Prime Minister Fiame Naomi Mataafa attended two high-level meetings at the Pacific Island Forum Leaders Meeting on Wednesday in Rarotonga in the Cook Islands.

Fiame attended the Pacific ACP Leaders Meeting which was followed by a meeting with the heads of the CROP agencies which are all regional institutions whose programs are driven by the goals set by the Forum.

The Pacific ACP Leaders meeting was an important one for Samoa as it hosts the all-important signing of the Samoa Agreement next week.

She then joined the CROP meeting with heads of the University of the South Pacific, the Pacific Community, SPREP [Secretariat of the Pacific Regional Environment Programme] and the Forum Fisheries Agencies who provide the opportunity for Forum Leaders to meet with CROP Heads who will report and provide policy advice on the implementation of the leaders priority initiatives.

In many ways, while leaders carry the aspirations of collective action in the Pacific, the very realisation of this vision lies with the regional agencies. They have the role of advising, developing and implementing the Pacific’s collective decisions and instructions.

Forum Chair and Cook Islands Prime Minister Mark Brown told the heads of CROP agencies that as a region, the Pacific has come together to develop the 2050 Strategy for the Blue Pacific Continent.

“We have, with your support, articulated the regional collective actions that now make up the 2050 Strategy Implementation Plan. We will now rely on your leadership to ensure that these priorities are implemented and progressed in the coming years,” he said in his remarks.

“Let me be clear – the 2050 Strategy is not and will not sit on a shelf to gather dust. If it is to truly guide our collective aspirations, it will require dedicated and consistent support to implement and this is something we cannot do alone as countries.

“You, our CROP agencies, are vital to the realisation of our collective vision in the 2050. Our collective expectations of the CROP are simple: coordination, collaboration and delivery of our regional priorities.

“We can all appreciate the complexities and hurdles to achieving these, but it is now imperative that we work towards meeting these three objectives.

“The continued refinement and reform of our CROP system is a vital and necessary first step to ensure that each of our agencies, and the network as a whole is fit for purpose to deliver on the 2050 IP and the Review of the Regional Architecture will be critical to our efforts to ensure that this is the case. 

"But as we are all too familiar in the Pacific, the effectiveness of our systems depends on the personalities who lead these very systems – in essence our heads of CROP agencies.”