In everyday international affairs, the South Pacific is a "boutique issue": small, specialized and fashionable. The South Pacific is a small issue in relative terms on the international stage, it is fashionable for the epistemic community on climate change and international development, and it is a specialized issue in the sense that it captures the detailed attention of only a select audience – those concerned with erosion of "natural" or "desired" foreign influences in the region. The overwhelming majority of international studies scholars here in China, I dare say, have even difficulty differentiating Melanesian, Micronesian and Polynesian cultural traditions of the societies in an area that's collectively known as "the South Pacific".
Nonetheless, I see a parallel, if appropriate, between interest in discussing China's interest in the South Pacific today with that of Japan in the mid-1990s. Back then, many traditional Pacific powers – including the United States – were reducing their presence in the region. In October 1997, Japan hosted its first-ever summit with the Pacific Islands, after three decades of interactions with the island countries through aid and investment. Most of the Pacific Island economies were still aid dependent and were receptive of the Japanese outreach. American commentaries characterized Japan's approach as being "assertive".
There are discernable patterns in Chinese and Japanese approaches. For China (and Japan), interaction with the low-income countries as a group makes sense in terms of efficiency, after all, international development agencies routinely use geographical groupings in their work, if only for the convenience of encouraging self-referencing.
In 1990, China became the sixth partner of the Pacific Islands Forum's Post Forum Dialogue. In 1999, the China-Pacific Islands Forum Cooperation Fund was established and China donated funds to the secretariat. The Pacific Island Forum opened a trade office in Beijing in 2002. Chinese economic engagement with the Forum and its members cover the usual scope of trade, investment, development assistance, and tourism.
Fast forward to today. On October 21, 2021, the first China-Pacific Island Countries (PICs) Foreign Ministers' Meeting was held via video link. In terms of political diplomacy, by recognizing the PIC as a total body, China has given the group a combined identity and decision-making capability.
On May 30, 2022, China released a draft of a document entitled "China's Position Paper on Mutual Respect and Common Development with Pacific Island Countries". Starting the same day, China's Foreign Minister, Wang Yi, was on his trip to seven of the mainly small island nations including the Solomon Islands, Kiribati, Samoa, Fiji, Tonga, Vanuatu and Papua New Guinea, in addition to Timor-Leste. The same trip also saw the second China-PICs foreign ministers' meeting taking place. Releasing of the document is preceded by a list of cooperation records between the Chinese provinces of Guangdong, Fujian and Shandong and various PIC economies.
The document on development virtually got lost in the chorus in international media reports that focused on a security agreement also presented by China. But it deserves a fast mention.
Trade. "According to statistics of the Chinese side, from 1992 to 2021, total trade volume between China and PICs having diplomatic relations with China grew from USD 153 million to USD 5.3 billion, registering an average annual increase of 13% and expanding by over 30 times in 30 years".
Investment. "According to initial statistics of the Chinese side, by the end of 2021, China's direct investment in PICs having diplomatic relations with China had reached USD 2.72 billion".
Cooperation among customs, inspection and quarantine authorities of China, Fiji, Tonga, Samoa and PNG have been signed on animal and plant sanitation, food safety, and product access, dating back to 2006.
Other areas of cooperation include ocean affairs, disaster prevention and mitigation, and climate change, agriculture and fishery, education, tourism, sports, women's affairs, etc. In short, China is taking an all-of-government approach to interacting with the PIC economies, those that have formal diplomatic ties with Beijing, that is.
Now, the topic for discussion is not so much what China pledges to offers the PICs or whether or not it overperforms or underperforms, especially in development assistance. Rather, departing from the premise that further integration of the PIC economies into the global supply chains is in line with the goals of reduction of aid dependency and enhancement of internal economic dynamism, it is useful to contemplate feasibilities of mutual accommodation if not cooperation in the traditional sense of the term among China, Australia, New Zealand, the United States and virtually all other economic entities outside the Pacific Islands region.
First, let's be realistic. The modality of tripartite cooperation that saw the water supply project among Cook Islands, China and New Zealand (2012-2014) and the malaria control project among PNG, Australia and China (2014-2018) is diplomatically-politically challenging. Regional geopolitics dynamics has changed. In theory, a potential aid recipient can propose a tripartite arrangement. But, when competition is the rule of the thumb for Australia and New Zealand to view Chinese activities in the South Pacific region, there is little chance for arguments of value in cooperative arrangements to prevail. But, all is not lost. In 2019, Guangdong Province of China, building on the prior experience through trilateral cooperation, established the Shenzhen-PNG anti-malaria demonstration center.
Second, there needs to be a fuller understanding of factual aspects of the PIC economies in the regional and global supply chains. Too often, studies that try to shed light on Chinese business connections in the region do a better job of zooming in on Chinese activities, eschewing the extent to which they are part of the economies of the individual countries and ties among them. In addition, such studies – customarily done by think tanks based in Australia and/or New Zealand – are more interested in contemplating implications for "traditional powers". While this is understandable, it is far from satisfying, assuming that promotion of self-generation of dynamics of PIC economies is the end goal.
Third, policy research efforts are more sensibly advised to pursue the subject of multilateralism in economic development of the PIC region through recognizing that product and supply chains are multilateral by nature. In other words, short of deployment of economic sanctions on a particular economy involved, the seemingly bilateral business activities ought to be treated with a sense of ease. This is particularly true for PIC economies, which often ranks low in terms of attraction in size for inflow of foreign direct investments.
In this regard, sentiments of "friend shoring" may be politically savvy, at least under current circumstances. But, if pursued as a guidance, it would risk depriving a PIC economy of having project development opportunities.
Fourth, with the ecology being fragile in all PIC economies, discussions about foreign investments ought to focus on standards – technical as well as managerial – for entry. The point here is to prevent a race to the bottom when it comes to tasks like protection of the natural environment and worker's rights. Multilateral efforts at technical training – with an investment recipient being put into the pivotal position – can go a long way in building up local economic capacities.
Last but not least, business and research interests in Southeast and South Asia should be brought into the equation for exploration of feasible multilateralist approaches to economic activities in the PIC region. Post-WWII Southeast Asian entities weathered through phases of geostrategic and geo-economic competition among major powers and arguably, prevailed far more remarkably than other regions of the world. Enlisting their participation can help mitigate against (geopolitical) competition driven instincts on the part of major countries today.
This paper is based on the author's speech at the conference "Australia and China in the Pacific: the Business Perspective", organized by the Business School and Center for China Studies of Sydney University, July 21-22, 2022.
