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A consulting firm is bringing Pacific values on relationships to a global Indigenous trade and leadership gathering in Japan.
More than 70 Māori delegates and over 170 Indigenous representatives gathered in Osaka, Japan, wrapping up the week-long event on Sunday. The Indigenous-led platform, part of the global Expo 2025, promotes trade, cultural exchange, and collaboration grounded in values of reciprocity, responsibility, and relationality.
Speaking to ‘Alakihihifo Vailala on Pacific Mornings, Sara-Jane Elika, Executive Director for Elika Consulting Group (ECG), says networking and leadership opportunities arise at events like Expo 2025. She adds that this enables Pacific and Indigenous women leaders to thrive.
“When you come to Expo 25, there’s over 200 countries here in different pavilions. To have your space to be able to talk about what you do as an Indigenous woman has been exciting. To share some of the characteristics and traits that make you who you are as an Indigenous Sāmoan woman, but also being a part of the Te Aratini delegation,” Elika says.
The event coincided with the United Nations International Day of the World’s Indigenous Peoples on Saturday and built on the launch of Te Aratini at Expo 2020 Dubai. Supported by partners from Japan’s Playground of Life: Jellyfish Pavilion, as well as Australia and Canada, the programme honours Indigenous ingenuity, trade and leadership.
Elika says ECG was one of the few Pacific businesses represented at the event. She was invited to share the firm’s work as an Indigenous-owned business and described the week as “amazing”. She enjoyed reconnecting with Māori friends and experiencing manaakitanga (hospitality and care) from the iwi-led Māori delegation, guided by Kaihautū (leader) Ngahiwi Tomoana.
Watch Sara-Jane Elika and Leaupepe Legaoi Ta’ala Ralph Elika’s full interview below.
ECG, led by Sara-Jane and Leaupepe Legaoi Ta’ala Ralph Elika, is a Pacific-owned consultancy specialising in Indigenous leadership, the Pacific economy, and business sustainability. The firm blends cultural values with strategic expertise for both public and private sectors, operating with a relationship-centred approach based on reciprocity, respect, and trust.
Elika says many of their Pacific cultural values, especially fa’aaloalo (respect), resonate with Japanese culture. She points to similarities in caring for elders, and a strong sense of loyalty and pride.
“To understand a little bit more about the Japanese and how they work with one another in terms of trade and business relationships as well. It’s a deeply respectful culture. It’s been great to be able to be hosted so well here.”
Consulting with culture works
Leaupepe Legaoi Ta‘ala Ralph Elika, the Chief Executive Officer of ECG, contributed to the Tauhokohoko Indigenous International Trade Research Panel, a five-year research initiative aimed at transforming trade policy, measurement, and facilitation through Indigenous knowledge, methods, and values.
Leaupepe says a key concept resonating with other Indigenous communities and leaders involved in the research is the idea of teu le vā*. He shared that the vā is not confined to a particular space, such as family settings or church, but it applies to all aspects of life.
“Every sacred relationship, sacred space, we take that everywhere we go. Even as a consultancy, that’s how we operate as a business and that’s how we operate in trade. We field various businesses… if you teu the vā [nurture the vā]… then the relationship is meaningful. Which in every way means profits and other things go up because there’s a meaningful, effective relationship.
*The vā is the relational space where respect, obligations and mutual care live. To the Sāmoan and many wider Pacific worldviews, the vā can exist between individuals, groups, generations, the living and the ancestors, and between people and the environment.”
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