Papua New Guinea’s Minister of Labour Mr Sani Rambi signed a memorandum of understanding with his Fiji counterpart Mr Filipe Bole today to provide technical assistance in the field of Occupational Safety and Health (OSH) as it’s known in PNG.
The signing is also significant since it is done on World day of Occupational Safety and Health.
Mr Bole advised the Fijian Labour Ministry would undertake this reform in three phases form June to December 2011 until June 2012 on a need basis.
PNG’s Labour Minister said the employment boom in PNG saw the need for assistance from Fiji.
“This is a transition period for the people of Papua New Guinea, we are going through a lot of mining booms - the oil and the gas industry , it’s timely that we need this technical assistance from Fiji.”
“We bring into the country more than 20,000 expertise from offshore to develop, especially the gas industry that will come into production in about 2014 which means PNG will really take off,” Mr Rambi said
“I call this the transition period because we need this technical assistance especially on OSH so the Government of Fiji can assist us attend to this employment boom that we are having in PNG. It’s timely that we are signing this document today.”
Mr Bole said labour inspectors in Fiji have the equipment and overseas training to supplement their training internally here. They also have very high degree of expertise that is why we do not get anymore expertise from overseas.
The PNG Government is ready to set up a unit within its labour ministry to take on board the MOU signing, where a new division within the department of labour is going to be set up.
During the 18th MSG Leaders Summit last month, Ministry of Labour permanent secretary Mr Taito Waqa said the Prime Minister of Fiji made his full commitment for the Fijian Government to provide assistance to ensure regional intergration and cooperation.