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Leading Australia's Future in the Asia-Pacific (LAFIA)
In 2011, two LAFIA programs will be conducted by the Australian Public Service Commission in conjunction with the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade and The Crawford School of Economics and Government at the Australian National University.
- LAFIA Asia 2011 will focus on Indonesia and India
- LAFIA Pacific 2011 will focus on Australia's Pacific neighbours—Papua New Guinea, Vanuatu and Samoa
Key senior executive government program
Each year senior executives from the Australian and New Zealand public sectors take part in LAFIA programs across the Asia–Pacific. More than 295 senior executives have participated in the LAFIA program, now in its eighteenth year. If you are a member of the APS Senior Executive Band 1, 2, or 3 (or equivalent) the program gives you the context and background for the international dimension of your senior leader responsibilities. Enhance your strategic leadership, build senior executive business and management skills, promote a greater understanding of the region and its significance and establish valuable contacts and networks.
If you are aspiring to elite levels of leadership within the Senior Executive Service you cannot go beyond the unique experiences, challenges and substantial rewards of LAFIA.
LAFIA Pacific 2011 (Papua New Guinea, Vanuatu and Samoa)
If you are a member of the Commonwealth, State or New Zealand public service senior executive (Band 1, 2 or 3, or equivalent) this program gives you the context and background for the international dimension of your senior leader responsibilities.
Enhance your strategic leadership, build senior executive business and management skills, promote a greater understanding of the region and its significance and establish valuable contacts and networks.
Program background
Join a diverse and high profile group of senior executives as part of LAFIA Pacific 2011.
LAFIA Pacific 2011 analyses Australia’s contemporary engagement with the Pacific region. LAFIA encourages you as a senior executive to think about the effects of current developments within the region on Australia, your agency and yourself as a leader in government.
The unique and challenging political, economic, strategic and social issues in the Pacific region directly affect Australia’s strategic and economic directions and policies. Civil disorder in Papua New Guinea, Vanuatu and Samoa has heightened the need for greater awareness and understanding of the Pacific’s complex historic, cultural, socioeconomic and political background. Through a first hand understanding of the Pacific and its policy challenges, Australia plays a key role in securing stable economic development in the region.
LAFIA Pacific 2011 takes you on a study tour of Papua New Guinea, Vanuatu and Samoa specifically structured for leaders in government.
The Australian Government’s intention to actively re-engage with the Pacific nations’ remarkable progress in this arena makes it a compelling time to be part of LAFIA Pacific 2011.
LAFIA Pacific 2011 allows you to experience contemporary whole of government challenges that face the Pacific region initially through intensive pre-tour diplomatic and academic briefings. When in Papua New Guinea, Vanuatu and Samoa you will meet with senior government, business and community leaders, visit key political, commercial and community locations and engage in stimulating discussions with influential decision makers.
Key elements of LAFIA Pacific 2011
- gain deep insights into the motivation of the people of the region
- broaden your understanding about Pacific institutions, culture and history
- cultivate an awareness of demographic profiles, social and economic context
- refine your understanding of political and strategic implications and
- conduct high level dialogue with political powerbrokers, business entities and government.
LAFIA Pacific 2011 is a distinctive contribution to enhancing your performance and leadership skills as a senior member of the Australian and New Zealand public sectors. Through a structured and tailored program designed to meet your portfolio needs and wider interests you are afforded a unique opportunity to experience first hand the social, economic and political dimensions that charge the Pacific.
LAFIA Pacific 2011 Program features
- Two-day Introductory Strategic Dialogue in Canberra -10 and 11 August 2011
- Two-week overseas study tour visiting Papua New Guinea, Vanuatu and Samoa - 18 September to 2 October 2011
- A post-study tour reporting and evaluation session in Canberra - 10 November 2011
LAFIA Pacific 2011 focuses on Papua New Guinea, Vanuatu and Samoa.
Papua New Guinea
Thirty-six years after Papua New Guinea’s independence, Prime Minister Sir Michael Somare’s government continues to face many challenges in forging a united and stable nation from over 700 linguistically diverse communities separated by harsh geography. PNG remains highly regionalised and fractured and the concept of nationhood remains weak among its 6.3 million citizens.
A dual economy comprising a small formal, corporate-based sector and a large informal sector of subsistence farming involving 85% of PNG’s population is increasingly proving problematic. The formal sector constitutes a narrow employment base but has nevertheless prompted a trend of youth migration into the towns and cities and has contributed to higher unemployment and violent crime in urban areas.
Poverty, prevalence of small arms, gender violence and HIV AIDS threaten human security in communities where institutions of state are weak and inter-tribal tensions exacerbated by uneven development and modernisation. The jury remains out on whether PNG government’s system of governance can successfully accommodate the conflicting needs of PNG’s heterogeneous population, the inherent culture of wantokism and tribal leadership conventions against the curse of perennial rent-seeking behaviour and corruption within the state apparatus. The ExxonMobil-led PNG LNG project – with which Australia is collaborating, is expected to increase GDP by 15 to 20%. However questions remain on whether PNG will manage the volatility of global energy prices, ‘dutch disease’ from mineral sector growth and avoid a tradition of mismanagement of revenues from such finite resources. LAFIA will examine Australia’s role in working with PNG on Sovereign Wealth Funds to manage project revenues effectively.
Australia remains one of PNG’s most important trading partners and the PNG aid program represents one of Australia’s largest bilateral programs. Historically strong people-to-people links also continue with the presence of approximately 8,000 Australians living in PNG. LAFIA Pacific will explore the social and political complexities of effective governance in PNG, possible future directions for the Australia-PNG relationship and the challenge of equitable and sustainable development in a nation that is home to two of every three Pacific islanders.
Vanuatu
The archipelagic nation of Vanuatu has recently initiated comprehensive public sector finance reform and achieved political stability, however its economy remains fragile and the Melanesian nation faces long term strategic challenges in building a viable, broad based economy able to more widely accommodate its rapidly rising, youthful population.
Vanuatu is dependent on its tourism sector and international aid. Tourism accounts for two-thirds of GDP, although employing only 1,200 people out of a population of 200,000. The majority of the population – over 70% reside in rural areas – is engaged in subsistence agriculture. Continued growth in Vanuatu’s tourism sector will be crucial to providing employment opportunities for Vanuatu’s young and rapidly growing population, 60% of which are currently under 25 years.
Vanuatu is active in international diplomatic fora and reaps positive gains from its active advocacy. A committed member of the Melanesian Spearhead Group (MSG), Vanuatu is advocating a Melanesian multi-state approach to common challenges and regional free trade. In recognition of good governance practices and comprehensive reform achieved to date, Vanuatu was awarded US$66million for a new transport infrastructure program from the US Government funded Millennium Challenge Account, the only Pacific Island country funded to date. Australia however remains Vanuatu’s largest aid donor with development assistance projected to reach A$66 million in 2010-11 and traditionally strong people-to-people links are being further consolidated with Vanuatu’s involvement in the Pacific Seasonal Workers Pilot Scheme (PSWPS).
In an effort to slow the unhealthy trend of urban migration, the Vanuatu Government has favoured initiatives for a resumption of traditional village-based barter trading. LAFIA 2011 will explore the implications of the renaissance of the traditional barter economy and a hoped-for revival of respect for the Chiefly system on the modern democratic state. Participants will examine the strategies the Vanuatu government is employing to deliver more broad based growth and expand tourism and consider what future reforms are necessary to sustain robust private sector growth.
Samoa
A stable parliamentary democracy since independence in 1962, Samoa is a benchmark in the Pacific for political stability, successful integration of traditional Chiefly (Matai) leadership culture into modern governance, good economic development and strong human development indicators.
From 2011, all seats of the National Legislative Assembly (NLA) will be reserved for Matai who are recognised chiefs of Samoan Village in a system that enshrines preservation of culture and successfully welds traditional leadership systems with modern democratic governance. The newly formed Tautau Samoa Party (TSP) constitutes the country’s first formal opposition to rival the long governing Human Rights Protection Party (HRPP) as Samoans head into the 2011 elections.
Internationally, Samoa plays an active role in a range of Pacific issues and in the Pacific Forum. It works closely with its neighbours and supports the RAMSI intervention and United Nations Peace keeping operations. In international trade matters, Samoa is close to achieving accession into the WTO and is relatively well integrated into the regionalised and globalised economy. Samoa, unlike most Pacific Islands countries, enjoys a balance of trade surplus with Australia, with Australian exports to Samoa in 2009-10 totalling A$29.8 million and Australian imports from Samoa in the same period totalling A$44.5 million. However the economy is still fragile and susceptible to external shocks. The September 2009 tsunami damage posed rebuilding challenges so comprehensive that the UN delayed Samoa’s shift to Developing Country Status from 2010 to 2013.
Traditionally strong ANZ-Samoa bilateral relations are built upon comprehensive aid programs, defence cooperation in maritime surveillance, strong police linkages and robust people-to-people connections with nearly 40,000 people of Samoan ancestry identified in the 2006 Australian census. .
Introductory Strategic Dialogue
The Introductory Strategic Dialogue (ISD) is an intensive two-day briefing of Australia’s engagement with the Pacific designed to prepare you for your study tour. You will hear a diverse range of views focusing on the cultural, social, economic and political perspectives of the Pacific including key historical events as well as current and topical issues.
The ISD is conducted by the Australian National University’s Crawford School of Economics and Government.
The key to the success of the ISD is the quality of presentations from high profile professionals with long experience in engagement with the Pacific region. Over the two days you will hear from and interact with:
- leading ANU academics
- senior leaders from various Australian Public Service agencies
- diplomatic representatives from countries including Papua New Guinea and New Zealand
- representatives from private sector corporations discussing the strategic context of business building in the Pacific.
Discussion topics for LAFIA Pacific 2011 ISD include:
- history and culture in the Pacific
- economic growth prospects, challenges and opportunities
- governance, accountability and democratic institutions in the Pacific
- future directions of the Pacific
- Australia’s interests in the region
- the pressures and opportunities posed by modernisation and globalisation
- the effectiveness of development aid and its sustainability
- security and policing in the Pacific
- doing business in the Pacific
- the role of strategic alliances
Study tour highlights
- roundtables with Australian, international and Pacific business leaders discussing business, finance and international trade
- formal cocktail receptions, dinners and informal discussions hosted by Australian diplomatic representatives in Papua New Guinea, Vanuatu and Samoa
- high level briefings by Australian diplomatic staff on Pacific economic, political, trade and security priorities
- intensive discussions with Pacific regional public sector counterparts
- stimulating forums with key Pacific non-government organisations and community leaders
- informative media sessions with Pacific journalists
- fully escorted visits to a range of Pacific historical, cultural and social attractions
- roundtable discussions with key government leaders and policy advisers on the Pacific’s bilateral and regional strategic policy agenda
- briefings with senior international and Australian aid representatives on aid priorities
- streamed visits and meetings tailored to your specific areas of interest
- structured free time to refresh reinvigorate and re-group
- insightful briefing sessions with Mr Angus Macdonald, Executive Administrator of the Australian Member Committee of the Council for Security Cooperation in the Asia Pacific (CSCAP) at the Strategic and Defence Studies Centre (SDSC) at ANU
Reporting and evaluation session
The reporting and evaluation session is the opportunity to reflect and share your experiences and those of SES colleagues about the LAFIA Pacific 2011 program to Papua New Guinea, Vanuatu and Samoa.
Specifically the session is an assessment of the personal and professional outcomes of LAFIA Pacific 2011 through its stated aims of:
- improving your understanding of Australia’s role in the Pacific
- enhancing your commitment to your agency and the role of the Australian and New Zealand public sectors
- positively re-assessing your leadership functions, responsibilities and outcomes
The reporting and evaluation session will be in Canberra on 10 November 2011.
The session will be followed by a LAFIA Pacific dinner.
Cancellation
Any cancellations from the program must be advised in writing. Written cancellations received before 31 July 2011 will be entitled to a full refund. Cancellations received after this date will incur full charges. Substitute participants at the appropriate level will be accepted.
Further information
Closing date for application — Friday, 4 March 2011. Complete and return the LAFIA Pacific 2011 registration form (PDF / MS Word) by facsimile to: 02 6250 4775.
For further information, please contact Jeanne Sainsbury on (02) 6202 3847.or email jeanne.sainsbury@apsc.gov.au
