Jacinda Ardern, the prime minister of New Zealand, has been named Pacific person of the year by a regional magazine, only the second person of non-Pacific heritage to ever be awarded the title.

The Islands Business magazine, a regional publication based in Fiji, said Ardern had shown a commitment to the Pacific region by advocating for urgent action on climate change at the Pacific Islands Forum in Tuvalu last year.

The magazine’s editor, Samisoni Pareti said Ardern’s skills at “negotiation, diplomacy and her charisma” had saved the day for the Pacific Islands at the forum.

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“She’s almost everything that the usual Pacific leader is not,” Pareti told the Guardian. “She is a woman, she is young, and she is a mother. Yet she can be firm when she needs to be, and emphatic when required. She is very open, candid and transparent in her style of leadership, a refreshing change to the traditional Pacific patriarchal style of governance.”

“The forum was on the verge of collapse due to Australia’s strong opposition to an ambitious emission target proposed by host Tuvalu and other small Pacific island nations, but it was Ardern who persuaded her mostly men colleagues to come and find the middle ground.”

Ardern had also unveiled the “Pacific reset” during her time in office, and frequently spoke of New Zealand’s identity as a Pacific nation, and the need for co-operation between Pacific nations, big and small.

Cover of Islands Business, featuring a graphic of New Zealand prime minister Jacinda Ardern Photograph: Islands Business, supplied

At the Pacific islands forum Ardern announced NZ$150m in climate change funding exclusively for use in the Pacific – and also travelled to the tiny Pacific atoll of Tokelau, the first visit by a New Zealand prime minister in 14 years.

Ardern said many Pacific islanders had expressed the wish to remain on their islands and adapt to climate change – and New Zealand would support them in this.

“We have a responsibility of care for the environment in which we live, but the challenge of climate change requires us to look beyond our domestic borders, and in New Zealand’s case towards the Pacific,” Ardern said during a keynote speech on climate change at the UN. “We recognise our neighbours in the Pacific region are uniquely vulnerable to the impacts of climate change.”

Ardern’s father, Ross, is a long-serving diplomat in the region, and has served terms in Samoa, Niue and Tokelau.

Pareti said although Ardern was not a Pacific islander by nationality or race, her leadership following the Christchurch terror attacks had caught the attention of islanders.

“That really drew our attention to Prime Minister Ardern and from then on we started watching how she performed, not only in parliament but in her dealings with crisis and her own electorate and country,” Pareti said.

“She has got everything that I guess one would wish upon a Pacific Island leader. She listens, she is decisive and she always tries to bring people together and not too divisive.”

Former Australian prime minister John Howard is the only other non Pacific islander to recieve the award.

Early in her term as prime minister, Ardern announced the Pacific reset policy, which has seen New Zealand “pivot” toward the islands. The policy has seen senior New Zealand government ministers travel to the islands regularly, and is at least in part an attempt to counter growing Chinese influence in the region.