The security treaty signed last week is the logical next step in the two countries’ relationship. But Australia’s interests in PNG should remain broad-based.
In Fiji, 95% of adults have received one jab and 80% are fully vaccinated. In PNG, however, less than 1% of the population is fully vaccinated – and the country is giving away its vaccines.
Having been protected by geography early in the pandemic, Pacific nations are now battling serious outbreaks and struggling to get their people vaccinated.
Tony Heynen, The University of Queensland; Paul Lant, The University of Queensland, dan Vigya Sharma, The University of Queensland
As immunisation emerges as the world’s primary weapon to combat COVID-19, much more work is needed to improve electricity access so vaccines can be refrigerated.
Our neighbour’s stability and prosperity is in our interests. Surely, there can be no better example of this than the current crisis: what is good for PNG is also good for Australia.
Decision-makers, locally and globally, must balance management of pandemics with a recognition that fish and fishing communities are essential to local well being.
Australia has been tightening the border between PNG and the Torres Strait Islands in recent years, exacerbating poverty and the spread of tuberculosis in villages that depend on cross-border trade.
There are the real challenges facing Papua New Guinea, and the current leadership crisis in Port Moresby may or may not not produce a meaningful response to them.
PNG is enjoying unfamiliar global attention after the APEC summit earlier this week, and the rivalry between the United States and China to exert influence in the region.
Summit season is usually a bit of a bore - worthy subjects lost in acronyms and diplomatic niceties. Not so this year as US-China tensions tore at the fabric of multi-lateralism.
Fresh earthquakes and aftershocks hit parts of Papua New Guinea following February’s deadly quake. It’s Australia’s slow push north that’s part of PNG’s seismic activity.
Why is Papua New Guinea so susceptible to landslides? Steep terrain, earthquakes and aftershocks plus recent seasonal rains have created an environment that is prone to collapse.
A team of researchers led by Edith Cowan University have surveyed the PNG island of New Britain to see how the bird population is faring. There’s good news and bad news.
It has taken more than three months for the Australian and PNG governments to jointly announce the Manus Island detention centre will close. But the detainees’ fate is now even more uncertain.
Papua New Guinea is now facing a drought and frosts that look set to be worse than 1997, when hundreds of people died. So how can memories of 1997 save lives over the next few months?
Over-fishing is a massive environmental and economic challenge. Fortunately, there are new solutions being trialled – including in a tuna hotspot in the Pacific.