The Agreements
The Agreements with Nanning, Settsu and Luganville emphasizes the principles of friendship, mutual understanding, goodwill, peace and prosperity and set the direction for exchange programs in the following areas:
- Civic organisations
- Professional and youth groups
- Educational exchanges including "sister school"
- Communication
- Cultural exchanges
- The exchange of city records and exhibitions
- Sporting exchanges
- Industrial and commercial exchanges
- Exchanges in technology
- Exchanges in agricultural learnings and
- Exchanges of learnings in tourism.
The Nanning Agreement
Bundaberg City Council minutes of 22 August 1996, indicate the Mayor of Nanning, Mr Song Fumin, invited the Mayor of Bundaberg to visit his city and this took place in April 1997. The delegation that visited Nanning was led by then Mayor, Cr Nita Cunningham and included business representatives and the press (Mr Noel Baldwin, Mr Terry Piggott, Mr Bevan McGarvie and Mr Ned Makim). The Mayor was authorised by Council to negotiate a Sister City relationship between Bundaberg and Nanning. Mr Piggott had made prior visits to China to study the lychee industry and to bring back specific cultivars for the Bundaberg Area. He initiated and strongly promoted the setting up of a sister city relationship
In December 1997, Ms Gao Fang Fang, then Director of the Foreign Affairs Officer of Nanning Municipality, led a small delegation to Bundaberg and continued talks on the formation of a Sister City relationship with members of the April delegation.
In March 1998, Mr Lin Guoquiang was appointed Mayor of Nanning. Enthusiastic about establishing a Sister City relationship, he led a delegation of 10 members to Bundaberg. On May 12 1998, the Sister City Agreement was formalised in the Bundaberg City Council Chambers and signed by then Mayor of Bundaberg, Cr Nita Cunningham and the Mayor of Nanning, Mr Lin Guoquiang.
The Settsu Agreement
On May 3 1998, a delegation of 34 residents of Settsu, led by the Mayor Mr Kaoru Morikawa, arrived in Bundaberg. The two (2) day visit came about through the good offices of Angela Rehbein (now Kitano) a former resident of Bundaberg, who was teaching English conversation at Councillor Kasuhisa Abe's tutoring school in Settsu. Through him, she met the Mayor, Mr Morikawa, who asked if Bundaberg has a Sister City in Japan. The Mayor of Bundaberg was contacted and discussions regarding a Sister City relationship were held with Councillors. The Director played an important role in promoting the relationship and in setting up the necessary framework in Settsu. The formal agreement between Bundaberg and Settsu was signed later that year on 9 November 1998 in Settsu.
The Luganville Agreement
Bundaberg Regional Council minutes of 27 July 2021 indicate it was resolved that the Mayor of Bundaberg was authorised to enter into a Memorandum of Understanding with Luganville Municipal Council (Vanuatu) on behalf of Bundaberg Regional Council. The Memorandum of Understanding was officially signed by the Mayor of Luganville, Mayor Peter Patty, and the Mayor of Bundaberg, Cr Jack Dempsey, on 28 July 2021, via a virtual meeting due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
On Friday 30 July 2021, the Mayor of Bundaberg, Cr Jack Dempsey, made an historic apology for the “blackbirding” and indentured labour of Pacific islanders in the Bundaberg Region’s cane fields. This apology coincided with the annual Vanuatu Independence Day, and the announcement of the sister city relationship between Luganville, Vanuatu and Bundaberg.