A former New Zealand MP and the founder of the New Zealand Parliamentarians Group on Population and Development says Pacific Islands men need to be more involved in health and education issues.
The Group presented its report in Parliament in Wellington last week highlighting the work achieved over the past ten years.
Kathryn O'Regan says while much has been achieved with the education of women, more needs to be done on raising awareness on sexual and reproductive health.
She says many of the health problems facing the region impact on women and children, but if men were to take responsibility she's confident things would improve.
"Men should be involved in all of this in sexual health education, you can't just look at one gender you've got to look at both two of them are involved for heavens sake, bring them along on board and once they understand better we hope things will improve for the conditions of those women and children as well."