Federation Business School

Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) as

Basis for an Alternative Viable
Development Model in Timor-Leste:
Planning and Challenges
Jerry Courvisanos
Federation Business School, Federation University Australia, Ballarat, VIC.
and
Matias Boavida
Department of Public Policy, UNTL, Dili, Timor-Leste

2017 UNTL/VU Biennial Conference, Institute of Diplomatic

Studies, Wednesday 5th July 2017
Sustainable Development (SD)
The essence of sustainable development is to provide
for the fundamental needs of humankind in an equitable
way without doing violence to the natural systems of life
on earth. (Kemp and Martens, 2007, p. 5)
SDGs: Path to SD is non-optimal and dynamic, with
business ventures (& new programs) that embrace:
productive union of mind and nature
linking economic (profit), social (people) and
ecological (planet) in business practice
support with local/regional/national community
Opportunity and choice about the SD path
SD in five developing countries?
Tunisia: R&D base, with bottom-up SD input
Indonesia: top-down non-SD, with no input
from community/entrepreneurs
India: strong role for private and social
entrepreneurs, as public policy fails to
address SD and cultural divides
China: strong top-down SD, drive to bottom
Bangladesh: women entrepreneurs strong,
weak but improving government SD support
SD in Timor-Leste?
Late 2015: SDGs Resolution by both the TL
Government and then Parliament
TL Government has a roadmap and the PMs
working group to implement it
Medium-term Coordinating Ministry (MECAE)
committed to creating SD through private
investment and developing non-oil exports in
domestic agriculture, community forestry and
coffee exports
Many donor-sponsored NGOs across agriculture,
education, health, and the physical environment
The Roadmap: 2017 Version
ENABLERS
Review of the Roadmap (TLSA Conference)
SDGs are being harmonised with the SDP in a
linear approach: On the surface there is
perfectly alignment, but ignores complexity
Top-down process: Lack of input from outside the
implementation group, with big development
SDP approach remaining unaltered
No observed transformation towards a diversified
fossil fuel disinvestment future
SDGs not embedded well into the ministries
Some achievements towards SDGs, but heavily
constrained by a long series of limitations
Where to from here?
Theme: Finding Pathways to Achieve the SDGs
What is needed are: alternative economic models,
vital to the growing global push towards renewable
energy, fossil fuel divestment and urgent action on
climate change. (Ramos-Horta and Mahar, 2016)
The 2015 SDGs Resolution by TL Government:
Opportunity to build an adjustment mechanism into
the SDP, to address growing uncertainties, also
introduce stronger renewable energy planning into
the SDP.
OR reject SDP by a critical mass from civil society
with initiative to develop unique SDG economic model
Mechanisms to achieve this?
Investment in physical and human capital by
State: Align SDG priorities with State budget
expenditure allocations
Businesses: Move from a land of kiosks to a
land of new sustainable innovations
Cooperatives: Indigenous fulidaidai movement
building through community ownership
Local culture: Connecting with strong socially
and ecologically sustainable customary traditions
For SD, what is the right mix of all the above?
Crucial SD Issues
1. Participatory decentralisation
2. Effective (formal and social) learning (for farmers,
cooperatives, seasonal workers, nascent
entrepreneurs): local-based
3. Financial system that supports eco-innovations
4. Shift from subsistence to sustainable agriculture
5. Localising food production
6. Build value (supply) chain for eco-tourism
economic model
Crucial SD Issues
6. Build historical tourism for domestic and foreign
links to memory of TLs past (colonial, World
War II, occupation resistance and atrocities)
7. Donors to create strong partnerships with local
NGOs and local-based small businesses (with
foreign experts only on demand of local NGOs)
8. Local State and private base push for
sustainable manufacturing with FDI support
building on the recently restructured
TradeInvest support and strong EIS regulations
 Approach to SD
the new

Social Commercial
Entrepreneurship Entrepreneurship

less profit more profit

more social NGO less social
Business
wealth (NFP) wealth

establishment

Where is the Timor-Leste economy? establishment

What should be the development path for Timor-Leste? the new
The New: Innovation Path with SDGs
Innovation path based on two economics traditions:
Creative destruction based on a technological driver
(in past for TL: Oil), now with Sustainable
Development Goals (SDGs), does it shift to eco-
sustainable technologies and solutions (renewable
energy, reuse, recycle with equity)?
Severe crisis (as in TL) the trigger for paradigm shift.
Adaptation mechanism capital investment
(infrastructure) and effective demand (build market
demand) with effective learning for eco-innovation
adaptation; allows for new private sector market
power (new entrepreneurs in TL)
 SD for TL
TL has many SD advantages it can use for innovation:
Pristine clean agricultural system (no chemicals, no
pesticides, etc..)
Breathtaking natural landscape (land and sea)
Survival and resistance to foreign intrusion
Strong self-efficacy, autonomy and endurance
against strong forces
Foreign direct investment (FDI) and diaspora
return funds can be easily accessed
Goodwill from donors for SD is very deep and
sustained
 How to build SD markets in TL?
Identify SD markets that build on the advantages in
the previous slide:
Turn these advantages into competitive strengths
Focus on developing markets where existing skills
can be utilised and new skills developed (e.g.
coffee, eco-tourism, market gardens, candlenut oil,
cassava, sandlewood), all in eco-sustainable ways
Value add processing on markets developed, even
if very simple tasks (e.g. tractor hire)
Collaborate with other producers and coordinate in
the supply chain (e.g. transport, marketing)
What is needed to support this strategy?

Absorptive capacity ability of individual or group/

organisation to absorb innovation stimuli (ideas) by
i. acquiring external information
ii. assimilate this information in the firm, and
iii. exploit it for commercial ends
Well-educated young from pre-primary to tertiary
to be able to function in entrepreneurial environment
with ongoing learning for all in the organisation
Sustainable development priority to build
cultural acceptance of the SDGs that drive a niche SD-
based economy which is bottom-up
 Government support for SD in TL
Government to support SD (commercial and
social) entrepreneurship through:
cultural change to SD
infrastructure for small business
training and social learning experiences
finance support (from microfinance to
investment in SD growth)
To succeed, SD requires commitment by all
Local participation by nominating SDG targets and
local administration (from municipality to suku):
Listen, and local communities will embrace SDGs
 Space for small-size ventures in TL
Public sector crucial in creating this space and not
crowded out by top-down high risk big projects
Foreign NGOs to give way to endogenous NGOs
who create space for social entrepreneurship
(e.g. Raebia took over from USC-Canada to
support sustainable farming businesses with
local champions)
Vocational education with good skills practice and
then add creativity in business (e.g. Centre of
Excellence in Entrepreneurship) as a profession
 Space created by facilitation
Following are critical facilitation roles:
1. Business enterprise/cooperative support providing
mentor, advice, idea identification, network contacts
and incubation facilities to start-up ventures
2. Financial support to fund entrepreneurs to set up
and invest in identified innovations with competitive
strength and meets SDGs
3. Clear regulation on business and land tenure rulings
to remove institutional uncertainty
4. Build local clusters (systems) with supply chain
connections & value added processingnext slide
Clusters collaborate for strong RIS

RIS: Regional Innovation System (e.g. municipality

or sub-municipality)

Tourism

Hospitality

Building
Education

Wine Industry
Clusters and their actors

Slvell (2009, p. 16)

 Conclusion
What unites the country from bottom to top, west to
east, female and male is a common civic identity
voluntary public identification with and cohesion
around a national identity: integration & participation
Ongoing revolution begun by the older generation in
terms of the fight to free the country and must
continue by the younger generation in terms of the
fight to free the people with the SDGs
SDG economic model emerges from public policies
combined with niche private sector and cooperative
investments to develop new sustainable sectors
 Thank you for your attention

For more: Full report available by

request at email address:
j.courvisanos@federation.edu.au