(Seasteading Delegation: Tom W. Bell, Egor Ryjikov, Marc Collins, Joe Quirk, Randolph Hencken, Nicolas Germineau, Greg Delaune and Bart Roeffen)
[Blog by Randolph Hencken, Executive Director]
Tonight, we are flying home from Tahiti after a promising exploratory mission here in French Polynesia. At the end of our meeting with President Édouard Fritch, his cabinet and numerous other government officials, the President stated that he is open to collaborating with us and will assign staff to work with us on a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU).
“It would be wonderful if we could work with The Seasteading Institute to bring sustainable development and economic activity to French Polynesia,” the President told us through our translator. “Let’s create the future together,” he concluded.
![nicolas-germineau-and-president-fritch](https://www.seasteading.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/Nicolas-Germineau-and-President-Fritch-800x600.jpg)
We will send a draft Memorandum of Understanding to the presidency this week. We anticipate finalizing the MOU within 30 days. Assuming we are able to agree on the MOU, we will then invest the resources to assist Tahiti to draft and pass legislation that will create a special jurisdiction, based in part on successful special economic zones from elsewhere in the world.
Hot off the press is this up-to-date press release about our meetings here.
Our meeting with the president appeared in the local Tahiti newspaper (French).
Over the past week, we’ve recorded a handful of short vlogs, which our community can view below.
Joe Quirk and I discuss our trip from a lagoon on Bora Bora.
https://youtu.be/V0195koHgWc[/embed]
Law Professor and seasteading legal adviser Tom W. Bell at the Presidential Palace moments before our meeting with the President. https://youtu.be/qSvFOuFf-mY[/embed]
Strategic Adviser Nicolas Germineau, Seasteading Ambassador and Engineer Egor Ryjikov, Joe Quirk, Tom W. Bell, and myself moments after our meeting with the President. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oFBAq4PjRNk&feature=youtu.be[/embed]
Seasteading Cleantech and Public-Private Partnership Adviser Greg Delaune, Blue21/DeltaSync Engineer and Architect Bart Roeffen and Myself discuss meeting with the President https://youtu.be/wd4dZrZ-ldE[/embed]