Close links with the University of Otago are helping to further improve the quality of tertiary education in Samoa, the Samoan Head of State, His Highness Tui Atua Tupua Tamasese Ta'isi Efi, says.
Tui Atua (71), who arrived in Dunedin on Sunday, met members of Dunedin's Samoan community that night, and again at a breakfast yesterday.
He visited Otago University yesterday, including the university School of Maori, Pacific and Indigenous Studies, and gave a public talk on "Fragrance Culture and Health Within Faasamoa" at the university last night.
More than 280 students of Samoan ancestry are studying at Otago University.
A former Samoan prime minister, Tui Atua is also the chancellor of the National University of Samoa.
The two universities had signed a Memorandum of Understanding in 2004, and some staff from the Samoan institution had since undertaken further study at Otago University, helping to develop their skills.
Education was crucial for Samoa's future, and closer academic and cultural links between Otago University and Samoa were mutually beneficial, he said in an interview.
He emphasised the need to maintain Samoan culture and spirituality.
Referring to the topic of his talk, he emphasised the importance of a sense of smell, and of fragrances in Samoan traditional spirituality and culture.
A spiritual connection with the environment was not an "intellectual exercise" and came from taking the necessary time to connect, feel and experience, he said in the talk.
This connection came not "through television or artificial sunbeds, but through waking up and walking out on to the grass, smelling the flowers, tending the trees and feeling the sun, rain and wind on one's face".