The South Pacific Conference, Suva

A talk presented by Lieutenant-Colonel F.W. Voelcker D.S.O. M.C. (ex-High Commissioner in Samoa).

It was decided in the 1947 Canberra Agreement to form the South Pacific Commission and was established that a conference would be held in two years time.

For the first time in history leaders of all the 16 island groups in the Pacific were brought together to discuss social and economic problems as opposed to politics, and share ideas and experiences.

The Conference met at the Nasinu Teachers' Training College, Suva in Fiji, April-May 1950.

He ends his address by lecturing New Zealanders on their paternalistic attitudes towards the peoples of the Pacific.