ENB folks urged to work together
MINISTER for National Planning and
District Development Paul Tiensten has called on the people of
East New Britain to work together to achieve another stage in
development.
Mr Tiensten, who is the Member for Pomio, said ENB had been
known as a role model province because it had achieved the
primary stage of development.
He said the province should now look at going into the secondary
and tertiary stages, which would include manufacturing and
downstream procession.
He made those comment during the swearing in of the five elected
members of the province into the provincial assembly last week.
He said he taken up the National Planning and District
Development portfolio to ensure his district and other districts
in the province developed.
Tammur intent on improving
Kokopo
KOKOPO MP and Minister for
Communication and Information Patrick Tammur has assured the
people of Kokopo that he will put all his efforts into
developing the electorate.
Mr Tammur made the undertaking during a welcome gathering at his
village, Vunamami.
He told the people that regardless of the ministry that he had
taken, he would still concentrate on the task at hand.
Mr Tammur said for the last 25 years the village people had
missed out on basic services like clean water, electricity,
proper feeder road linkages, health and education.
He said he would serve all four corners of Kokopo including the
Duke of York Islands.
He urged the people to put away their political differences and
work with him.
Mr Tammur also acknowledged former member Sir Rabbie Namaliu for
what he had done in the electorate and said he would continue
from where Sir Rabbie left off.
Me’ekamui leaders applaud MoU signing
Francis Ona’s former supreme council
member and Panguna Me’ekamui leader Philip Takaun and another
Me’ekamui chief Philip Miriori want Bougainville to unite to
move forward.
They made these remarks during the signing of the Panguna
communiqué recently.
Mr Miriori said that the memorandum of understanding signing was
a big step towards laying the foundation for peace on
Bougainville because the fight started in Panguna.
He said to return to Panguna and make peace after 18 years was a
break-through for Bougainville peace.
Mr Miriori said that the Me’ekamui-led government was working on
a three-year programme of reconciliation as it had a lot of
outstanding issues to sort out.
On the issue of the mine, he said the time was not yet right for
the people to discuss that because it was the cause of the
conflict.
Mr Miriori added that Bougainvilleans should unite as one to
pursue their ultimate goal and that was independence.
RVO lacks vital gadget
By ELIZABETH VUVU
A VITAL equipment for measuring sulphur dioxide emission is yet
to be acquired by the Rabaul Volcano Observatory although it was
requested by the agency last year.
Suphur dioxide emission is a health hazard, the observatory
said.
The lack of this measuring instrument has been a major concern
for the volcano observers due to the increasing levels of
sulphur dioxide emission from the volcano.
Senior RVO official Steve Saunders said the gadget would be very
useful in monitoring the level of the toxic emission.
He said the funding for the requested instrument had not been
released since last October’s eruptions when it was first
requested.
Mt Tavurvur was measured in the past as producing up to 200
tonnes of sulphur dioxide a day but Mr Saunders said at present,
RVO had no way of determining the amount of toxic emissions.
Officials from the East New Britain provincial disaster office
said the money was still in the “pipeline”.
Mr Saunders said the meter would help to closely monitor
activities of the volcano and to determine the amount of toxic
gas being emitted.
With the instrument, RVO could come up with a graph on the daily
level of toxic emission, he said.
Educator: PNG lacks ICT
PNG is suffering from a need of
advanced communication infrastructure and needs to keep with
world standards of information systems and networking, secretary
of Papua New Guinea Computer Society (PNGCS) Mr Sadiq Ali said.
He said as costly as it may seem, the investment would do much
good to match the first-rated countries and further more, the
future generation would be the ones to benefit from it.
“Coming from an ICT educator’s angle, PNG needs to teach its
younger generation on the potential of ICT and the good it will
do for the economy.”
Mr Ali was speaking at a seminar last week organised by PNGCS to
facilitate ICT graduates to enhance their knowledge and skills.
Knowledge vital for growth, says Young
UNITED Nations Children’s Fund (Unicef)
country representative Hamish Young said knowing the status of
child nutrition in Papua New Guinea was fundamental to the
global aspect of development that should become a focus for the
national government.
He said every child had the right and one of the rights was to
have proper nutrition.
Mr Young was addressing representatives from the National Health
Department, Clinton Foundation, the National Planning, Education
department and the Centre for Disease Control in Atlanta who
presented the national survey on the micro-nutrient deficiency
yesterday.
“It is general knowledge that a child who is well nourished
becomes better developed and becomes better student in school
and entrepreneurs but when children become less nourished it
hampers their development potential,” Mr Young said.
The survey gave the status of the nutrition while highlighting
various nutrient deficiency facing the country.
Among those reported was the high prevalence of stunting,
wasting, anemia and under nutrition in the four regions of the
country where the survey was conducted.
‘Stop TB programme’ set up
THE World Health Organisation (WHO)
has implemented a five-year Stop TB Strategy programme in Papua
New Guinea to clamp down on the disease in both adults and
children.
The programme describes the TB epidemic as worsening rapidly due
to the weak state of health services and the disease’s
co-existence with the HIV epidemic and the possible emergence of
multi-drug resistance of TB.
The objectives of the programme are:
*To achieve high quality expansion and
implementation of DOTS (Direct Observe Treatment)
*Address the newly emerging challenge
of TB/HIV co-infection in 16 districts of the country;
*Assess the multi-drug resistant TB
situation in two of the 20 provinces; and
*Contribute to the health system
strengthening in 66 of the 87 districts in all 20 provinces.
The programme is targeted to benefit the general population and
it is anticipated that areas with a high prevalence,
particularly the poorest sections of the community will benefit
most.
The implementation of this programme will involve the work of
community volunteers and churches.
Bulolo gets gift from NZ
BULOLO Hospital in Morobe province is
the proud recipient of hospital equipment and medical supplies
worth NZ$3,147 (K6,403) from Timaru Hospital in New Zealand.
President of the Rotary Club of Bulolo-Wau
Brian Paiferi said the medical supplies and hospital equipment
were organised by Mr Boustridge and Mr Sneath with Timaru Rotary
Club and Timaru Hospital.
“The Timaru Rotary Club shipped over 20 hydraulic beds,
defibrillator, four cartons of dressings, oxygen masks, and a
varying array of much needed medical supplies.
“I would like to take this opportunity to thank Timaru Hospital
and Timaru Rotary Club for the donation ,” Mr Paiferi said.
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