor of the health of a nation’s economy is the poverty, wealth and health indicators of the population at large.

Our social indicators show PNG up as a very poor nation in terms of unacceptably high level of law and order problems, poor health and education facilities and services.

The recipe that we stare right in the face everyday is one of a nation that’s sitting on a time-bomb of lawlessness, chronic unemployment and a groundswell of uneducated or undereducated and sickly unhealthy population that will not take the nation to the next level of happiness, health and wealthy in 20 years time if not sooner.

What are we doing about these very real problems?

Huge chunks of money are now going to the districts or to infrastructure development projects that are contracted to the same old few contractors who keep making millions of kina and delivering poorly finished and substandard roads and other capital works.

Will the district expenditure programs prioritise law and order, health and education spending?

Down the pecking order highly irregular appointments are made to chief executive positions in the public sector or court judgments for reinstatement of illegally displaced or suspended senior officials with departments do not get actioned decisively.

That recent appointment of a total unknown person to act as administrator of troubled Gulf Province is a joke.

Where did Governor Havila Kavo and legal advisors Emmanuel Mai and Sarea Soi find this man?

Why did they not advertise publicly and get a suitably qualified, experienced and a respected Papua New Guinean to fill the vacancy while the tug of war between the Governor and the suspended administrator Miai Larelake exhausted its day in court? Come on, Gulf is not a cowboy country and Gulf people are not from Planet Mars.

This is a province that’s going to be the host of over K15 billion worth of oil and gas-based development and it needs level-headed direction and leadership at the political and administrative levels – not politically opportunistic and personal avarice-driven agendas. Position the right people in the right places to move the province forward and onto a higher level of happiness, health and wealth than its present sorry state.

Doesn’t anyone care at all?

At the national public service level there is also important departmental leadership issues outstanding at that very crucial Department of Foreign Affairs, Trade and Immigration. The passport scams issue has not been resolved.

There is no assertive leadership at the top level, it seems because the department head position is held by an acting appointee.

Senior management officers are either suspended, ignored or receiving no delegation to perform.

The case of reinstatement of a departmental deputy secretary, Ms Lucy Bogari, is one that has been frowned upon and treated with considerable contempt by the acting secretary despite directions to the contrary by the Public Services Commission, the Department of Personnel Management, and the Minister for Foreign Affairs, Trade and Immigration and the National Court.

Is this person indispensably above the law or is he above the Minister, the PSC, the DPM and the National Court? Hey, come one, have this matter straightened out.

This cannot go on for ever, can it?

Someone higher up has to put his foot down. PNG needs a predictable Foreign Affairs, Trade and Immigration management leadership promptly.

There are too many international issues that are not getting enough attention.

The department’s timely intervention in issues such as the seasonal workers scheme in Australia is sadly lacking.

It is a topic that is abuzz among the Pacific media community. Seasonal workers program is a bilateral scheme that’s been dissected over and over following a Ms Lynda Ridgeway’s media appeal to regulate who gets into Australia from PNG under the seasonal worker scheme.

She’s gone through a traumatic experience and we can all understand where she’s coming from.

But she must have the grace – and it is only a small ask – to isolate the criminal and condemn the individual responsible for the crime.

Leave the rest of us along. That’s what this scribe would tell Lynda Ridgeway – the angry and traumatised Australian mother -- whose eight-year-old child was sexually abused by a “sickly ignoramus” who should have served the full five-year jail term under the toughest conditions possible.

There are two issues involved that Ms Ridgeway has drawn attention to for the authorities.

The first is the criminal act for which the Papua New Guinean involved as served 22 months of a five-year jail term and has been deported home to PNG.

Understandably and with all due sympathy Ms Ridgeway is angry and traumatised by this unwelcome intrusion into the sanctity of her family.

As a parent this scribe would not only feel the same but possibly resort to PNG-style “jungle law”.

The second issue is of how she has taken her experience and linked it to her advocacy for all Papua New Guineans entering Australia under the bilateral assistance scheme of “seasonal workers” under the auspices of Australia-PNG relation to be rigorously screened.

She does not want sex criminals, predators, paedophiles or potential sex criminals entering Australia and repeating sex offences similar to that which happened to her child. Ms Ridgeway is a traumatised parent for the experience she has faced but her argument needs to be put in a more focused and appropriate perspective.

Ms Ridgeway was the parent who befriended the Papua New Guinean in the first place. As a responsible parent she should have thoroughly checked the type of person she was befriending or entrusting the safety of her child.

Why begin screaming for security screens and criminal report checks after the event?

An isolated criminal conduct overseas -- as heinous or as intolerable as it is in the case attributed to in this article -- by a Papua New Guinean is no justification to taint all other God-fearing and law-abiding PNG citizens with the same paint-brush.

We are not all rapists and child abusers like that poor excuse of a human being so hold your peace, madam.

All decent human beings irrespective of race, creed or colour would condemn any crime – serious or otherwise – in the strongest terms possible.

Situations must be adjudged in a properly focused perspective. This scribe has no sympathy for child molesters and abusers, rapists, women bashers, paedophiles, racists and anyone else who has no respect for humankind or property that belongs to another person.

Sometimes it becomes a little too offensive when non-Papua New Guineans make generalised “below-the-belt” remarks about all PNG citizens with allusion to alleged criminally-induced “below-the-belt” conduct by one or two individuals.

We are not all criminals or potential criminals.

How would Ms Ridgeway and her wantoks or fellow Aussies feel and react if discarded and destitute PNG mother in the streets of Australia referred to father or fathers of her children as a criminal and then insisted that all Australian males were the same?

Nobody in Australia would take too kindly to that kind of paint job, wouldn’t they?

It’s a bit like an equation in Pythagoras’s Theorem -- in trigonometry -- where what you do to one side, you do on the other to arrive at a win-win solution.

So, Ms Ridgeway, why don’t you just chill?

We are a proud people too.

Papua New Guineans generally live our lives communally. Papua New Guineans fend for their aged family members and do not isolate or incarcerate them in senior citizens’ homes.

We look after the unfortunate in our tribes, clans and extended families by adoptions, sharing, caring and loving each other.

Offences of the type referred to by Ms Ridgeway are swiftly dealt with and punished appropriately in our tribal culture.

The culture we have is not uncommon.

It is very much alive and happens elsewhere too in the developing world in Asia, Africa, Pacific and the Caribbean.

These are life-styles based on and built upon a living and widespread ethnic culture of loving, caring and sharing tribal, clan and family wealth and fortunes going back to dreamtime as native Australians would say.

Do we need these seasonal fruit picker jobs in Australia?

The answer should be a resounding nay.

Why is this scheme necessary?

That’s the poser by The National daily newspaper on Friday in its editorial.

The editorial went on to say: “Papua New Guineans have every right to point to it with embarrassment and irritation. “As a South Pacific nation of more than six million people and 33 years of independence, questions are increasingly asked about the slow rate of our development.

“Those who support this proposal point to attaining skills in another country, the opportunity to earn reasonable money for a hard day’s work and the chance to broaden the experience of those who take part.

“Little is heard of successive PNG government failure to bring development to our rural people, to set up a wide range of projects on their behalf and thereby generate employment.

“This seasonal assistance project may take a small bite out of our huge unemployment figures and it could help repair the fraught relationship between PNG and Australia, frayed by differing agendas and conflicting personalities.

“PNG must make sure that our workers are not let into Australia on sufferance, but in a genuine effort to bring benefits to both countries.

Any lesser goals would be indefensible.”

This scribe could not agree more.

• Share your views with the writer at mailto: susuve.laumaea@interoil.com or SMS to: (675) 6845168.

Ties between PNG Forest Products and mining continue to grow

Captions: 1. Treasury kits, Bulolo. 2. Police houses, Bulolo. 3. Transportables, Hidden Valley

The long relationship between PNG Forest Products and the mining industry continues to strengthen.

A new 600-man camp together with all furniture, being constructed by PNGFP Building Systems has been supplied to Morobe Mining Joint Ventures at Hidden Valley, to help accommodate the large new workforce expected to be employed at the new mine.

This is in addition to ongoing supply of kitset buildings to Lihir Gold Limited, Higaturu Oil Palm, Ramu Sugar, Oil Search Limited, Guadalcanal Oil Palm Solomon Islands and many types of buildings including residential houses, classrooms, relocations houses and others.

The modern-day acceptance of pre-fabricated pine buildings as being suitable for all industry needs in PNG echoes the original foundations of the forest resource at Bulolo and the manufacturing industry that derives from it.

Perhaps only historians would know it today, but PNG Forest Products evolved as a timber company from the Bulolo Gold Dredging Company, which began operations in the late 1920’s, dredging alluvial gold from the large gravel deposits in the river valleys around Wau and Bulolo.

The success of the gold recovery operations, and its associated airlifts and gold rushes, is the stuff of legend.

It became necessary for the company to set up a sawmill, to manufacture the necessary buildings to house workers and their families, as well as accommodating the infrastructure needed to run a successful operation.

But perhaps the most remarkable achievement occurred as mining operations were in decline.

As mining was running down and finally ending, the timber milling facilities actually grew, and in 1954 the first plymill in PNG began operations.

Exports of timber products became a major part of the operation until the early 1980’s.

The progressive-thinking company saw the need for a range of affordable kitset type houses and began a ‘Design and Manufacture Programme’.

Success has been continuous.

The company employs approximately 1,200 workers at its head office and manufacturing base in the original home town, Bulolo.

PNG Forest Products Building Systems has been producing kitset houses for over 25 years, and is PNG’s leading provider of Kitset Buildings.

These are prefabricated from ACQ & CCA Pressured Treated Plantation Pine, producing a permanent product with little or no maintenance.

PNG Forest Products Ltd also produces approximately 12,000 cubic metres of plywood products annually and a similar volume of sawn timber,

PNG Forest Products' proud history of helping Papua New Guinea develop over 50 years

Captions: 1. Plantation pine at Bulolo. 2. Golden Pine Plantations, Bulololo. 3. Lower Baiune Power Station, Bulolo

PNG Forest Products evolved from Bulolo Gold Dredging Limited that commenced operations in large-scale alluvial mining in the late 1920’s.

The Bulolo region was at the time one of the largest gold fields in the world.

A total of seven dredges scoured the valley floor, dredging thousands of tones of high grade gold-bearing ore.

As the mining operation scaled down, the plywood factory and sawmill were constructed.

In collaboration with the then government, the pine plantations were also established at this time.

In 1954, plywood production and the export of product to overseas destinations commenced.

From the early 1950’s the company has been involved in the conversion of both hardwood and plantation resource to high value end products.

Today, PNG Forest Products is the leading producer of timber and plywood products using only 100% plantation pine.

Its products include prefabricated houses, dressed timber and mouldings, treated power poles, export high grade plywood and veneers.

The company operates a 5.5MW Hydro Power Station at Baiune which was built pre-war to supply power to the gold dredges.

Today, it supplies the total power requirements for the company township of Bulolo and Wau.

PNG Forest Products is truly a self-sufficient organisation with retail stores, freezers, bakeries and a cattle farm.

 

Meet my youngest son, Keith

This is my 16-month-old son, Keith, the last of my four young children, and someone who has been so close to me since the untimely death of his beloved mother and my wife Hula (you can read her story by clicking her name in this story), on Easter Sunday this year.

Malum

FORUM ECONOMIC MINISTERS' MEETING (FEMM) TO DISCUSS FOOD AND ENERGY SECURITY IN THE REGION

Food and energy security in the region will be high on the agenda when the Forum Economic Ministers meet in Port Vila, Vanuatu, 27 – 29 October for their annual meeting.

“The agenda of this year’s FEMM reflects the direction provided by the Forum Leaders, particularly on the need for sharing national experiences around food and energy security and also to consider what regional cooperative efforts might help to mitigate some of the worst effects of the shifts in global prices,” says Tuiloma Neroni Slade, Secretary General of the Pacific Islands Forum Secretariat.

Mr Slade adds: “There have been unprecedented developments in the global financial markets in recent weeks. With global economic slowdown associated with the financial crisis, the Forum Island Countries stand to be affected  through  an inevitable stifling of demand for our exports and services, including tourism, as well as possible reductions in aid inflows. .

“However, there are some positive developments as well in terms of the fall in oil prices, although commodity prices remain at much higher levels than we have experienced on average over the last five years. This remains a significant concern for policy makers in our region, particularly given the heavy reliance of our member countries on oil imports and the macroeconomic and household level impacts.”

“As requested by Forum Leaders at their meeting in Niue in August, the Forum Secretariat will present a proposal for regional cooperation in bulk procurement of petroleum products for discussion by the Ministers.  This is one of the fundamental regional mechanisms to provide supply security and address high fuel prices,” says Mr Slade.

The meeting in Port Vila will also get an update on the implementation of past decisions made by FEMM. In particular, discussions will include the development of regional support to audit services to improve integrity and financial security based on the progress made through the Pacific Regional Audit Initiative as well as on developments on temporary movement of labour.

Other issues on the agenda include regional options for assistance with economic regulation, and financial sector supervision in Forum Island Countries.

For more information, contact, Mr Sanjesh Naidu, the Forum Secretariat’s Economic Adviser, Economic Governance Programme, on phone 679 331 2600 or email: sanjeshn@forumsec.org.fj