Lawyers from around the Pacific will gather in Australia today to talk pro bono, ethics and legal issues affecting the region.
There are about 1700 lawyers in the Pacific, excluding Australia and New Zealand, and about 100 of them are expected at the two-day conference being run by the South Pacific Lawyers Association.
Its chairman, Ross Ray QC, says the meeting will include sessions on issues such as document drafting, case analysis, commercial law and legal aid.
He says the conference is a good opportunity to promote ties between the different law societies across the region.
"In some of these areas they are so small that they don't have the resources to introduce the systems that they really need. So we are in a position to assist them with that. And through regionalisation, a number of the countries can look at what works, what doesn't work, and what best suits their particular professional needs."