'Hooked on the canneries, accustomed to access to the United States escape hatch and reliant on limited US funds to keep local government and services going, the territory has done little to find other means of earning its keep...'


What is the future of American Samoa? This question is always on the minds of the United States territory's thinking residents and rightfully so. They have cause for worry about the future.

The question is posed here again following the publication in October by the United States Department of Labour of a minimum pay award for American Samoa.

The award contains facts and figures that should fuel renewed debate about the territory's fate. Hourly pay rates will rise by five percent over the next two years for nearly everyone.

But (at November 2004) for the 4738 workers in two tuna canneries, their hourly rate will stay on at US$3.60. Cannery workers will still remain better off than some other workers whose minimum hourly rate after the full five percent will be US$3 or less.

Of the 12,264 employees at October 2004, 5124 or 41.79% of the total labour force were government workers collecting an average of US$7.99 an hour, more than double the average pay of private business workers.

Do those figures suggest that American Samoa is horribly overburdened by over government?

A lot of cannery workers are citizens of independent Samoa, 64 kilometres from American Samoa. Their numbers are so large that the two canneries, one United States-owned and the world's largest, the other Thai-owned, are as nearly important to Samoa's economy as they are to American Samoa's.

The thought of the closure of the canneries is a terrifying one for both countries.

Where would American Samoa be left if they shut down? It is a thought so alarming that the territory's people can hardly bear to entertain.

The reason the cannery workers didn't get a pay rise was to ensure the canneries stayed open. Both cannery companies say they will be sticking around at Pago Pago, but the tuna cannery industry is fiercely competitive internationally.

As the Labour Department report points out, the Pago Pago canneries which ship their products to the United States, the world's greatest canned tuna market under special preference, have genuine worries about their security.

These include competition from other canneries with lower labour costs and weaker safety and environmental laws, a weak American market, low canned tuna prices, relatively ineffective tariffs, general economic uncertainty and the evolution of free trade that are or could enable foreign competitors to land their products in the United States more cheaply.

So, suppose the canneries do close. Several thousand people would be out of work, including several hundred people engaged on servicing Pago Pago-based fishing boats, and people who could not be kept in employment by assorted businesses dependent on business from the canning and fishing businesses.

Could the government keep all those 5000 people on US$7.99 an hour on its payroll? In recent months, some American Samoan politicians and businessmen have lamented that:

• A century of United States colonial rule has produced a place that is utterly and completely dependent on continuing American rule of style inappropriate for a small 21st century developing country, that's if American Samoa can be regarded as being a developing country.
• For American Samoa, tourism, now the greatest single earner and employer for most Pacific Islands countries, is virtually zero. American Samoa is a pretty place. American Samoan culture remains intact.

It's surprising how many people around the world have heard of Pago Pago and Sadie Thomson, and Rain, the associated short story. The trouble is getting to American Samoa.
Hooked as they are on Washington, D.C., 65,000 resident American Samoans can go to the United States any time they choose.

Hooked on the canneries, accustomed to access to the United States escape hatch, and reliant on limited United States government funds to keep local government and local services going, the territory has done little to find other means of earning its keep.

Attempts to attract serious investments have flopped and have even been embarrassing, such as the opening of Asian garment factories found subsequently to be using imported slave labour.

The territory exports nothing but fish caught by foreign vessels plus Samoans recruited as cannon fodder for Mr Bush's wars. Only about one-third of the territory's 195 square kilometres of land is any good for agriculture.

According to a 1990 survey, 88% of the 1126 small farms grew purely for household needs.

“Agriculture is relegated to third-tier priority,” the labour department commented. American Samoa has other serious worries-apart from no tourism, no exports but canned tuna and, perhaps one day, no canneries.

Yes, what does the future hold for American Samoa?