A COLUMN WRITTEN BY KALIOPATE TAVOLA, PUBLISHED IN ISLANDS BUSINESS, FEB 2021

February 2021 marks the first anniversary of the endorsement of the PAfTS 2020-2025. It was not the first strategy of its type for Pacific regionalism. Clearly, it is too early to make any meaningful assessment of its implementation. I will leave that for later. The occasion, however, should not go to waste. Any anniversary is propitious for strategic reflection. I propose, therefore, to cast an evaluative eye on two aspects of the Strategy – its long and eventful gestation period, and design: and draw out useful learnings that can be incorporated into the 2050 Strategy for Pacific regionalism.

The Strategy was endorsed by Forum Trade Ministers at their meeting (FTMM) in Suva on 3 February 2020. The idea for the formulation of the Strategy was conceived on 11 July 2018 at a Senior Trade Officials meeting during the Pacific ACP (PACP) Trade Officials meeting in Apia. The Strategy had been two years in the making.

The conception of the idea of an Aid for Trade (AfT) strategy during a PACP Trade officials meeting is instructive. The same officials were engaged in the formulation of a first AfT strategy during the time of the negotiations with the EU for an Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA). The EPA negotiations were suspended, and regional geopolitics may have intervened. This led to the rejection of the first strategy, twelve years ago in 2009.

The EU resources earmarked for that got mothballed. Some, if not all, will be recycled to fund the newly endorsed Strategy. The Regional Authorizing Officers (RAO) for the PACP states met representatives of the EU in the margins of the 2020 FTMM to sign €94 million AfT financing agreements.

The rejection of the first AfT strategy in 2009 also marked the launching of the PACER Plus negotiations and by the time the Free Trade Agreement (FTA) was signed in 2017, Australia and New Zealand (ANZ) had committed themselves to earmarking millions of dollars for AfT under that agreement. These AfT resources under PACER Plus are currently being disbursed under the extended Pacific Horticultural and Agricultural Market Access (PHAMA Plus) launched on 11 April 2019.

There seems therefore to be AfT resources galore. This therefore calls for parsimoniousness rather than extravagance on the part of Pacific Island Countries (PICs). They should ensure that proper policies, rules and regulations are in place for effective and efficient implementation of the provisions of the Strategy. PICs own the Strategy. Sovereignty over the use of these resources therefore remains in the hands of national political leaders. The Pacific Islands Forum (PIF) essentially coordinates, especially the resources needed by the Strategy.

AfT is not just a regional issue. It is multilateral. When the AfTS 2020-2025 was endorsed in 2020, it marked a fifteen-year gestation period of the concept that was endorsed by the WTO Ministerial Conference held in Hong Kong in 2005. The concept underwent various global reviews. The 2019 global review, for instance, focussed on its implementation in the context of two trade-related constraints: sustainable development and the green economy; and connectivity and digital skills development. Both are quintessential to Pacific regionalism.

Both these constraints would have been built into the relevant four principles that guide the Strategy, namely: (i) strategic regional impact, (ii) prioritization, (iii) leveraging existing policies and mechanisms, and (iv) ownership – especially the first three principles. Furthermore, they would have been sufficiently incorporated into the four priority areas of the Strategy, especially the first three, namely: (i) services; (ii) electronic commerce, and (iii)comprehensive connectivity. The fourth priority area is ‘deepening Forum markets.’

The above underlines the need for accountability, not only to the region but also to the multilateral system. It is noted that the draft Strategy was submitted and well received by development partners at the recent WTO Global AfT Review in Geneva. Such accountability, especially the latter at the multilateral level, is critical for the influential patronage of PICs’ agency on issues that matter to them particularly on those of an existential nature.

The fourth principle of the Strategy: ownership, by regional members at their respective national levels is critical for Pacific regionalism. As can be noted, for example, from my previous article: ‘Derogation of State Power to the Region Not an Option’, and from Professor Greg Fry’s ‘Framing the Islands’ (2019, ANU Press), Pacific regionalism is not, and has never been in the business of derogating power from state members to the regional body. This essentially, in my mind, particularizes the kind of specific strategies that the Pacific Islands Forum, especially PICs, should be considering in the context of the 2050 Strategy.

For the PAfTS 2020-2025, in particular, ownership of the Strategy is by members at the national level. This is where decisions are made: by national political leaders. However, an inescapable fact of the Strategy is its promotion and expansion of trade and related industrialization and their natural propensity for regional economic integration and related processes. The latter is essentially the stuff of regionalism. PICs have to agree to increase trade amongst themselves: to agree to reduce trade barriers to increase trade; to agree to put in place effective policies and regulations that will increase trade and freer movements of trade, capital, labour and skills.

But if Pacific regionalism will not source the power from its members to decide on these issues at the regional level, as we have seen in the last four to five decades, then it is incumbent on the members themselves, the PICs, who have ownership of the Strategy, to re-strategize going forward to 2050.

This article recommends a strategy of Pacific regionalism structured on the basis of bilateralism and sub-regionalism as its core building blocks. Bilateral agreements between PICs and especially given a series of them creating a lattice that interconnects all PICs, are more likely to be effective in furthering the desired results of the Strategy and consequent regional economic integration.

Bilateral agreements of this ilk are more likely to be less contentious than a regional agreement and the pathway to its eventual benefit less arduous and less time-consuming. Thus, its facility – especially with the benefit of hindsight of how Pacific regionalism has fared in the last four to five decades.

On the basis of this and on its foreseen utility, the existing bilaterals between Fiji and Samoa, between Vanuatu and New Caledonia, et al, for example, deserve all our praise. On the other hand, the recent disestablishment of that between Fiji and Papua New Guinea is one that baffles all sound judgement.

Prima facie, sub-regionalism presents a natural building block for regionalism.  In the context of Pacific regionalism, such an option seems mandatory given our geography. Our meagre attempt at it with only the Smaller Island States (SIS) as the recognized subregional grouping and the Secretariat’s hardnosed opposition to any further expansion of the idea, can only be regarded as domestic myopia that has outlived its currency. Pacific regionalism has to be bold and innovative going forward.

Sub-regionalism is founded on members’ proximity of interests and ideas. It can be envisaged that in the context of the Strategy, its provisions can find ready and willing hands and minds to foster and grow. With the dedication born of contiguity, the benefits arising from these provisions can be realized sooner than later and shared amicably. Should the subregion become incorporated onto Pacific regionalism, the learnings so derived can benefit the larger grouping.

In this context, it can be said that the Strategy may be that which Pacific regionalism has been lacking to bring about the regional economic integration that regional leaders had envisaged way back in 1971.

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