Manage PNG’s capital well

Letters

I CHALLENGE the Government to table a holistic policy on the management of capital into and out of the country.
There is nothing done strategically to leverage the capital flight that is prevalent since Independence to change the accepted definition of PNG as a resource-rich but poor country per capita earnings and wealth distribution.
The high propensity to import and consume goods and services produced and supplied by foreign countries is one aspect of the outflows.
The other is the high rate on repatriation of earnings by transfer pricing of cost manipulation employed by most foreign-owned businesses.
The next is the normal 99 per cent remittance of earnings by non-national employees as well as nationals acquiring educational and medical services for their dependents abroad and other private needs and investments.
There is a lesser counter balance to that scenario, which results in the depletion of foreign reserves and depreciation of kina.
Other countries have effectively used strategic intervention incentive packages to attract and retain capital formation in the domestic market to translate into wealth creation, generation of new investments and jobs for those who come out of the education system.

GS