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Smarten up or get left behind
By JAMES KILA
New generation Papua New Guineans
need to be smarter to keep abreast of global trends, technological
and communication advancement.
Coffee Industry Corporation (CIC) Chief Executive Officer Ricky
Mitio said this upon return from the Global Initiative on
Commodities Conference in Brasilia, the capital of the Republic of
Brazil recently.
Mr Mitio was the sole PNG representative to the conference jointly
sponsored by the Common Fund on Commodities, United Nations
Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) and the United
Nations Development Program.
The conference was hosted by the Brazilian Ministry of
Agriculture, Livestock and Food Supply.
The overall objective of the conference was to re-launch the
commodities agenda from a poverty reduction and development
perspective; raise the profile and understanding of the
commodities and identify an international strategy for commodities
based on good governance and solidarity.
From what he observed at the conference, Mr Mitio emphasized that
PNG needs to smarten up because it is sitting on the edge of
technological and commercial advancement of Asia - South Korea,
China and India.
“PNG can not be complacent!
“This generation of today must be prepared to make difficult
decisions now because we owe it to our future generations to
ensure we read the global trend and prospects today and strategize
for our country’s economic development growth, he said.
“We need to position ourselves well to pave way for PNG to flow
with the rest of the world,” Mr Mitio added.
“Otherwise, our complacency will leave our country behind with the
technological race and our children will have to catch up or be
left behind altogether in misery and poverty.
“These are challenges for PNG,” Mr Mitio said.
“Our technocrats must rethink on many fronts,
“Our diplomatic missions should be scaled down so that more
regional trade commissioner type representatives with private
sector experience are appointed to strategic regions of the world.
Mr Mitio also stated that PNG must worry more about boosting
investment and trade using our oil, gas and mineral resources as
development platform to diversify agriculture economy where our
people own land, have the know-how and the free labor to create
wealth for our people.
The conference highlighted that 2.5 billion people in the world
make their living through the production and trade of commodities
including agricultural goods, forestry products and minerals.
The conference also heard that as many as 38-developing countries
were estimated to be dependant on single commodity for more than
50% of their export income, while 48 countries depended on only
two.
It said these countries depended on commodities as a source of
livelihood, employment, foreign exchange and public revenue while
commodity sector provided the principle stimulus for economic
growth.
Mr Mitio said the conference also highlighted and discussed the
rapidly rising demand for commodities in the developing countries,
particularly in Asia, had led to increase in prices in many
commodities in recent year and to an impressive increase in
South-South trade in commodities.
He said from the conference it can be seen that more than half of
the commodity trade of developing countries was now accounted for
by trade in amongst the Asian countries.
He said these developments and new trends such as bio-fuel
production and the growing variety of specialty products and end
uses have opened up new challenges and opportunities for
developing countries, especially those with high commodity
dependence.
Mr Mitio explained that a number of global NGOs and other like
minded groups, governments, individuals got together in Geneva,
Switzerland in 2002 and decided that traditional coffee trading
structures of the developed countries and their multiple national
corporations were not doing enough to transfer maximum reward to
producers in the developing world.
This concern was raised at the first meeting in Geneva which Mr
Mitio attended.
He said established coffee trading houses in Europe bitterly
opposed formation of such initiatives for self explanatory
reasons.
However, the momentum caught on with many producing nations as
well as good support for consumers who insisted on traceability of
coffee they bought on shelves in the coffee shops.
Mr Mitio explained that in the 21st century elimination of
poverty, child labor, environmental friendly mode of production
etc, besides the threat of global terrorism are the key
consideration being pursued by consumers worldwide.
A number of meetings were convened since then and a lot of
progress had been made on many fronts. The conference was the
eleventh session of the Global Initiative
Mr Mitio said specific group discussions focused on supply side
issues, value chain issues and financing commodity development and
diversification.
He said PNG participated in the value chain issues at which Mr
Mitio raised concern about the confusion created by so many
specialty coffee groups each with their own guidelines and
specifications. Some of the notable ones include Fair Trade, Bird
Friendly, Oxfarm, Starbucks.
Mr Mitio these groups are additional costs to producers in
developing countries. Therefore, Mr Mitio during the group
discussion called for standardization of all specialty and gourmet
coffee trading practices. The forum took note of this important
intervention.
 
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