Earthquip PNG raising concerns over export of jobs

By LARRY ANDREW
COMPANIES in Papua New Guinea sending hydraulic cylinder repair jobs to Australia are taking away employment opportunities for locals, a company director says.
David Warriner, the director of Earthquip PNG in Lae, said the companies had been doing it because their administrations were in Australia.
He said PNG Hydraulic had been set up to do the big work in hydraulic cylinders, including forklifts, at Lae wharf and had been in operation since 1998.
“We used to do plenty of jobs before,” Warriner said.
“We are the only company that does these hydraulic cylinder repairs.
“We want more work and we do not want work to be sent out.
“We do not want to be exporting jobs (such as) heavy engineering repairs. It is the sort of basic building blocks of the economy.
“If you’re not doing heavy engineering repairs, you’re losing all your technical capability.”
Warriner said more and more work been exported which did not make sense.
“And we want to see that what gets to be repaired gets repaired in the country,” he said.
“Papua New Guinea has a small window of time where its manufacturing base is economically competitive. I don’t think it’s been utilised.”
Warriner said Lae had been the engineering place for Papua New Guinea but had not been supported.
“We need to be supported,” he said.