**** Speech by Hon. Charles Abel MP, Minister for National Planning, Representing Hon. Peter O’Neill CMG MP, Prime Minister of Papua New Guinea - APEC High Level Policy Dialogue on Human Capacity Building (HLPD-HCB) 6 May 2015 ****

Good Morning,

It is indeed an honour to speak with you today.  This is the first APEC High Level Policy Dialogue to take place in Papua New Guinea since it was announced that our economy would host APEC in 2018.

I wish to offer a warm welcome from the Prime Minister of Papua New Guinea, the Honourable Peter O’Neill, who due to existing commitments cannot join us.

Prime Minister O’Neill is probably Papua New Guinea’s strongest advocate for APEC. 

He appreciates the depth of knowledge across many sectors that APEC opens up for our economy, and he encourages all Government departments to increase their engagement through APEC.

Ladies and Gentlemen,

Papua New Guinea is indeed in a unique position in the Asia-Pacific. 

We provide a bridge between the Pacific Islands and the broader APEC community of economies.

As we participate in APEC forums throughout the year, we share the views and perspectives of our Pacific Brothers and Sisters with the largest economies in our region.

We do this in the interest of enhancing development and prosperity for all of our people and our communities.

We know that, for the most part, the grassroots people of the Asia-Pacific all want the same thing…We seek to enhance the potential of our people to build better lives.

We seek to gain knowledge and to develop new skills, and to have an equal opportunity to participate in economic activity.

I know that these desires for empowerment are held dear by our friends from the Philippines. 

As a nation with strong maritime linkages with islands states, the Philippines has great understanding of the challenges faced in the Pacific.

Papua New Guinea is grateful to host this high level policy dialogue with you.

As this meeting gets underway I wish all delegations great success in dealing with the issues you have on your agenda.

From a developing economy’s perspective, it is heartening to see the way the APEC agenda has evolved from the base issues of free trade and investment – to embrace behind the border issues that facilitate economic engagement.

The issues before you are some of the most serious on the overall APEC agenda – they involve making a difference to the lives of millions of people. 

Indeed, APEC is a forum that has truly embraced the importance of human capacity building as an essential component of ensuring regional prosperity.

The SOM Steering Committee on Economic and Technical Cooperation has a bottom-up focus that is based on a need to facilitate economic and technical cooperation.

This is a process that focuses on the basics of empowerment – to offer the chance of self-help that will create opportunity.

Ladies and Gentlemen,

In Papua New Guinea, these are issues our Government faces every day.  We hope our experience will provide interesting perspective in APEC discussions today and tomorrow.

When we came to office, we focused the attention of our Government on the basic issues that are essential to development – our four policy pillars.

These are education, healthcare, law and order and infrastructure.

In the area of education we decided that the Government had to get all children into school so they can prepare for brighter futures. 

As such we delivered a policy of fee free education – and now the National Government pays all fees.

This policy has nearly doubled the number of children in school to almost 2 million.  Importantly girls in our families are benefitting from the free education policy. 

Because, before we had fee free education, often it was the girls of poorer families that missed out on school because of cost.

Now primary and secondary schools are fee and children have the opportunity – indeed they exercise their right – to attend school.

Certainly the implementation of this policy carries challenges. 

Nearly doubling the number of school students in the space of a few years has placed pressure on student-teacher ratios. 

But this was a choice that we made so that we would increase opportunity through education – sooner rather than later.

We are working to overcome these challenges with an increase in teacher education places in our universities and colleges, and we are building new schools and classrooms.

The next challenge was are facing is increasing the number of positions in our higher education intuitions for our current school children.

As a Government, we have also worked to expand universal healthcare around the nation.  This is a fundamental requirement for an economy that needs to be driven by a healthy workforce.

We have further continued to increase our budget allocation for law and order expenditure. Ensuring that communities can live in safety and security further opens further potential to engage in economic activity.

In Papua New Guinea you will also see a substantial infrastructure development program being implemented. 

This is most obvious in Port Moresby as we prepare for the upcoming Pacific Games – but through decentralisation and empowerment at a local level we delivering infrastructure at a grassroots level.

Ladies and Gentlemen,

I hope that the contribution from Papua New Guinea will share our experiences of recent years in the development of our human capacity resources.

At the same time, through this policy dialogue and the broader work of the SCE, we look to gain knowledge, information on best practices and better ways to facilitate development.

As our economy prepares to host APEC in 2018, it is the desire of the Prime Minister and our Government to see Papua New Guinea continue to engage and contribute to SCE. 

Working with our counterparts we wish to advance initiatives that will strengthen human capacity building in our region.

I wish you every success in your discussion today and tomorrow.

I also look forward to our ongoing engagement in the years to come.

Please enjoy your experience in Papua New Guinea, and I hope you will return again soon.

Thank you.

Note: The APEC Senior Officials' Meeting Steering Committee on Economic and Technical Cooperation (SCE) coordinates and manages APEC members' economic and technical cooperation (ECOTECH) agenda that helps APEC members to meet their commitments.  The APEC High Level Policy Dialogue on Human Capacity Building operates as part of this process.