After 20 years building a successful transport company, Mapai Transport founder Jacob Luke is exploring ways to correct PNG’s trade imbalance with NZ, and providing training opportunities for young Papua New Guineans.

Mapai’s Jacob Luke and Grant Wakerley.

After commencing operations in 1985 with a single vehicle, Mapai Transport now has a staff of more than 300, and a fleet of 70 prime movers, 170 trailers, 20 delivery trucks (spread between Lae, Goroka and Mt Hagen, and Port Moresby), side lifters, forklifts and more than 900 containers.

In 2008, founder Jacob Luke set up Mapai Customs & Forwarding Agency services, primarily as an added value service to ensure the smooth movement of Mapai’s clients’ freight into PNG.

Now, Luke is looking south for the next venture, and the scope is broader than transport and logistics.

A NZ company, Mapai (NZ) Ltd. was formed 12 months ago, with Grant Wakerley appointed International Logistics Manager.

NZ Venture

‘Jacob has clearly given the board the mandate to move the company from just a purely transport and logistics business to a training business that does transport and logistics to pay the bills,’ Wakerley tells Business Advantage PNG from his office in Auckland.

‘This is a fundamental mind shift within the business and establishing a branch in NZ is part of that shift.

‘The team is currently exploring possibilities of trade within the Pacific region.’

‘The main driver for establishing an office in NZ is to boost export and import activities between PNG and NZ, particularly those companies that are working on exporting products from PNG to NZ.’

Pacific agriculture

Mapai Transport is one of the major freight providers along PNG’s Highlands Highway. Credit: Mapai Transport

The team is also currently exploring possibilities of trade within the Pacific region, particularly focused on the agricultural industry.

‘Mapai would like to participate in assisting this trade to happen,’ says Luke.

‘The NZ government has a number of initiatives around training for young Papua New Guineans, especially in agriculture, horticulture and science.’

‘We don’t necessarily have be the ones actually growing or be the end supplier, but we are hoping to be the catalyst to seeing things happen,’ adds Wakerley.

‘The driver is not income for Mapai. We want to see PNG create employment and income generating opportunities, particularly for the families in the remote rural areas,’ says Luke.

Training

‘They also want to set up ‘good solid training opportunities’ for Mapai staff in NZ, ‘giving the young people opportunity to learn skills that will see them set up for life.’

‘The NZ government has a number of initiatives around training for young Papua New Guineans, especially in agriculture, horticulture and sciences. Mapai sees these as growth areas that PNG must take advantage of,’ says Luke.

Mapai executives have been talking to the Pacific Cooperation Foundation and the Pacific Trade and Invest, which link projects within the Pacific nations to countries requiring certain produce and high value-added products.

‘We want to ensure that PNG is in that mix’, says Wakerley.

Wider focus

‘The appointment of Kevin Christie as CEO of the Mapai Group based in Lae means Jacob and I can now focus our attention on the wider programme, which also includes a development project in Monokam in the Enga Province,’ notes Wakerley. 

The Monokam project involves building infrastructure, including schoolrooms, teachers’ housing, and community facilities, including an all weather market.

‘We also helped negotiate with the Asian Development Bank to fund and build a health clinic with maternity facilities,’ says Wakerley.

According to Statistics New Zealand, NZ exported NZ$ 183.74 million (K412 million) worth of goods in the year to September 2016, while it imported NZ$10.52 million (K23.59 million) worth of goods from PNG. The top PNG exports to NZ were coffee tea and spices (NZ$6.71 million/K15.05 million). PNG’s main import from NZ was meat (NZ$29.32 million/K65.75 million).