Is development aid still serving the Australian national interest?

A key to Wafi going ahead is affordable and reliable power. Ramu 2 cannot deliver that!!

The way China is exercising a greater presence despite reducing aid surely requires Canberra to take notice.

Let me use PNG as an example. We currently give PNG about $600 million a year in development assistance. It is spread between 50 and 100 projects, diminishing its effectiveness. And much of the aid is delivered by contractors resulting in upwards of 50 per cent of our aid being "boomerang aid" meaning it never even gets to Papua New Guinea!!

The Albanese Government needs to urgently review our whole approach to engaging with our neighbours. By any measure it is just ineffective. It has, in my view, outlived its effectiveness.

That review needs to look at what China is doing.... because it is working.

First it needs to engage the private sector more fully in its engagement. It can do so effectively by helping fund joint ventures between Australian and PNG companies.

I would allocate half the existing aid budget to joint ventures that promote the PNG private sector and boost trade.

It might also include Australia buying more of PNG's produce, notably coffee and cocoa, and seafood. The package could also subsidise freight to Australia and assistance with plantation rehabilitation and other measures to improve productivity.

China is talking about taking more of PNGs coffee production. But it would be at China's price. We should get in first.

Secondly, half the aid budget should be made available to the NGO sector and Christian churches. That will reduce the number of DFAT bureaucrats!

The NGOs and churches are well placed to partner with PNG counterparts to deliver programs that cut out red tape and really benefit the 10 million people of PNG.

I well recall the visit to PNG by Prime Minister Rudd over a decade ago, The Grand Chief asked his office to seek my view on where PM Rudd should be taken when in PNG. I suggested he be taken to Goroka where the late Kela Smith was Governor.