Job losses are expected for staff working for Whānau Ora’s Pacific Commission Agency, Pasifika Futures. This comes amid last week’s announcement by Te Puni Kokiri (TPK) that the existing Whānau Ora Commissioning Agencies contracts have not been renewed.
According to the TPK website, they have been running a procurement process to select Commissioning agencies to deliver new contracts from 1 July 2025.
Te Pou Matakana, the North Island agency, Te Putahitanga o Te Waipounamu in the South Island and Pasifika Futures were informed last week that their contracts would not be renewed.
The journey for Pasifika Futures began in 2013 when TPK released a request for proposal to identify non-Governmental organisations that could deliver Whānau Ora Commissioning Agency services for Pacific families across New Zealand.
The Pasifika Medical Association (PMA) was approached to establish a Pacific Agency and in March 2014, established Pasifika Futures Limited as the Pacific Whānau Ora Commissioning Agency. It was dubbed as a historic point in time for Pacific communities in New Zealand.
However it now appears that TPK have decided to go in another direction.
We reached out to the Minister of Whānau Ora Tama Potaka office for comment, who referred us to TPK.
We asked TPK to confirm that The Cause Collective was the new Pacific Commissioning Agency and also asked why the Pasifika Futures contract was not renewed.
In response to our request. TPK states:
“There was a strong market response to the Request for Proposals. While we acknowledge that some of the successful respondents have come forward with this information, as contract negotiations have not yet concluded, this information remains commercially sensitive. Te Puni Kōkiri will therefore not be advising of these decisions until this process has concluded.”
The Cause Collective took to Facebook to announce that they are honoured to be named the preferred respondent for Whānau Ora commissioning services for region four (Pacific peoples across Aotearoa New Zealand).
Contracts are expected to be confirmed by April.
We have reached out to Pasifika Futures for comment. They are set to release a statement shortly.
