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Papua New Guinea
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THE PAPUA NEW GUINEA COAT OF ARMS
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_-_PNG_-_UNOCHA.svg) Location of Papua New Guinea within the Continent of Asia | |||
 Map of Papua New Guinea | |||
 Flag Description of Papua New Guinea:The flag of Papua New Guinea was officially adopted on June 24, 1971. For many centuries red and black were the traditional colors used in the majority of native art work. The five stars are symbolic of the Southern Cross, and the golden Bird of Paridise is a local tribal symbol. | |||
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Official names Independent State of Papua New Guinea1
Form of government constitutional monarchy with one legislative house (National Parliament [111])
Head of state British Monarch: Queen Elizabeth II, represented by Governor-General: Sir Michael Ogio
Head of government Prime Minister: Peter O’Neill
Capital Port Moresby
Official languages English; Hiri Motu; Tok Pisin
Official religion none
Monetary unit kina (K)
Population (2013 est.) 7,275,000COLLAPSE
Total area (sq mi) 178,703
Total area (sq km) 462,840
Urban-rural population
- Urban: (2012) 12.6%
- Rural: (2012) 87.4%
Life expectancy at birth
- Male: (2012) 61.1 years
- Female: (2012) 65.3 years
Literacy: percentage of population age 15 and over literate
- Male: (2008) 63.6%
- Female: (2008) 55.6%
GNI per capita (U.S.$) (2013) 2,010
1Gau Hedinarai ai Papua–Matamata Guinea (Hiri Motu); Papua–Niugini (Tok Pisin).
Background of Papua New Guinea
Papua New Guinea, island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It encompasses the eastern half of New Guinea, the world’s second largest island (the western half is made up of the Indonesian provinces of Papua and West Papua); the Bismarck Archipelago (New Britain, New Ireland, the Admiralty Islands, and several others); Bougainville and Buka (part of the Solomon Islands chain); and small offshore islands and atolls. The national capital, Port Moresby, is located in southeastern New Guinea on the Coral Sea.
The islands that constitute Papua New Guinea were settled over a period of 40,000 years by the mixture of peoples who are generally referred to as Melanesians. Since the country achieved independence in 1975, one of its principal challenges has been the difficulty of governing many hundreds of diverse, once-isolated local societies as a viable single nation.
Geography of Papua New Guinea
The Land
Papua New Guinea stretches from just south of the Equator to the Torres Strait, which separates New Guinea from Cape York Peninsula to the south, the northernmost extension of Australia. Mainland Papua New Guinea reaches its maximum north-south expanse of some 510 miles (820 km) along its western border with Indonesian Papua. Almost completely straight, the boundary is formed primarily by the line of longitude 141° E and curves only briefly westward to follow the Fly River for approximately 50 miles (80 km), starting just southwest of Kiunga. From the western border the land tapers—with a substantial indentation in the south coast formed by the Gulf of Papua—to a fingerlike shape that points southeast toward the D’Entrecasteaux Islands and the Louisiade Archipelago. Off the mainland are a number of small islands and island groups scattered to the north and east and, farther northeast, Bougainville Island and the Bismarck Archipelago; the latter forms a crescent that arcs from the Admiralty Islands in the north to New Britain and Umboi Island, off the mainland’s Huon Peninsula.
- Relief
Papua New Guinea’s magnificent and varied scenery reflects a generally recent geologic history in which movements of the Earth’s crust resulted in the collision of the northward-moving Australian Plate with the westward-moving Pacific Plate. The low-lying plains of southern New Guinea are geologically part of the Australian Plate. Indeed, New Guinea was separated physically from Australia only some 8,000 years ago by the shallow flooding of the Torres Strait. The southern New Guinea plains, called the Fly-Digul shelf (named for the Fly and Digul rivers), are geologically stable.
Northward lies a belt of limestone country of varying width, most prominent in the Kikori River–Lake Kutubu area. This forms an extraordinarily harsh environment of jumbled karst, dolines, rock towers, and seemingly endless ridges of jagged rock, all covered in virtually impenetrable lowland rainforest.
A mountainous zone called the Highlands, extending from the west to the southeast, occupies the central part of the island of New Guinea. In Papua New Guinea those mountains reach elevations in excess of 13,000 feet (4,000 metres), rising to the country’s highest point of 14,793 feet (4,509 metres) at Mount Wilhelm in the Bismarck Range, part of the Central Range. The Highlands also feature enclosed upland basins whose floors are usually at 4,500 feet (1,370 metres) or higher. The basins contain lake deposits, formed in the recent geologic past by impeded drainage; soil wash from the surrounding mountains; and layers of volcanic ash, or tephra, deposited from nearby volcanoes, some of them recently active. Such basins, therefore, are usually very fertile.
The north coast of the mainland, unlike the swampy south coast, drops sharply to the sea. The country’s most northerly zone consists of a complex unstable volcanic arc in the Bismarck Sea stretching southeastward from the Schouten Islands (not to be confused with the Indonesian island group of the same name) to the Huon Peninsula and eastward through the island of New Britain. There the arc bifurcates, one arm sweeping northwestward through New Ireland and the Admiralty Islands, the other proceeding southeastward through Buka, Bougainville, and the country of Solomon Islands.
- Drainage and soils
Steeply sloping mountain areas, exceptionally heavy rainfall, geologic instability in all except the most southerly areas, and the rapid growth of both population and commercial enterprise have combined to create some of the highest soil-erosion rates in the world, rivaling those of the Himalaya region. Consequently, while rivers are usually quite short in length, they carry extraordinarily high sediment loads, which have built up vast swampy plains and deltas, especially along the Sepik, Ramu, Fly, and Purari river systems. Once they leave the Highlands, often through spectacular gorges, such rivers meander slowly across the sediment plains. For example, some 510 miles (820 km) from its mouth, the elevation of the Fly River is a mere 60 feet (18 metres) above sea level, an average downhill gradient of only about 1.5 inches per mile (2.4 cm per km). The high deposition rates create major problems for any proposed human use of those rivers, such as transportation or hydroelectricity generation. The northern volcanic fringe contains some of the most fertile soils of the islands.
- Climate
Although all the climatic regions of Papua New Guinea are basically tropical, they are nevertheless varied. In the lowlands, mean annual maximum temperatures range from about 86 to 90 °F (30 to 32 °C), and the minimums are between 73 and 75 °F (23 and 24 °C). Seasonal variation in temperature is slight, and the daily variation approximates the annual variation. Cooler conditions prevail in the Highlands, where night frosts are common above 7,000 feet (2,100 metres); daytime temperatures there generally exceed 72 °F (22 °C) regardless of season. Each variation in elevation creates new ecological zones for plant and animal life.
Rainfall, rather than temperature, is the determinant of season. Precipitation is dependent on two wind systems—the southeast trade winds and the northwesterly turbulence zone (the monsoon)—and on the three site characteristics of latitude, elevation, and exposure. The southeasterlies blow for approximately seven months (May to November) on the extreme southeast of the country (Milne Bay) and for gradually shorter periods in northern areas, predominating for only three months in the Admiralty Islands. Conversely, northwesterlies are more common on the north coast and in the Bismarck Archipelago, but they affect Port Moresby for only three to four months of the year (the rainy season, December through March). The Highlands seem to have their own airflow systems, receiving rain throughout the year—totaling between 100 and 160 inches (2,500 and 4,000 mm)—except for a midyear dry phase. With the northwesterlies, rain is frequently from heated saturated air that loses its moisture as it cools and rises (convectional storms), and rain shadow effects are reduced. With the southeasterlies, however, exposure is particularly important. The Port Moresby coastal area is parched throughout the period of the southeasterlies, which flow parallel to the coast, yet where mountainous land lies athwart the airflow, as in New Britain or the southward-facing slopes of the Highlands, rainfall is extremely heavy, frequently exceeding 300 inches (7,600 mm). Port Moresby receives less than 50 inches (1,300 mm) of precipitation annually, which affects the water supply and the generation of hydroelectric power.
- Plant and animal life
Much of the coast is lined by mangrove swamp, succeeded inland by nipa palm (Nypa fruticans) in brackish waters. Large stands of sago palm are scattered farther inland, particularly along the valleys of the larger rivers in the north and along the deltas of the south coast. Primary lowland rainforest covers much of the island up to elevations of approximately 3,300 feet (1,000 metres). The forest is characterized by a large number of species, by the absence of pure stands of any one species, by fairly distinct layering of the forest into two or three levels, by the limited development of undergrowth, and by the small amount of human impact upon it. Dense undergrowth is usually a sign of human interference, except on soils that are particularly poor or where the low height of the forest allows sunlight to penetrate to the soil surface. In those lowland areas where drier conditions prevail, agriculture and the burning of vegetation to facilitate hunting have long sustained a grassland environment (for example, in the Sepik and Markham river valleys).
In the uplands above 3,300 feet, stands of single species become more common, and trees such as oaks, beeches, red cedars, and pines become increasingly dominant. Above about 6,500 feet (2,000 metres), cloud or moss forest characterized by conifers, tree ferns, and a wealth of fungi and epiphytes (such as mosses and orchids) appears.
Papua New Guinea possesses a rich variety of reptiles, marsupials (animals that carry their young in pouches), native freshwater fishes, and birds but is almost devoid of large mammals. This has assisted the evolution of some 40 species of birds-of-paradise. The largest animals are the cassowaries (large flightless birds) and crocodiles. For roughly the past 65 million years the island has been isolated from Southeast Asia by the sea. Although New Guinea’s animals have evolved in isolation from Southeast Asia, the former land bridge to Australia explains the presence of marsupials, tree kangaroos, and echidnas—species New Guinea has in common with that continent. New Guinea shares with the Indonesian archipelago many species of insects, carried by winds. Likewise, New Guinea has been a centre of dispersal for many plants to all neighbouring regions. The extraordinary profusion in Papua New Guinea of plants such as orchids, figs (genus Ficus), and false beech (Nothofagus) and of such animals as cassowaries, birds-of-paradise, parrots, butterflies, and marsupials—including tree kangaroos and cuscus (a type of phalanger)—gives the island an unparalleled biogeography.
Papua New Guinea’s unique biological species have long been sought by collectors throughout the world, but the government has established several conservation and protection measures. The export of birds-of-paradise is banned, and hunters thereof are restricted to the use of traditional weapons. Similarly, the export of many other birds and butterflies and of crocodile skins is strictly regulated. Other policies encourage the controlled expansion of selected exports of “farmed” orchids and crocodiles and of “cultivated” butterflies and other insects. A number of conservation projects, encouraged by foreign environmental groups, provide a small income for a few local landowners.
Demography of Papua New Guinea
The People
- Ethnic groups
Papua New Guinea’s social composition is extremely complex, although most people are classified as Melanesian. Very small minorities of Micronesian and Polynesian societies can be found on some of the outlying islands and atolls, and as in the eastern and northern Pacific these people have political structures headed by chiefs, a system seldom found among the Melanesian peoples of Papua New Guinea.
The non-Melanesian portion of the population, including expatriates and immigrants, is small. At independence in 1975 the expatriate community of about 50,000 was predominantly Australian, with perhaps 10,000 people of Chinese origin whose ancestors had arrived before World War I. By the early 21st century most of these people had moved to Australia. The foreign-born community had not expanded but had become more mixed, with only some 7,000 Australians; the largest non-Western groups were from China and the Philippines. The government sponsored the immigration of Filipinos in the 1970s to provide workers in skilled professions, and many entered business and intermarried locally. The unauthorized, illegal entry of other immigrants, notably from China, was an ongoing concern of the government in the early 21st century.
- Languages
The official languages of the country all reflect its colonial history. English is the main language of government and commerce. In most everyday contexts the most widely spoken language is Tok Pisin (“Pidgin Language”; also called Melanesian Pidgin or Neo-Melanesian), a creole combining grammatical elements of indigenous languages, some German, and, increasingly, English. Hiri Motu is a simplified trading language originally used by the people who lived around what is now Port Moresby when it came under that name in 1884
In addition to the official languages, there are more than 800 distinct indigenous languages belonging to two radically different language groups—Austronesian, to which the local languages classified as Melanesian belong, and non-Austronesian, or Papuan. There are some 200 related Austronesian languages. Austronesian speakers generally inhabit the coastal regions and offshore islands, including the Trobriands and Buka. Papuan speakers, who constitute the great majority of the population, live mainly in the interior. The approximately 550 non-Austronesian languages have small speech communities, the largest being the Engan, Melpa, and Kuman speakers in the Highlands, each with more than 100,000 speakers. Amid such a multiplicity of tongues, Tok Pisin serves as an effective lingua franca.
- Religion
The majority of Papua New Guinea’s people are at least nominally Christian. More than two-fifths of the population is Protestant; Lutherans make up the largest portion of these, and there are some Anglicans and a growing number of Pentecostals. Approximately another one-fourth are Roman Catholics. Seventh-day Adventism is increasing in popularity, and there are also small numbers of Bahāʾīs and Muslims. Despite the apparent inroads made by introduced religions, much of the population also maintains traditional religious beliefs, and rituals of magic, spells, and sorcery are still widely practiced.
- Settlement patterns
The great majority of the country’s population lives in rural areas. Rural settlement patterns are extremely varied. The southern New Guinea plains are only sparsely populated by relatively mobile sago gatherers. The Highlands valleys are densely settled, whether in villages or scattered hamlets. The north coast and northeastern archipelagoes are generally well-populated, despite the hazards of volcanic eruptions, frequent earth tremors, and, rarely, tsunamis. The island of Karkar and the Gazelle Peninsula of New Britain are centres of particularly dense population.
The small urban population lives for the most part in towns whose original location was determined either by access to a good harbour for early colonial planters or, in the interior, by the availability of level land sufficient for an airstrip. Despite the greatly diminished importance of plantations and the relocation of most of these airstrips out of the towns, those origins helped determine the existing urban layout. Port Moresby and Lae, on the Huon Gulf, are the largest cities.
- Demographic trends
Papua New Guinea’s rate of population growth tends to be high and life expectancy somewhat low, relative to other countries in the region. An estimated half of the population is under 18 years of age. In the late 20th and early 21st centuries the birth rate greatly exceeded the world average, while the death rate was moderately high and falling. Rapid population growth has created difficulties in providing basic health and education services. Unemployment and underemployment have exacerbated the problems of poverty, crime, and ethnic tensions, especially in urban areas.
Economy of Papua New Guinea
- Agriculture, forestry, and fishing
Agricultural production, most of it from subsistence farming, accounts for about one-third of the country’s gross domestic product. In the archipelagoes of the north and northeast, yams, taro, and bananas are grown as staple foods. These were formerly also the staple foods for Highlanders, who now mostly rely on sweet potatoes known as kau kau. Throughout much of the Highlands, carefully tended gardens dominate the landscape; some are arrayed in checkerboard patterns defined by drainage ditches, and others are circular mounds built on compost to warm and enrich the soil.
In the north the intensive cultivation of fertile soils gives way to swidden (slash-and-burn) cultivation of taro and yams in the forests of the foothills. These thinly populated areas in turn give way to sago swamps along the courses of the great Ramu and Sepik rivers. In the slightly more elevated areas away from the main rivers there are extensive areas of poor grassland with a high water table that are used for swidden cultivation and hunting.
Almost all commercial crops are exported, although the domestic vegetable market is growing rapidly. After 1975 smallholders increasingly took over the bulk of export crop production, replacing foreign-owned plantations. High-quality Arabica coffee is grown throughout the Highlands, mostly by smallholders; Robusta coffee is grown on the north coast and cacao in the islands. In the colonial era copra was the premier crop in lowland areas, but now only small amounts are produced, together with some rubber in the southern region. The production of plantation crops has suffered from declining terms of trade and was mostly stagnant from the 1980s. The major exception has been the cultivation of oil palm in West New Britain (on previously little-used volcanic soils) and on the eastern mainland, boosted by foreign investment.
Forest exploitation, dominated by foreign-owned logging companies, has been extensive, particularly along the north coast, in parts of the southern region, and on New Britain and New Ireland. At times logs have accounted for one-tenth of the value of national exports, but that proportion fell by about half during the Asian economic crisis of the late 1990s and only recovered slowly in the first decade of the 21st century. Forestry was a controversial industry, with logging companies developing connections with the political elite, and it was marked by corrupt practices including improperly issued licenses, mislabeled species, transfer pricing manipulation (the practice of hiding the real value of transactions—e.g., by undervaluing exports—in order to maximize profits), tax avoidance, environmental damage, and lack of reforestation.
Tuna fisheries have great potential and foreign-owned canneries have expanded, but licenses have been sold cheaply and fishing zones monitored poorly.
- Resources and power
From 1970 onward, major mineral discoveries transformed the economy of Papua New Guinea from one dependent on tropical crops to one based on minerals for most of its exports. Large deposits of gold or of gold and copper led to major developments at Panguna on Bougainville, at Ok Tedi in the Star Mountains in the western mainland area, on Misima Island in Milne Bay, at Porgera in Enga province, and on Lihir Island, northeast of New Ireland. Misima was mined out and shut down in 2005, and production was predicted to be reaching its end at the giant Porgera and Ok Tedi mines in the first decades of the 21st century.
After 70 years of exploration, major natural gas and crude oil finds were made in the late 1980s; oil and gas production began near Lake Kutubu and Tari in 1992. A large-scale liquefied natural gas project was begun in the southwestern slopes of the main range in 2009. Hydroelectric power supplies Port Moresby, the Highlands region, Lae, and Madang, on the north coast.
Major resource exploitation has caused local landowner groups to contest, principally with the national government, the distribution of mineral revenues. Serious environmental damage from mine tailings has been a constant problem in several projects. Beginning in 1988, dispute over these issues was one factor that led to open warfare around the Panguna mine, causing not only the mine’s closure but also a renewal of hostilities among the inhabitants of Bougainville in what had been a long-dormant secession movement. A peace process began in 1997. Despite this major upheaval, Papua New Guinea experienced a mining boom early in the 21st century; several new mines opened during that time, with income from mining and quarrying providing about one-fourth of the gross domestic product. Gold and copper made up some two-thirds of the value of exports.
- Manufacturing
Industrial output is of little significance, accounting for less than one-tenth of gross domestic product despite the government’s attempts to promote its expansion. Aside from the processing of palm oil, manufacturing activities are centred chiefly in Lae and Port Moresby; products include processed food, beverages, tobacco goods, wood products, textiles, and metal goods. The rapid construction of liquefied natural gas projects has dramatically boosted the economies of both cities, although inflation and shortages of housing and skilled personnel have worsened.
- Finance
The kina, introduced several months before Papua New Guinea gained independence, is the country’s currency. The central bank is the Bank of Papua New Guinea. The value of the kina increased greatly following independence, but the secession crisis in Bougainville in 1989 and poor fiscal control resulted in major devaluation through the 1990s. Over the next decade, responsible financial management was restored and the central bank strengthened. Papua New Guinea has had a small stock exchange since the late 1990s, but many of the companies traded—chiefly mining, oil, and financial concerns—are foreign-based.
- Trade
Papua New Guinea generally has a positive balance of trade, and foreign reserves have grown since 2005. The principal destinations for exports, principally gold and copper, are Australia, Japan, and China. Australia has consistently supplied nearly half of the country’s imports since independence, but gold exports have brought trade with Australia into surplus. Major imports include machinery and transport equipment, refined petroleum, and foodstuffs.
- Services
New Guinea’s spectacular scenery and dynamic cultures provide great potential for the tourist sector. That potential has been limited, however, by a number of factors. The costs of accommodations and air travel from abroad are generally high. In addition, the country’s longtime concerns about personal security have inhibited both local and foreign tourists from traveling on the mainland. Adventure and environmental tourism have grown, however, notably in the island region.
- Labour and taxation
Employment in the commercial sector has grown slowly since independence (and even declined in the 1980s and ’90s). Formal salaried work employs only about one-tenth of the adult workforce. The proportion of women in salaried work is very low. Basic wages are higher than in most of Southeast Asia, but productivity is relatively low. There is a shortage of people able to perform skilled work, which is concentrated in the capital and in mining areas, and the shortfall is made up by thousands of foreign workers. The government has had little success in encouraging rural village-based development aimed at reducing migration to urban areas by people seeking formal employment.
Foreign investment and taxes thereon have dominated the cash economy and government receipts since independence, and there has been low revenue from the formal sectors of growth in agricultural commodities, except palm oil. The small size of the salaried workforce limits the personal income tax base, and the bulk of tax revenue comes from company taxes. A 10 percent goods-and-services tax (GST) is the main form of taxation on the great majority of the population. The GST only makes a modest contribution to state revenues, even though 60 percent of it is returned to the province of origin.
- Transportation and telecommunications
Internal transport in Papua New Guinea is expensive, whether to the island provinces or by road on the geologically unstable mainland. There are no railroads and few paved roads. Port Moresby is connected by road to only two other provinces and not to any other major population centres. The port city of Lae is linked to Madang on the north coast, and the Okuk (Highlands) Highway connects Lae to the major Highland towns and the Tari gas fields, but it is occasionally blocked for days because of landslides and inadequate maintenance. The rural road network, already in poor repair, is often damaged by heavy rainfall.
For places not served by the Highlands road network, air transport is required to travel between the small towns of each province and between Port Moresby and other population centres. Overseas air access is via the international airport at Port Moresby. Papua New Guinea previously had more regularly operative airstrips per 1,000 population than almost any other country in the world, but the number of small airstrips serving remote outstations fell off rapidly in the late 20th and early 21st centuries. Reasons for the decline included the expansion of the road network, lack of funding, and a reduction in government staffing and official air charters.
Electronic media expanded dramatically in the early 21st century, with a network of cellular telephone transmitters covering all heavily populated areas and even remote regions. Cellular phone usage far surpasses the use of landlines. Computer usage is low, however, partly because of the lack of infrastructure. Although only a small proportion of the population has access to the Internet, it is used extensively by those who do, notably political bloggers.
Government and Society of Papua New Guinea
Culture Life of Papua New Guinea
More than a thousand different cultural groups exist in PNG. Because of this diversity, many different styles of cultural expression have emerged; each group has created its own expressive forms in art, dance, weaponry, costumes, singing, music, architecture, and much more.
Children dressed up for sing sing in Yengisa, Papua New Guinea
Most of these different cultural groups have their own language. People typically live in villages that rely on subsistence farming. To balance their diets, they go hunting and collect wild plants (such as yams roots) for food. Those who become skilled at hunting, farming, and fishing earn a great deal of respect.
On the Sepik River, a group of indigenous people is known for their wood carvings. They create forms of plants or animals, because they believe these are their ancestors.
Sea shells were abolished as currency in 1933. However, in some cultures, to get a bride, a groom must bring a certain number of golden-edged clamshells as a brideprice. In other regions, brideprice is paid in lengths of shell bead money, pigs, cassowaries, and cash.
People of the highlands engage in colorful local rituals that are called "sing sings." They paint themselves, and dress up with feathers, pearls and animal skins to represent birds, trees, or mountain spirits. Sometimes an important event, such as a legendary battle, is enacted at such a musical festival.
Sport is important. PNG has strong teams in Australian rules football including the second greatest number of players of any country in the world, soccer, rugby union and rugby league, which is considered the national sport.
Location of North Solomons (Bougainville) Province in Papua New Guinea.
Bougainville
Bougainville is part of Papua New Guinea and is the largest of the Solomon Islands group.
Bougainville, the adjacent island of Buka, and assorted outlying islands including the Carterets are sometimes known as North Solomons. Together they make up the Papua New Guinean province of that name. The population is 175,160 (2000 census).
The island is ecologically and geographically, although not politically, part of the Solomon Islands. Buka Island, Bougainville, and most of the Solomons are part of the Solomon Islands rain forests eco-region.
Bougainville and neighboring islands
The island was named after the French navigator Louis Antoine de Bougainville His name has also been lent to the creeping tropical flowering vines of the bougainvillea family. In 1885, it came under German administration as part of German New Guinea. Australia occupied it, in 1914, and, as a League of Nations mandatory power, administered it from 1918 until the Japanese invaded in 1942 and then again from 1945 until PNG independence as a United Nations mandatory power.
The island was occupied by Australian, American and Japanese forces during World War II. It was an important base for the United States Army Air Force, Royal Australian Air Force, and Royal New Zealand Air Force. On March 8, 1944, American forces were attacked by Japanese troops on Hill 700 on this island. The battle lasted five days, ending with a Japanese retreat.
The island is rich in copper and possibly gold. The Bougainville Revolutionary Army (BRA) ostensibly reclaimed the country from corporate mining interests in the 1980s, in the form of Bougainville Copper Limited, (BCL) an Australian controlled company.
The mining activity triggered a nine-year secessionist revolt that claimed 20,000 lives. The bloodshed ended in 1997, after negotiations successfully brokered by New Zealand.
During most of the revolt the island was also under blockade, which forced the people to supply themselves with everything from electric power to soap. Biodiesel fuel was refined out of coconut oil to fuel vehicles as well as building a small hydroelectric power station out of old vehicle parts.
The resourcefulness of these people can be seen in their use of the coconut which besides biodiesel was also used for making soap, lamp oil, baskets, treating wounds and placed in the coals of a fire to act as a mosquito repellent.
The region is still striving for autonomy, motivated in part by fear of re-established corporate exploitation of the area.
On June 15, 2005, the election of the first autonomous government of Bougainville, presided by Joseph Kabui, was held.
On July 25, 2005, rebel leader Francis Ona died after a short illness. A former surveyor with the Bougainville Mining Limited, Ona started the 10 year secessionist war in November 1988 with sabotage attacks on the mine in Panguna in support of demands for compensation for environmental damage.
History of Papua New Guinea
Papua, the southern section of the country, was annexed by Queensland in 1883 and the following year became a British protectorate called British New Guinea. It passed to Australia in 1905 as the Territory of Papua. The northern section of the country formed part of German New Guinea from 1884 to 1914 and was called Kaiser-Wilhelmsland. Occupied by Australian forces during World War I, it was mandated to Australia by the League of Nations in 1920 and became known as the Territory of New Guinea. Australian rule was reconfirmed by the United Nations in 1947.
In 1949 the territories of Papua and New Guinea were merged administratively, but they remained constitutionally distinct. They were combined in 1973 as the self-governing country of Papua New Guinea (PNG). Full independence was gained in 1975. In the late 1980s a violent secessionist movement broke out on Bougainville. A cease-fire, monitored by Australian troops, went into effect in 1998, and a peace accord that granted the island broad autonomy was signed three years later.
Proposed cuts in defense forces as result of economic reforms demanded by Australia and international organizations sparked a weeklong mutiny in 2001; the government rescinded the cuts and promised to review the mutineers' concerns over foreign economic influences. Sir Michael Somare, of the National Alliance party, became prime minister in 2002. In 2004, Australian police officers were deployed in PNG as part of an aid package designed to help end gang violence and restore law and order in the country, but after the supreme court ruled the following year that the officers' immunity from prosecution and other aspects of the deployment were unconstitutional Australia withdrew the contingent.
In late 2006 PNG's government and its relations with Australia were roiled by the Moti affair. Julian Moti, an Australian lawyer of Fijian descent had been appointed attorney general in the Solomon Islands, was wanted in Australia on child sex charges, and Australia sought Moti's extradition from PNG, where Moti was arrested (Sept., 2006) while in transit. Moti managed to flee with apparent help from PNG officials. An investigation into the incident implicated the prime minister in Moti's flight from PNG, a charge Somare denied; Somare subsequently disbanded the board of inquiry, which issued its report to Somare in Mar., 2007. Elections in June–July, 2007, returned Somare to office, leading a reorganized coalition. The defense minister rejected the board of inquiry report in Oct., 2007, on the grounds that the board had not been legally constituted.
Somare's government subsequently suffered from a number of scandals, including some involving the prime minister's finances. Although he survived a number of no-confidence votes, in Dec., 2010, he faced an investigation by a leadership tribunal over financial allegations. Somare stepped aside as prime minister, and his deputy, Sam Abal, became acting prime minister (and again in April); Somare returned to office in Jan., 2011.
In March, Somare was found guilty of failing to file his financial information properly and was suspended from office for two weeks in April; in June, his son announced his retirement for health reasons (following an April heart operation), but constitutionally it was not an official resignation. In August, an alliance of opposition members and disgruntled government coalition members voted in Peter O'Neill, the works and transport minister and former finance minister, as prime minister; the supreme court ruled that the move was unconstitutional in Dec., 2011. The ruling created a constitutional crisis and a contest for power, with O'Neill's government backed by parliament and generally maintaining control while Somare's continued to be backed by the supreme court. Elections in June, 2012, resulted in a plurality for O'Neill's People's National Congress, and he became prime minister in August with the support of Somare.
Papua New Guinea in 2011
Papua New Guinea Area: 462,840 sq km (178,704 sq mi) Population (2011 est.): 6,188,000 Capital: Port Moresby Head of state: Queen Elizabeth II, represented by Governor-General Michael (from May 6 ...>>>Read On<<<
Disclaimer
This is not the official site of this country. Most of the information in this site were taken from the U.S. Department of State, The Central Intelligence Agency, The United Nations, [1],[2], [3], [4], [5],[6], [7], [8], [9], [10], [11], [12], [13], [14],[15], [16], [17], [18], [19], [20], [21], [22], [23], [24],[25], [26], [27], [28], [29], [30],[31], [32], [33], [34], and the [35].
Other sources of information will be mentioned as they are posted.