A group of nine workers left Port Moresby today towards Robinvale in Victoria to almond crop.
According to the plan, up to 2,500 visas were made available to workers from Kiribati, Tonga, Vanuatu and Papua New Guinea to work in Australia up to seven months in any 12 month period.
But since its introduction in August 2008, he has taken part only a couple of hundreds of workers of the Pacific - most of Tonga.
Chairman of seasonal workers from the PNG, Alexis Maino task force said that nine men PNG will work in Australia up to 4 months.
It is said, they had to go through a rigorous process to select the first batch of PNG seasonal workers.
Presenter: Firmin Nanol
Speaker: Alexis Maino, President of the force for the season worker of the PNG task
MAINO: Will go to Melbourne and Melbourne, the employer will be organized buses to take them to Robinvale in Victoria, which is where they will be based for the next four months.
NANOL: how the Papua New Guinea nine or ten selected and where they come from across the country?
MAINO: We are following the provisions of the memorandum of understanding we signed with the Australians last year and we have established what they call a ready labour pool and we work about 250 more or less of the reserve. Your request is usually highly dependent on the application by farmers in Australia. So that particular farmer based in Victoria, wanted to hire 10. Thus of the reservation took place about 20 of them recommended that the employer. To try to balance it out, we had 15 men and five women.
Later the businessman returned to say that only it would be necessary to male employees, the work will mainly be pruning of almond. We allow only 15 men and 15 men, the employer...Rental of work they were able to select ten and ten, nine are now. We have a very strict criteria to follow, knowledge of English, but focus primarily rural. So we have people of interest in rural areas and we have done that at this moment we have some of the Highlands of the East, some of East New Britain, and have some Central Province and morobe to Iran now.
NANOL: these nine men, it really have to do in Victoria?
MAINO: You will be working on the farm of almond and season of preparation is now complete, but it will be necessary to do the pruning and that, which is why you using small chainsaws to do all the work of pruning for the next four months until Septemberend of September should be going.
NANOL: how much are going to be paid in Australian dollars?
MAINO: Seeking $ 18, $19 an hour, so the rate is similar to any Australian worker. So that even within that period of four months, they may be a little fair of money and the idea is not for them and unnecessarily use revenues to win. We have another task force has been configured, because to configure by connecting them with the financial institution to help them start small businesses primarily out of rural areas.
Do NANOL: once these nine people finished after four months of seasonal work and back, there will be another batch down or it will depend on the needs of farmers and the farm in Australia or victory?
MAINO: Yes, some farmers have expressed interest, and I just returned from a forum of countries of sending work - with seasonal work in Tonga and while he was there I met with the Australians and New Zealanders staff members as representatives of the growers association. From Australia, there are one or two groups or farmers concerned to Papua New Guinea, which is why we are going to examine. The other, of course, which is New Zealand have only a New Guinea whose contracted in accordance with the New Zealand what they call recognised seasonal employer scheme. So I spoke to the Association of growers in the first place and he's going to do the work there, but they are usually willing to accept more Papua New Guinea there, for it is another area that we are going to start looking. But we have the approval of Cabinet for both our participation in the pilot scheme, as well as the New Zealand schema.
Do NANOL: collectively after four months, how much you think that they are likely to recover in Australian dollars?
MAINO: Being up about $20,000, and if you change in kina, which is a little right of money for an individual, a quantity that may help to start some small businesses.
NANOL: and Australia, which will take care of them, such as farm or another contractor of the work or hire the company?
MAINO: We have an agreement with the memorandum of understanding that the employer will provide housing, Medicare, pastoral care and all that. What is the part of the agreement which has been accepted by both Governments, Government of PNG and Australia.
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