I acknowledge the traditional owners of the lands on which we meet, and pay my respects to elders past, present and emerging.
I extend a warm welcome to all leaders from across business and government joining us today - from Papua New Guinea, Australia, our region and the world.
My particular thanks to Tracey Spicer and the President of PNG Core, Anthony Smare.
This forum is about all of us working together to find new pathways for investment and development and maximising the dynamic and growing trade relationships that do so much to benefit the people of both PNG and Australia.
I also want to acknowledge my friend, Prime Minister James Marape.
Over recent years we've shared in so many memories and celebrated so many milestones in the PNG-Australia relationship.
We've each had the honour of addressing the other's national parliament including the great personal honour and privilege I had to be the first foreign Head of Government to address the Parliament of PNG.
We've trekked Kokoda side by side and step by step.
At Isurava we honoured the bond between our people and the ANZAC legacy we share, forged in the hardship and the pain of the Second World War.
In October, we watched the NRL Grand Final together, here in Sydney.
And in what was a spectacular occasion, we celebrated 50 years of PNG's Independence in Port Moresby.
At that terrific Golden Jubilee we came together to look back on a nation-shaping moment in the history of both of our great countries and to look ahead to our shared future.
There are certain values that link these moments that lend them a special significance and connect them.
A sense of mutual respect between our nations.
A deep trust.
And an appreciation for the history and geography that unites us and our peoples.
As leaders, it is those values, the values of the citizens we serve the values our people have defended together in war and built together in peace that underpin all we seek to do within the PNG-Australia relationship.
The enduring strength of those values is proved by the friendships and connections we see here today.
We are the nearest of neighbours.
We are the closest of friends.
And with the signing of the Pukpuk Treaty - we are allies, too.
Pukpuk is important.
An acknowledgment that our mutual security in the Pacific comes naturally from within our Pacific family.
For Australia, it is only our third alliance - and the first in more than seven decades.
It is without a doubt an historic moment and it formalises a deep and enduring truth.
We are mates. We are equals.
As Prime Minister Marape has put it before:
"Australia and PNG are equal partners - relating, coexisting, working side by side going forward into the future."
We have built our nations together.
We are allies in protecting sovereignty and defending democracy.
And importantly, we are allies in prosperity.
Because it is in each other that we find our most reliable and abundant sources of friendship and it is with each other that we also find our most reliable and abundant sources of economic opportunity.
Friends,
Australia is committed to remaining a proud and reciprocal economic partner of PNG.
A record $8.1 billion in goods flowed between our two nations in 2024-2025 alone.
PNG's exports to Australia continue to flourish.
And while raw materials are an important feature of our trade relationship, they are by no means the whole of it.
New investments to strengthen biosecurity mean PNG's dynamic agriculture sector can continue to thrive and grow its market access.
Exports of vanilla, coffee and cocoa beans to Australia are growing strongly diversifying our trade relationship and proving that Australian markets are hungry for PNG's exceptional produce.
Infrastructure investments are helping local producers take their goods to port - and to market - via better, safer, more reliable roads.
We are backing the upgrade of 47 kilometres of the Wau Highway connecting communities and boosting commerce across the Morobe Province.
And we are committed to sealing the Kokoda Highway in partnership with the PNG Government - a fitting name for a joint project, given our history.
We are investing over $600 million to help upgrade five critical ports in PNG - because for a nation of 600 islands, we know that sea-trade is crucial for growth.
And in a region where climate change is an existential threat, we are helping PNG attract a greater share of international climate finance.
Building infrastructure and supporting agriculture that can withstand more severe weather patterns.
All of these projects are concerned with backing local jobs, construction and supply chains within PNG.
So the benefits of these new developments and the enhanced trade that come with them flow straight back into PNG, strengthening its status as an essential economic partner in the Pacific.
We are also proud to be investing in PNG's greatest resource: its people and their capacity.
Better health facilities, new opportunities in education and skills, more resilient energy and communications technology - these are the building blocks for stronger communities and better lives.
They are also investments in a more dynamic, more productive and more prosperous economy.
But just as investing in our people and our trade creates economic opportunity - so too does investing in our shared culture.
For every one of us in this room, I know the entry of the PNG Chiefs into the NRL is a deeply exciting prospect.
It's a celebration of shared culture between PNG and Australia, certainly.
But it also represents new opportunities for investment.
Footy games held in Port Moresby.
Increased tourism and economic activity.
The development and upgrade of key infrastructure.
All of this holds massive economic potential for PNG.
Because the PNG Chiefs are about furthering the love of the game and backing PNG to flourish grasping with both hands the investment that flows with elite sport.
That's something we are already seeing, with Qantas announcing last week direct flights between Sydney and Port Moresby will resume in March.
It's all part of welcoming a country which has given so much to rugby league into a competition where they so obviously belong.
Friends,
As you spend this week furthering and building opportunities for our two nations to grow and reflect on the two threads which run through all we do together.
The thread of prosperity that benefits and belongs to our two peoples.
And the thread of our mateship.
That is the story of everything we have achieved together in trade, in education, in our mutual defence and infrastructure.
And that is the next chapter we have to write together.
To ensure every Pacific nation can author their own destiny.
To secure the future of the beautiful region we all call home.
As Prime Minister Marape says: Papua New Guinea and Australia are two houses, with one fence.
And we both benefit, we all benefit, from a neighbourhood that is more peaceful, more stable and more prosperous.
Where sovereignty is upheld and democracy is supported.
Where investment is encouraged and trade is sustained.
Where we work together, each day, to benefit the people we serve.
To honour our shared history.
And to grasp the opportunities of our shared future.
