The President of the Papua New Guinea Hockey Federation Kaluwin Potuan says installing more turf pitches is the fastest way to boost the development of the sport throughout the Pacific.
The PNG men's and women's teams are in New Zealand this week to participate in the Oceania Cup, alongside Australia, Samoa and the hosts.
The top two teams will qualify for next year's World Cup in the Netherlands.
The PNG teams arrived in Taranaki on Saturday and have spent the past few days acclimatising to the turf pitches.
Currently Fiji are the only Pacific country that have turf installed and Kaluwin Potuan, who is also the Vice President of Oceania Hockey, says that needs to rise to help lift the standards in the region.
"We train on grass - about three or two sports use the same facilities. Once all the countries have the turf then it will enhance the number of games, it will enhance the skills that each individual country will have and third it is one of the major contributing factors to the development of the code in the island nations."
The PNG women play Samoa first up on Wednesday morning with the men taking on New Zealand.
