Mori, at the Micronesian Chief Executives Summit in Majuro, Marshall Islands last week, outlined his advice to struggling Pacific countries in an interview with the Marshall Islands Journal.
“We must live within our means,” he said. “We cannot run government deficits.”
According to the Journal, Mori’s home state of Chuuk in the FSM is hard pressed to meet its government payroll under the burden of a $40 million deficit.
He told the Journal that subsistence fishing and farming would ease pressure on money economies while promoting better health.
Mori also urged efforts to expand private businesses and industry in the developing Pacific as a way to wean workers off the government payroll. But he warned against cutting government jobs before “growing” the private sector.
The FSM president also told the Journal that U.S.-affiliated islands should stick together, approaching Washington with a single voice in order to command full attention. He said he plans to lead Micronesian leaders to Washington D.C. later this year.
Meanwhile, at last week’s summit, Mori exhorted the world’s industrial nations to heed the dire consequences of air pollution.
“We will all be drowning in our own backyards if leaders of developed nations do not take swift action to reduce greenhouse gas emissions,” he said.
