Our Island Cousins

 

Why you should consider mentoring a pacific business
By Markerita Poutasi

You’re living in a Pacific country. For many of us that statement is non-controversial, particularly for the 260,000 New Zealanders that can call on cultural heritage and roots from any one of the 28 countries or territories that make up the Pacific Islands’ region. If it’s news to you, you are not alone. Every year, I meet people who do not associate New Zealand and the Pacific region as being integral to each other. Those long forgotten compulsory social studies classes of our youth may have mentioned that New Zealand is geographically part of the Pacific triangle, but what does that mean in the 21st century when foreign policy settings increasingly look north to the tiger economies in Asia for growth? Do we tend to sometimes skip over, miss-out or forget about our long association and connection with the “large ocean states” of the Southern, Western and Northern Pacific? What’s our place in the neighbourhood?
As a person of Samoan/New Zealand descent who grew up in a century where New Zealand began embracing its cultural complexity, I have come to realise (obviously before reaching age 10) that not everyone is Samoan, Tongan, Cook Islands, Fijian, Niuen, Ni-Vanuatu, I-Kiribati or Tokelaun-centric. In my professional career, I’ve had the privilege of travelling widely and working in the Pacific region. Our connections are not just people-to-people, historical or post-colonial. There are thousands of Kiwis working and playing in the Pacific each year and two-way trade is consistently over $1.2billion in goods alone. Every year, thousands of Kiwis venture “home” or travel for leisure in the region. And there is a return flow as well.