Females core to PacTow’s operations

The National Business
  • PACIFIC Towing (PacTow), a successful 42 year old PNG company and subsidiary of the Steamships Group, is growing and diversifying.
    General manager, Neil Papenfus, views its female employees as important contributors to its ongoing success, not just in PNG but the broader Oceania and South East Asia regions.
    PacTow has implemented a range of initiatives to position it as an ‘Employer of Choice’ for women and to help better recruit, train, empower and promote women. They are;
  • Women in Maritime Scholarship: Introduced in 2014, in partnership with the Australian Government’s Australia Awards and the China Navigation Company, this programme is helping PacTow grow its female workforce.
    The programme is fast tracking the careers of 20 female deck and engine cadets.
    2020 will see more young women benefit from this programme.
  •  Gender Smart Safety: This programme, developed by the PNG Business Coalition for Women, will be implemented at PacTow worksites in 2020.
    It is based on the fact that women experience some different workplace safety concerns to men.
    Gender Smart Safety specifically aims to improve the workplace safety of women by centrally involving them in workplace safety decision making and management.
  •  Female managers: PacTow has several female managers, including finance manager and company 2IC, Trudie N’Dresanei, as well as HR manager Anna Ingip.
  •  Leadership Training: PacTow makes a considerable training investment in all staff. Last year PacTow staff received an average of nearly 400 hours of training each. Included in this training was the Business Coalition for Women’s Cert IV in leadership and management.
    Several PacTow staff had received this training which specifically prepares talented and high potential women for senior positions.
  •  Business Coalition for Women: The ‘Coalition’ produces resources to help the PNG business community improve their gender equality credentials and take advantage of the business benefits of having more gender diverse workforces. PacTow is a foundation member and long term supporter of the Coalition.
    Papenfus sits on its board and publicly endorses its products.
    Importantly, PacTow implements its programmes (example Cert IV in leadership & management, gender smart safety) to the benefit of its female staff and also sponsors coalition events.
    PacTow agrees that this year’s World Maritime Day theme of ‘Empowering Women in the Maritime Community’ serves as an opportunity to highlight the important contribution of women within the maritime sector which has long been a male-dominated industry.
    Ingip, reports that “in increasing numbers, our female staff are maintaining and repairing engines, steering and berthing vessels, providing valuable input on complex projects, and making management decisions, all of which contribute to PacTow’s success and its increasing contribution to PNG’s economy.”
    Pacific Towing’s headquarter is in Papua New Guinea and has businesses in Solomon Islands and Fiji.
    Towage, mooring, salvage, commercial diving, and liferafts are Pacific Towing’s core services.
    However, the company is increasingly sought out to provide customised solutions in diverse project settings.