[Excerpt from Papua New Guinea Country Report, prepared by the Government of Papua New Guinea for the United Nations Fourth World Conference on Women, Beijing, China September 4-15, 1995]

Poverty

Traditionally Papua New Guineans have been self-sufficient with highly developed agricultural and economic exchange systems. Today, poverty in rural areas of Papua New Guinea is not poverty in absolute terms of starvation and lack of shelter. Villagers have a base of subsistence farming and traditional shelter practices. This is not to deny that there are a few areas where there is agricultural stress and of shortages of land resulting in poor yields. Poverty must be viewed in terms of improvement on the basic traditional diet and nutrition and the standard of living.

Rural poverty is increasingly a function of lack of essential infrastructure and social services such as health and education, especially in the very remote rural areas. Where the infrastructure and social services are not available or are inadequate, there is often malnutrition and poor health. Those who are not part of the cash economy have low or virtually no income to supplement the traditional goods/food basket and have little chance of improvement in housing and general standard of living.

There are great improvements in the standard of living in some provinces such as East New Britain but this improvement is lagging in many other areas. It is not implied that poverty will not get worse in the rural country. What is required is more productive investment in the rural sector to stimulate income and employment generation development activities. These investments, making the rural sector more attractive, will help to minimize rural-urban migration.

In the urban areas, particularly Port Moresby and Lae, attaining nutritional and shelter requirements in dependent on employment. This dependence on the cash economy coupled with a lack of employment, has contributed to increasing urban poverty.

The 1994 United Nations Development Program Human Development Report placed Papua New Guinea low in ranking among 173 countries, based on classifications of education, life expectancy and the gross national product. These indicators, while important, do not adequately describe the situation of women and poverty in Papua New Guinea. To understand trends for the coming decade, nutrition, shelter, land and environment must also be considered.

1. Food and Nutrition

   The majority of people in Papua New Guinea are able to meet their basic nutritional needs and there is no real starvation in rural areas apart from localized food shortages due to natural disasters and a few pockets of severe malnutrition.... Women, particularly in rural areas, may be disadvantaged in terms of access to knowledge of food preparations of nutritional value. Women who are especially vulnerable to malnutrition are located in areas such as smallholder cash crop projects, plantations, urban squatter settlements and areas of high outmigration of able-bodied population.

   The combined efforts on nutrition of various government departments such as Agriculture, Health and Education, along with women’s organizations and other nongovernment organizations, have resulted in the revision of the 1978 Food and Nutrition Policy with the adoption of the Papua New Guinea National Nutritional Policy which was endorsed by the national Executive Council in March 1995. The National Plan of Action for nutrition is being finalised for endorsement by the Government in the November 1995 session. As a complement to the National Nutritional Policy, the Department of agriculture and Livestock is drafting a National Food Crops and Livestock Policy. The overall policy objectives are contained in the White Paper on Agricultural Policies which will be endorsed by the National Executive Council in the November 1995 Budget Session. The recent initiative by government on the Child Survival Cash Program has brought to light many of these nutritional concerns and has seen commitments from non-governmental organizations and agencies concerned with improving the welfare of mothers and children.

2. Female headed households

TABLE 3: Percent Distribution of Citizen Households by Size, by Sex, of Household Heads,

3. Unemployment

4. Child Care

   In the urban areas, there are a number of child care facilities, ranging from child-minding to preschool. These are governed by the Child Welfare Act for licensing. Cost for these are K70-100 per fortnight which represents a large portion of the lower levels of the wage scale. A keyboard operator will typically earn K200/fortnight. Most women rely on family and fiends to provide child care as costs are prohibitive. There is a need for government to provide subsidized child care at affordable rates according to salary level.

1. Housing

   Housing is an emerging development problem in Papua New Guinea.... In the urban society housing has become a critical issue that requires urgent attention particularly because of lack of proper housing to suit the needs of families, urban single workers, and female-headed households. The increase in labour force and female participation particularly in the urban centers is not being addressed by urban planning authorities.

   Existing data available from the 1990 census is not disaggregated by gender and is focused on the ownership of homes and types of housing in existence in the urban centers. Although there is an increase in home ownership, the great majority of Papua New Guineans, about 66% in urban areas, live in low cost housing, in domestic workers quarters and the urban settlements. The number of domestic quarters has doubled from 1980 to 1990. This reflects the growing demands of the working population for domestic workers in urban centers and an increase in urban migration to major centers.

   There is no effective response to the accommodation demands of a fast-growing labour force although the real estate industry is emerging strongly in the industrial centers of Papua New Guinea.... Housing for young women and female workers consists primarily of hostel accommodation which is very limited. The few hostels in existence are run by government, non-government organizations and churches. The conditions of government run hostels are very poor, unhygienic and insecure. most hostels are based in the nation’s capital of Port Moresby, with one based in Lae and one in Goroka. Women’s hostels established by Papa new Guinea non-government organizations are managed by the Young Women’s Christian Association, Country Women’s Association, Catholic Church and the Girl Guides of PNG. However there is a great need for their expansion to other centers.

   The 1990 census revealed an increase in marriage breakdown. In urban centers the percentage of separation or divorce was 1.7% for females and 1.3% for males. This implies that the incidence of single parent female-headed households is increasing and so will the demand for appropriate accommodation. This matter will need to be monitored closely by housing authorities and social service providers. Current policy and housing schemes are not insensitive to special categories of the population, particularly female-headed households.

   Existing government housing policy is targeted at the urban population involved in the productive formal sector. The government is no longer building houses to rent but is encouraging home ownership schemes due to the huge maintenance costs that are incurred by government. All houses owned by the government have been sold to the public servants living in them. However, there are no new developments for new recruitments of public sector employees. The government has directed its agencies to set up national home ownership schemes for its employees.... It is difficult to establish how many Papua New Guinean women have access to services and are utilizing such home ownership schemes. Information on existing schemes is not always made available or accessible to women.

   There are may other issues that need to be addressed, such as accommodation for women and girls attending tertiary education institutions. The design of dormitories and female hostels needs to be carefully reviewed to ensure that they are secured and comfortable....

2. Land and Environment