Transcript
PETER NUTTALL: It's not a question of regulation. There are systemic issues that have to be addressed and one of them is simply the lack of investment. You talk about 'commercial' routes. There are some commercial routes in the Pacific, there are some routes where it is viable to economically run a boat and make profit out of it. There are many, many routes in the Pacific where it simply isn't the case. Maritime transport is a public good for the Pacific. It's not so much an economic activity as a public necessity. So you've got a situation here where you've got the start of a new school year, you've got people on an isolated outer island wanting to move to the capital. It's unfair to call that a commercial route. Shipping up here is marginal, economically marginal. There are very few ship operators, especially in the outer remote islands, which are running a profit. You end up with old boats, really poorly maintained, poorly qualified seamen, no money for maintenance programmes, huge demand for travel and people trying to meet that need so it becomes really difficult when a ferry goes down to turn around and say you're a commercial operator, you're responsible and there's something of a witch hunt going on at the moment which I don't think is entirely justified. You have to look at the wider scenario. We're in a situation at the moment where the New Zealand government, aid development, bilateral partners have put $2 billion plus into a programme for one specific purpose, to reduce diesel dependency in the Pacific. Now up here in the Pacific one of our largest burners of fossil fuel is maritime but all the money that we have put up so far is going into electricity. If we'd diverted some of that funding into putting better generation shipping availability we might not have some of the problems we currently have.
SALLY ROUND: So just tell us about some of the initiatives that you're working on, in terms of sustainable shipping that might help in future.
PN: You know when this issue of decarbonisation comes about, the Pacific has been highly active in international theatre and the Paris Agreement - currently in the International Maritime Organisation calling for decarbonisation across all energy sectors - transport has lagged behind every other sector. Maritime transport has lagged even further and we're struggling to understand why there is a lack of emphasis in this area when there is so much technology that is available, there are so many simple solutions that are available that are not even being trialled, not prioritised that could make enormous difference not only in impacting on the amount of fossil fuel burnt in the industry but providing better generation technology, more appropriate, more affordable and cleaner technology. Now that can actually be done at remarkably low cost. There were experiments done here in Fiji in the 1980s in the last oil crisis where for minimal investment, large ferries were fitted with sails and we were saving 23 to 30 percent across all routes in Fiji. So the technology's available, the savings have been demonstrated, there are a huge range of research partners across the world. We're currently working with people in England, in Germany, in Holland who would love to come out here and work on this issue. There is just no political prioritisation of it as yet.
SR: Can you just draw the line between sustainable shipping and better safety.
PN: If you have newer ships, if you have better technology, you're obviously going to have higher standards of safety. If you don't have to spend 50, 60, 70 percent of your operational capital on putting fossil fuel into a boat, you have more money to spend on safety. You have more money to spend on maintenance, you can pay better rates, you can pay better wages. I mean I have a PhD in the field but you don't need it, it's not rocket science.
SR: Is it happening anywhere in the Pacific?
PN: Yes. The initiative that we're running in the Marshall Islands - the Marshall Islands, of course, the only Pacific state that has set a firm target for transport emission reduction in the Pacific. Of all the countries in the Pacific, only the Marshalls actually went to Paris and said we want to reduce our transport emissions, so what we're doing in the Marshalls is designed a whole country framework to transition the Marshall Islands to a low carbon transport framework and the German government has been the first cab off the ranks. They've come in with a 9.5 million Euro project. We're looking at the government shipping fleet and small ships along the scale of the ship that was lost in Kiribati and going how can we build and supply better generation shipping, reduce fuel bills and increase connectivity, affordable connectivity between the island states?
