What works in Papua New Guinea

Papua New Guinea has undertaken several major development initiatives with mixed results. The Rural Communications Project successfully expanded mobile coverage from ~20% to ~90% in rural areas, providing ~500,000 residents first-time telephony access through 59 solar-powered base stations, though 5 towers were lost to vandalism and theft. The National REDD+ Programme verified 17M tCO₂e of avoided deforestation across 1.4M hectares and channelled USD 63.4M in climate finance, with 60% (~USD 38M) directed to customary landowners and communities. In contrast, the Family and Sexual Violence Units programme, operating since 2007–08 to address an ~60% intimate-partner violence prevalence, was found in 2015 to have only 7 of 17 units fully functioning, with low conviction rates and limited rural reach due to chronic understaffing and resource constraints.