‘PNG’s 5.5m people live in abject poverty’
By JEFFREY ELAPA
ABOUT 5.5 million out of the 6.5 million people of Papua New Guinea live in poverty, according to research fellow Dr Mike Bourke.
Dr Bourke, a research fellow at the Australian National University, made a presentation at the Divine Word University last Thursday on the level of poverty in PNG.
The data presented was based on several researches carried between 1963 and late 1990 and were carried out in every district in Papua New Guinea.
The study indicated that out of the 6.5 million population of PNG, 18.4% (about 975,000) people in PNG were the poorest, 2,242 000 people ( 42.3%) of the population were less poor while another 2,078, 000 people (39.2%) in rural villagers were least poor.
Dr Bourke said the implications of poverty in PNG are due to low cash income, inaccessibility to health facilities, and limited access to secondary or tertiary education and the limited access to market.
Dr Bourke said PNG has an overall life expectancy rate of 54 years while the worse provinces of Sandaun and Gulf provinces have an average of 46 years life expectancy rate.
The research further indicated that PNG has a highest infant mortality rate of 73/1000 births while Sandaun and Gulf provinces have the highest have 110/1000 live births.
PNG has one of the highest maternal death rates of 930 every pregnancy, which means that every mother who is pregnant has about 1% changes of surviving due to birth complication.
The Dr Bourke said in his presentation that most of the poorest rural villagers live mostly on the edges of the central highlands or inland of low land location while some live on the coastal isolated islands.
He said Sandaun, Western and inland of Gulf and Central, Pomio, inland of Madang, East Sepik and some parts of Milne Bay live in extreme poverty.
He added that Lake Kopiago in Southern Highlands and Kombiam in Enga provinces are some areas where people also live in poverty.
The report said that a lot of people from the poor areas migrate to towns and cities in search of better services and conditions of life while statistics showed that very few students complete secondary and tertiary education.
The report also indicated that PNG has one of the highest illiteracy rates among rural villages except for Mortlock Island in Bougainville with the highest educated citizens with over 47/950 people while Pomio in the East New Britain has the least and poorly educated population.
Dr Bourke revealed the high poverty rate among the rural villages can be addressed through:
* Better quality of primary education like having improved teachers pay and condition;
* Improve access to secondary education;
* Greater access to local health centres;
* High cash income , mostly from agriculture and livestock;
* Better food security;
* Repair infrastructure; and
* Better communication.
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