Pacific Islands Forum, Leaders' Meeting Opening Ceremony
Speech, (check against delivery)
Vanuatu
4 August 2010
It is a great pleasure to be here in Vanuatu for the forty-first annual meeting of Leaders of the Pacific Islands Forum.
I bring the warm greetings of Australian Prime Minister Gillard, who as you know is unable to be here as a result of Australia's general election to be held on 21 August.
Prime Minister Natapei, I congratulate you, your Government and the people of Vanuatu for hosting this meeting. Thank you for welcoming all of us so warmly today.
Like so many other Australian visitors to your islands, I am struck by its beauty and the warm hospitality of its people.
I congratulate Vanuatu on 30 years of independence, a significant milestone which you celebrated last week. Our Governor-General was delighted to be able to join you. She tells me she was overwhelmed by the welcome she received.
Australia and the Pacific
A year ago it was Australia's privilege to host the fortieth meeting of the Pacific Islands Forum Leaders Meeting in Cairns.
The Forum is our region's pre-eminent body. Australia is proud to have been a founding member. Leaders have been meeting now each year since they first gathered in Wellington in 1971, coming together to work for our common benefit in the Pacific.
Strengthening cooperation with the island nations of the Pacific is a priority for Australia and a focus of our foreign policy.
We are committed to working side-by-side in genuine partnership with you, working together to sustain peace and security and to enhance prosperity in our region the Pacific.
Partnership has been the theme of Australia's engagement with the Pacific, symbolised by our bilateral Partnerships both for Development and Security with the island countries of the Pacific.
Partnership enables us to build better lives for our region and our people.
A Pacific community partnership is in our common interest as we face many challenges together.
The challenge of climate change, the challenge of sustaining our region's fisheries, and the great challenge of improving the lives of over 2.5 million people in our region still living in poverty.
We also face the challenge of good governance.
This year we celebrate the 10th Anniversary of the Biketawa Declaration, under which our nations and our leaders pledged to work together for good governance in our region.
Today we also celebrate the achievement under Biketawa of the Regional Assistance Mission to Solomon Islands (RAMSI), with a special exhibition at the Forum today.
We wish our friends in the Solomon Islands well as they vote today, a right that every Pacific citizen should have and be able to exercise fully, freely and in a timely manner.
Australia as Forum Chair
Leaders agreed to an ambitious agenda for Australia's year as Chair. There were three key priorities:
- helping to build the foundations for sustainable economic development;
- improving the coordination of the resources available for development in the region and improving the effectiveness of development assistance; and
- working together to tackle climate change.
In Cairns, Leaders issued the Climate Change Call to Action. The Forum took action to address the challenge in our region and in the world, taking our commitment to the Climate Change negotiations in Copenhagen.
Our role in the outcomes at Copenhagen should not be underestimated, particularly the achievement of the fast-start financing commitment with dedicated funding for small island states.
Forum Leaders agreed on the Cairns Compact on Strengthening Development Coordination in the Pacific, so that all the region's development assistance and capacity building resources could be used much more effectively.
Leaders launched PACER Plus, the process for negotiating a Pacific Trade and Economic Integration Agreement.
Forum Leaders committed to advancing energy security and tackling the preservation of our fishing stock.
On behalf of Australia, I am pleased that good progress has been made on each of these fronts over the past year. That progress will be reported to Leaders in our Retreat.
Economic Development
We have as a region together taken steps to strengthen our economies.
A year ago, the world was in the grip of the Global Financial Crisis.
At the Cairns meeting, we agreed to work together to combat the adverse effects of the Crisis in our region by maintaining open trade and avoiding protectionism, with the ultimate aim of achieving sustainable economic development for all the Pacific.
Negotiations commenced on the PACER Plus trade and economic integration agreement and a Chief Trade Adviser has been appointed.
PACER Plus is more than just a free trade agreement. It is fundamentally concerned with the building the capacities of Pacific economies to take advantage of trade access and liberalisation.
PACER Plus has the potential to help Pacific nations increase jobs and export capacity, and to address trade imbalances that exist between some of the larger and smaller countries in our region.
Cairns Compact
The landmark Cairns Compact on Strengthening Development Coordination in the Pacific addresses the stark reality that, despite decades of development assistance, our region is still not on track to achieve the Millennium Development Goals by 2015.
These fundamentally important goals are about people being able to seek medical treatment when they need it, send their children to school, drink clean water, and live in a healthy environment.
In large part because of the Cairns Compact, we now have stronger evidence that there is some good news on Millennium Development Goals in the Pacific, particularly education.
More children are now in school in the Pacific, most notably in Papua New Guinea. This is primarily due to good policies, such as removing school fees, carefully prepared plans and governments allocating budgets for sensible programs. There is however much more to be done in other areas, in particularly maternal and child health.
Development partners, including Australia, are playing their part.
This is the real essence of the Cairns Compact. Everyone working together to address the complex challenges we face.
Through the Cairns Compact we have also identified the importance of taking a coordinated approach to climate change adaptation and mitigation programs. Climate Change financing is a very important area that we must get right.
Finally, on the Cairns Compact, I congratulate Kiribati and Nauru for taking the lead and piloting the new peer review process.
As Chair of the Forum, Australia has worked closely with Forum members and the Forum Secretariat to implement the Cairns Compact since it was agreed at the 2009 Forum in Cairns.
We must now all take this forward to achieve real and lasting outcomes.
Climate Change
Last year, in the lead up to Copenhagen, this Forum issued a Pacific Leaders' Call to Action on Climate Change, which urged world leaders to address this most important challenge.
While much remains to be done to address climate change, both locally and globally, some progress has been made.
In Copenhagen, developed and developing countries agreed to take action to hold global temperature increases to below two degrees Celsius.
In addition importantly, developed countries agreed to support developing countries to reduce their emissions and adapt to climate change by providing funding of US$100 billion per annum by 2020.
Australia is committed to delivering its fair share of this funding. At least 25 per cent of this will be allocated to Small Island Developing States, with the Pacific of course our primary focus.
As Chair of the Forum, Australia also highlighted the effects of climate change on Pacific islands to world leaders at the 64th United Nations General Assembly, the G20 meetings and the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting in Port of Spain.
Beyond the Forum
As a Pacific nation, Australia's future prosperity is linked to the Pacific's prosperity. Australia's stability is linked to the Pacific's stability.
We are united in the face of shared challenges.
We are united in our shared aspiration for a better future for all of our nations and all of our peoples.
Australia has taken its responsibility as Forum Chair seriously, reflecting our commitment to the Pacific Islands Forum as the Region's pre-eminent body.
Closing Remarks
It is now my honour, on behalf of Prime Minister Gillard and on behalf of Australia as the outgoing Forum Chair to hand over the Chair of the Pacific Islands Forum to the Prime Minister of the Republic of Vanuatu.
I thank Forum Secretary-General Neroni Slade, the Forum Secretariat and the leaders of the Pacific for supporting Australia in that task over the past year.
Without the strong personal commitment of leaders, much of what has been achieved over the past year would not have occurred. This is testimony to the strength and effectiveness of the Forum, and our shared sense of regional purpose.
I particularly commend Secretary General Slade for his many contributions. The Forum could not be better served by our Secretary General.
As the Forum Chair now passes to Vanuatu, I am confident that the past year will provide a solid platform for progress.
Geography has made us neighbours, but a collective desire for peace, stability and prosperity has made us partners in securing a shared future.
Collaboration, cooperation, and partnership, are the keys to shaping a dynamic, cohesive, prosperous and resilient Pacific.
I thank the leaders of the Pacific for their support of Australia. I wish Vanuatu all the best for the next year as Forum Chair.