INQUIRY INTO STRENGTHENING AUSTRALIA’S RELATIONSHIPS WITH COUNTRIES IN THE PACIFIC REGION Submission to the Joint Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade by the Office of the Pacific, Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT) June 2020 CONTENTS INQUIRY INTO STRENGTHENING AUSTRALIA’S RELATIONSHIPS WITH COUNTRIES IN THE PACIFIC REGION INTRODUCTION 3 CONTEXT 4 IMPACTS OF COVID-19 ON THE PACIFIC AND AUSTRALIA’S ENGAGEMENT 5 IMPLEMENTATION OF THE STEP-UP: ECONOMIC PROSPERITY, SHARED SECURITY & PEOPLE CONNECTIONS IN THE PACIFIC 7 REACHING OUTSIDE GOVERNMENT TO STRENGTHEN THE STEP-UP 10 REFLECTING THE PRIORITY NEEDS OF THE PACIFIC 12 CONCLUSION 14 Inquiry into strengthening Australia’s relationships with countries in the Pacific Region 2 INTRODUCTION Australia’s relationships with its neighbours in the Pacific region are anchored in our common interests and values, our shared history, decades of sustained engagement and our collective interests in a stable, resilient and prosperous Pacific. In partnership over many years with the countries of our region, Australia has worked to help grow economies, to build resilience and to enhance regional stability through our development programs, our defence, policing and border security cooperation and our humanitarian and disaster responses in times of need. As a long-standing partner, Australia has recognised the need to do more to support our Pacific family. The Pacific Step-up is a commitment to lift the ambition and scope of Australia’s engagement, elevating the Pacific to one of our highest foreign policy priorities and making it a central component of Australia’s long-term objective of shaping an open, inclusive and prosperous Indo-Pacific. At the time of writing this submission, Australian and Pacific governments and communities are grappling with the health and economic challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic. Australia has made it a priority to work with Pacific partners to prepare for and respond to the virus, as well as to plan for recovery. Australia is re-orienting our Pacific development assistance and Step-up initiatives to do this. The challenge is unprecedented, events fluid and our approach evolving. We are continuing our discussions across the region on how we can best chart a path to economic recovery and build resilience to future pandemics. This submission outlines Australia’s enduring approach to the Pacific and the current status of Australia’s Step-up initiatives. Our current work with the Pacific in the face of the pandemic benefits from the enhanced levels of cooperation we have been building through the Pacific Step- up. This submission also sets out how we have adapted many Step-up programs given travel and other restrictions, and how we have reprioritised our engagement to support our region’s pandemic response. The Office of the Pacific (OTP), DFAT, would be happy to engage further with the Committee as the inquiry proceeds and our COVID-19 Pacific response evolves. OTP would also be pleased to provide further details on any of our Step-up programs at the Committee’s request. Inquiry into strengthening Australia’s relationships with countries in the Pacific Region 3 CONTEXT As articulated in Australia’s 2017 Foreign Policy White Paper, the stability and sustainable economic progress of the Pacific is of fundamental importance to Australia. Many Pacific island countries face significant development challenges. Small formal economies, distance from major markets, high costs, and rapidly growing young populations hamper economic sustainability. Governance and capacity constraints in some countries limit their ability to deliver services and manage broader regional challenges, such as illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) fishing and transnational crime. Climate change has been identified by our region as the single greatest threat to the livelihoods, security and well-being of Pacific peoples (in the 2018 Boe Declaration on Regional Security). Up to 60 per cent of Pacific women and girls have experienced violence at the hands of partners or family members and women and girls in the Pacific face significant challenges as a result of gender inequality. Under the Step-up, Australia is both pursuing new approaches to work in partnership with our region to strengthen our impact, and making our highest-ever contribution to Pacific development – reaching an estimated $1.4 billion of development assistance in 2019-20. No single country or organisation can tackle the challenges in the Pacific on its own. Strong bilateral and regional partnerships are necessary. Australia continues to advance Pacific regionalism, including through our membership of the Pacific Islands Forum (PIF). We welcome and support regional efforts to ensure a stronger collective Pacific voice on the international stage. How we engage is just as important as what we do in the Pacific. OTP, led by a Senior Executive Service Band 3 Head, has been created within DFAT to coordinate and deliver this ambitious whole- of-government agenda. The Step-up has been embedded across government. Regular close consultation with the Pacific, through dialogue between leaders, officials, business and civil society representatives and the expansion of our diplomatic network (already the largest across our region), helps align our work with regional priorities. OTP has supported Ministers to sustain a high tempo of engagement through virtual and other means even when COVID-19-related restrictions impede travel. Our efforts are helping to underline Australia’s deep, long-term commitment to our region. Inquiry into strengthening Australia’s relationships with countries in the Pacific Region 4 IMPACTS OF COVID-19 ON THE PACIFIC AND AUSTRALIA’S ENGAGEMENT Australia has been monitoring closely the health and economic impacts of COVID-19 across our region since its emergence in early 2020, mindful of the limited capacity of many Pacific island country health systems to handle a major outbreak. At the time of writing, there have been few cases of COVID-19 in the Pacific. As at 23 June, there had been 27 confirmed cases in Pacific countries1. However, the pandemic will likely have a severe economic impact in our region, in particular for those countries that rely heavily on tourism and commodity exports. While the COVID-19 virus does not discriminate, its impacts do. Women are overrepresented in the hardest hit economic sectors, including tourism, services, hospitality, and the informal economy. It is harder for women to access critical health services, including for sexual and reproductive health services, because the prioritisation of COVID-19 among weak health systems limits remaining health services. Women comprise the majority of the health workforce, and also take on the majority of unpaid care work at home, which not only impacts health workforce capability, but also increases women’s exposure to infection. All around the world, including in the Pacific, marked increases in gender-based violence have followed the onset of quarantine and social distancing measures. Gender equality and the empowerment of women and girls is one of Australia’s highest aid investment priorities, globally and in the Pacific. The new depth to our Pacific partnerships delivered through the Pacific Step-up has positioned Australia well to support regional responses to the COVID-19 pandemic. Australia moved quickly to provide substantial support to countries in our region to respond to their acute needs. We are redirecting our development assistance program and Pacific Step-Up initiatives, bringing forward funding for critical health services and working with our partners to help mitigate the economic impacts. We are also helping to plan for recovery. Since January, we have responded to over 80 requests from Pacific island countries and Timor- Leste2. We have provided support for public information campaigns, laboratories, medical supplies (including COVID-19 testing supplies and personal protective equipment), health expertise and for the World Health Organization’s regional preparedness plan. The Pacific is benefiting from new regional health security partnerships, involving many of Australia’s premier health and medical research institutions, focused on laboratory strengthening, disease surveillance, field epidemiology and infection prevention and control. In the early stages of COVID-19, Australia also assisted students from Vanuatu and PNG to leave Wuhan, China and complete quarantine in Australia so they could return to their home countries. Building on this early response, the Australian Government’s Partnerships for Recovery policy redirects over $280 million from within existing development program resources, including over 1 Excluding US and French territories. 2 Timor-Leste participates in a number of the programs Australia is delivering through the Pacific Step-up such as the AIFFP and labour mobility initiatives. Inquiry into strengthening Australia’s relationships with countries in the Pacific Region 5 $205 million for the Pacific and Timor-Leste. This consists of $100 million to manage health, economic and social impacts, $44 million to immediate response and recovery efforts, $45 million for an essential services and humanitarian corridor and community responses, and $17 million on other initiatives including for multilateral responses in the region and investments focused on responding to the differential impact of COVID-19 on women and girls. Additionally, we have adapted Australia’s bilateral aid programs