At the historic launching of the first-ever “2050 Strategy for the Blue Pacific Continent,” the Secretary General of the Pacific Islands Forum Henry Puna commended Pacific Islands Forum (PIF) Chair and Prime Minister Frank Bainimarama for his exemplary leadership in strengthening the Pacific region’s solidarity.

Puna thanked Prime Minister Bainimarama for his unwavering support and commitment to uniting the Pacific Family and providing a vision and way forward for the region, to work together and build a resilient and inclusive Blue Pacific Continent.

“Let me thank the Prime Minister and Forum Chair for his stewardship of this august body over the course of the past 12 months. We have had our challenges as a family, and of course, we have had to continue to deal with broader issues such as COVID-19.”

“However, Chair, you have brought our family back together, and you have driven this organisation to produce a blueprint for its long-term survival and prosperity. The leadership you have shown these past months is the sort of exemplary leadership that we will require as we voyage into the future as one family, guided by our north star.”

“When our great, great-grandchildren look back in time, I am confident that they will identify this moment as the point in time where we as a region decided to change our course, our direction, and our destiny for the good of our people,” SG Puna said.

He assured Prime Minister Bainimarama of the Forum’s commitment to the effective implementation of the 2050 Blue Pacific Strategy.

“On this front, I am also pleased to be joined by my fellow Heads of CROP Agencies. Because, together, our shared promise is that we will work together as regional agencies; we will marshall our collective resources, and we will align our agencies to support the vision and the objectives of the 2050 Strategy. This is indeed our shared commitment to Leaders, to Members, and the wider people of the Blue Pacific Continent.”

Fiji assumed the Chair of the Pacific Islands Forum in August 2021, under the leadership of Prime Minister Bainimarama.