bodyType

customContents

entityId

entityUuid

articlePageQuery

filter

article

articleBaseAdvertisingInfoArticle

articleListArticle

articleSeoArticle

helpersCheckIsPostiesArticle

hooksArticleAcknowledgementGateOverlayArticle

hooksTrackPageViewArticle

hooksContentInterestArticle

articleLinkingDataContent

hooksAmpRedirectArticle

articleSchemaContent

liveArticle

advertZone

sentiment

contentLock

topics

types

sections

moreOnThisArticles

urlAlias

commentCount

authorLocations

authors

corrections

sponsorType

displaySlideShow

multimediaEmbed

printHeadline

seriesContainer

socialHeadline

headline

flag

firstTopic

glossary

flattenTypeIds

publishedDate

additionalInfoBoxes

quizIds

images

image

relatedLinks

relatedNewsletters

__typename

createdDate

sponsor

paywallTypes

pdfFiles

seriesReverseOrder

series

disableOffPlatformContent

published

updatedDate

summary

subHeadline

body

keywords

readingTime

customTimezone

liveContents

Agence France-Presse

Papua New Guinea’s new prime minister has an ambitious - cynics would say far-fetched - objective of turning one of the world’s poorest countries into the “richest black nation” on Earth in just a decade.
If national economies were like football teams, then Papua New Guinea would be near the bottom of the table struggling to avoid a relegation dogfight.
Violent crime and corruption are endemic, reliable electricity is rare, and population centres sit like isolated city-states, surrounded by trackless jungle and mountain ridges that soar into the equatorial sky.
As rich as Papua New Guinea is in culture, language and beauty, it is the 153rd most developed country in the world out of 189, according to the United Nations - doing slightly better than Syria, marginally worse than Myanmar.
New prime minister James Marape wants to change that.
Papua New Guinea PM Peter O’Neill resigns, ending political crisis
He has promised that within 10 years his compatriots will live in “the richest black Christian nation” in the world.
That is not going to be easy. The current title-holder is the highly industrialised economy of Trinidad and Tobago, where the average resident earns around 833 per cent more than Papua New Guinea.
If the British territory of Bermuda were also included in the rankings, the task would be even more daunting.

Papua New Guinea’s economy would have to grow at a world-beating rate of around 30 per cent per year, every year for the next 10 years just to catch up.
“PNG has never experienced 30 per cent growth in the past; nor has any other country for that matter, at least not for any sustained period of time,” said Maholopa Laveil, a lecturer in economics at the University of Papua New Guinea.
To reach his lofty goal, Marape appears to be betting on a surge in gas revenues and more of that cash staying in the country.
In Papua New Guinea, witch hunts, murder are reactions to the modern world
He has hinted that he may look to renegotiate a massive liquefied natural gas (LNG) contract with Total and ExxonMobil that would double national production to better benefit the local economy.
He has also promised to stop the export of unprocessed hardwoods and tackle corruption.
But the strategy comes with risks.
The World Bank has warned that even before a second LNG project comes online, the economy has “become increasingly concentrated in petroleum and gas-related activities”.
That, the bank warned, raises Papua New Guinea’s vulnerability to the vagaries of international energy markets and natural disasters - like the 7.5 magnitude quake that froze production and stalled the economy in 2018.

Even the country’s existing PNG LNG project - which started to flow in 2014 - has failed to live up to expectations.
It required a controversial public loan worth more than A$1 billion (US$700 million) and helped national debt spike.
The project was forecast to increase GDP by over 97 per cent, but according to Paul Flanagan - a former Australian government official who runs the influential PNG Economics blog - the increase has been closer to 6 per cent.
“Overall, the PNG LNG project massively over-promised and then failed to deliver,” one of his recent blog posts read.
“For household disposable income, the prediction was an 84 per cent improvement. The outcome is a decline of 9 per cent.”
Flanagan believes that regardless of any energy boom, Marape - a former finance minister - will need to undertake difficult currency and trade reforms if the country has any hope of growing sustainably.
“Time will tell if the new government will tackle such difficult political economy challenges, challenges that must be addressed to make PNG a much richer black Christian nation,” he said.


Trump’s executive order to boost US deep-sea mining will force China to act

Pacific island nations see a US pullback – will China step up?

PNG’s first ‘glassman’ sorcery conviction: can it ‘stop madness’ of mob justice?

Asia can’t afford to wait for the US to wake up to its climate duty

Pacific nations

Could Papua New Guinea become the ‘richest black nation’ on Earth in just 10 years? New PM James Marape sets audacious goal

A Papua warrior at Goroka Tribal Festival. Papua New Guinea. Photo: Shutterstock

Slums at Hanuabada village at the outskirts of Port Moresby in Papua new Guinea. Shutterstock

Police commute on a road as the close streets leading to Parliament house in Port Moresby on May 28, 2019. - Papua New Guinea Prime Minister Peter O'Neill stalled his announced resignation and took legal action to prevent a vote of no confidence on May 28, deepening the country's political crisis. (Photo by Vanessa Kerton / AFP)

Papua New Guinea’s new Prime Minister James Marape promised that within 10 years his compatriots will live in ‘the richest black Christian nation’ in the world. Photo: AFP

News

Asia

Australasia

As rich as Papua New Guinea is in culture, language and beauty, it is the 153rd most developed country in the world out of 189


Papua New Guinea’s new prime minister has an ambitious - cynics would say far-fetched - objective.
