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Watch: Amid competition with China, Australia to allow kava import to boost Pacific ties

Reuters
Port Vila, VanuatuUpdated: Jan 16, 2019, 01:23 PM IST
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Photograph:(Reuters)

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To improve cultural ties, Morrison said Australia would remove restrictions on kava, a mildly intoxicating brew that is deeply embedded in the social fabric of Pacific islanders .

Australia will allow imports of the intoxicating drink kava, Prime Minister Scott Morrison said as he sought to forge closer ties with its Pacific neighbours amid growing Chinese interest in the region.

"Kava is an important product and has a successful market around the world and we have done a lot of work with Vanuatu to ensure some of those markets are opened up and that can include now to a greater extent, than has currently existed in Australia, for that to be realised as well," PM Morrison said.

Australia and China have been vying for influence in sparsely populated Pacific island countries that control vast swathes of resource-rich ocean. Vanuatu last year had signed up to China's Belt and Road initiative(BRI), just a few months after Australia promised to bolster its cyber-security capability.

"We're here because we believe in the region and always have. We've always been here. We will always be here supporting our friends and family and partners in the Pacific. We have done it for decades. In fact, we have been here for 40 years," the Australian prime minister said, adding,"we will continue to be here because we believe in the peace and prosperity and stability and independence and sovereignty of our region." 

To improve cultural ties, Morrison said Australia would remove restrictions on kava, a mildly intoxicating brew that is deeply embedded in the social fabric of Pacific islanders.

Morrison will next travel to Fiji on Thursday as part of a Pacific tour. Australia last year offered Pacific countries up to $2.16 billion in grants and cheap loans to build infrastructure.