Rural towns need to shine again

By STEVEN WINDUO
IT is difficult to ignore the state of affairs in a small rural town. I have the privilege of visiting small rural towns like Kiunga in the Western, Misima in Milne Bay, and in recent times, Tufi, in Oro. Small rural towns have their own modern histories that are over-shadowed, sometimes with the general lack of progress and growth.
These towns began out of a major political or economic activity, which, after full development, have declined in the past 40 years. Kiunga’s growth and development is linked to the giant Ok Tedi mine. Misima town is linked to the Misima mine.
Tufi developed as a strategic post for the British administration in Papua and later served as the base for the government to serve the people of Papua from that strategic location.
Tufi is a beautiful rural town, but it has seen much regression in growth over the years. Some of the local people I met complained about the lack of development in the town and the surrounding areas of the fjords.
The only policeman in Tufi knows how difficult things have become. His family lives in a deteriorated house with a leaking roof. He is a reserve policeman with the ridiculous salary of K60 a month. Around the town, a handful of government workers live in poor housing facilities doing what they can to maintain government presence there.
While Tufi offers the ideal getaway for tourists and other visitors, the township itself badly needs a facelift. Basic government infrastructures have become skeletons of old permanent buildings, and government workers operating in total neglect.
There are two shops in the town, one owned by a local and the other by an Asian man. In some ways I thought of these businesses as a spin-off from tourism around the activities of the Tufi Resort. Where a successful business such as a resort attracts a wide range of customers then it is possible to see spin-off businesses emerging.
There is tremendous tourism potential for Tufi and its picturesque fjords, natural lush rainforests, and culture. But with poor government services and infrastructure, there is the risk of underdevelopment and possible disinterestedness in economic activities that can sustain the communities of the fjords.
The local businesses and economy need to develop to encourage economic sustainability among the people of the area. It is not impossible, but requires some strategic social and economic engineering. Everyone thinks this depends on political leadership, but much of it also depends on the will of the community to do more to realise their dreams. The opportunities to earn cash are always present in the environment around the people. I was very impressed with the entrepreneurship of the women who sold tapa cloth and other arts and craft products near the resort where I stayed.
Another way of encouraging socio-economic growth in many of our rural towns is to institute a rehabilitation programme under the district development services programmes. The evidence of this development is witnessed in many parts of the country. Once the rural towns are given a facelift, social and economic activities will re-emerge.
At the centre of such developmental thinking is that the law and order issues must also be addressed without succumbing to it. Peace and justice sector along with education and health must take on the priority of development agenda in the rural towns and districts. A governance structure must be backed up by a visible government presence in the district.
In places where development is visible, the return of social and economic entrepreneurship is visible.  Let’s reclaim our rural towns and their contributions to the development of our people. It is critical as rural towns are the tentacles of the nation, which play a critical function in how we imagine ourselves as a nation.
Transport and telecommunications infrastructures are critical to the growth of small rural towns. Our existing rural airstrips and wharfs need total rehabilitation and constant care. Our rural roads need more care and attention. Rural roads, bridges, and jetties/wharfs are needed in the next five years.
Our people need to earn cash and connect up via mobile phones and internet with the rest of the world. We have to do a lot more than what we have been doing in the last 42 years.  We need to empower them to live in a sustainable way.
We need to improve the learning environment of our children. We need to be strategically engaged with the development needs of our people.
For me, I feel that we need to strategically re-develop our small rural towns to entice growth and development in our rural areas. We forget that the majority of our people live in villages, with no nearby banking facility, hospital, government facilities, education office, trade stores, and markets for earning cash available to them. We need to focus on the development of our rural towns to see real growth.
I feel for a place like Tufi with so much potential in tourism, especially with the great fjords as the major attraction, the excellent arts and cultural foundations of the people, and the wonderful history of the place, and of course the rich fertile soil for encouraging the farming of agricultural products like cocoa and vanilla.
If government stations like Tufi are rehabilitated we will progress. Small rural towns are the heartbeat of our country.
Without the heartbeat, a nation is will undergo a slow death until it no longer can speak about development for our people. They were built to ensure our people see their government at work in their lives and where they can also participate equally in the socio-economic activities like everyone else in the country.
I hope our long-forgotten towns will receive some attention in the next few years.