The federal government needs to help the ABC expand its South Pacific profile and engagement now!

You will most likely struggle to find support for the ABC on this website! So it is an interesting challenge to set out the case for some modest additional funding for the ABC - radio and television!

Last year, the Managing Director of the ABC signalled he would be asking the Federal Government for a special allocation of $12 million to enable the ABC to expand Radio Australia's FM Pacific Service footprint and for the re-establishment of three satellite feeds for the ABC International TV service, ABC Australia.

The funding would also enable the ABC to employ more journalists in the region (much needed) and provide some technical support for the National Broadcasting Corporation of PNG, which has been really struggling through underfunding and poor resourcing.

We know from David Anderson this request was flagged with the government last year. When he appeared before a Senate Committee in February nothing had eventuated.

Someone - again - needs to put a very large rocket under DFAT and probably Treasury and Finance. This is a modest proposal - given the total ABC budget is around $1 billion a year!

The ABC's once substantial presence in our immediate region was put into reverse gear when the Abbott Government in 2014 stupidly cut funding for the ABC's overseas broadcasting operations.

This was really poor policy.  Distinguished former ABC journalists such as Sean Dorney have been campaigning for it to be restored and increased.

One would have though an "alert" DFAT would have moved swiftly to support the ABC with the proposal expansion - which amounts to a re-engagement - given that this is probably the most "consequential" year for Papua New Guinea in some time with national elections to be held in May-June.

It is also a consequential year as China is unquestionably expanding its presence and influence in PNG, and the Solomon Islands in particular. It is also no coincidence when it about the same time as the disastrous 2014-2015 Australian Budget that China really stepped up its engagement in PNG, to be followed four or five years later by the Solomon Islands.

But there is another reason why some urgency should be attached to the ABC request. The Federal Government has effectively "underwritten" the acquisition by Telstra of Digicel, which has a never substantial presence in PNG and a number of our other neighbours.

As Telstra prepares to meet the many challenges associated with the acquisition you would have hoped that DFAT would see the obvious synergy that a great ABC presence - radio and television - would do Telstra no harm whatsoever!

The Federal Government will go into "caretaker" mode with the next couple of weeks. Is it too much to ask for the $12 million sought by the ABC to be approved before then?

Ideally that would give the ABC to expand its footprint in PNG, to employ more journalists in PNG and elsewhere in the region to boost its coverage of the PNG national elections, and regional issues - including China's growing influence which inevitably will extend more and more into the communications fields across the region.

China's footprint is generally substantial - it can be argued that a greater role in radio and television communications is inevitable and imminent.

The more the ABC can broaden its presence the better placed Australia will be to counter China's communications expansion. And the sooner the better of course!

The proposal increases some technical support for the NBC of Papua New Guinea - which has a long and historic association with the ABC.

Papua New Guinea is slowly but surely expanding literacy. The education system has serious shortcomings, but literacy is improving.

With the majority of the population (say 80 per cent) still living in rural and remote communities, communications via radio and television is a challenge. In recent years, the rapid expansion of mobile phone and internet services has helped improve communications and enhance literacy.

Australia gives PNG around $500 million year in "development assistance" in various forms - some good, some frankly useless.

Is it too much to ask that an extra $12 million to vastly improve the ABC's services in PNG, and other neighbours such as the Solomon Islands and Vanuatu, at a time when it would be highly beneficial?

That the ABC has not even had a response is to be regretted.

There is time to correct that!

Is it too much to ask that it happens before the Parliament is dissolved before our national elections?

Surely not!!