View article

The major dimensions of village agriculture in PNG in the year 2000 are presented in this paper. Population is increasing faster than the area of cultivated land which means that intensification of agriculture and land use is occurring. Physical constraints to agricultural expansion and development are discussed. The geographical pattern of agricultural intensification, the means used to maintain soil fertility and crop yields, the adoption of new crops and the use of cash to buy imported food are described. Areas of high and low incomes are identified and are shown to be associated with geographical variation in the ease of surface travel to urban centres. The relationships between all these dimensions and development and vulnerability to degradation and poverty are discussed.

THE aim of this paper is to provide a national overview of PNG village agriculture in the year 2000. Many myths and prejudices exist about agriculture in PNG, largely because there is a great deal of regional variability and it is difficult to generalise at a national level from a small number of local cases. It is important that the development of policy and the implementation of programs is based on accurate information, collected systematically over the whole country. High quality, national-level information is now available, upon which decision making can be firmly based. This paper provides an overview of this information and PNG agriculture in the year 2000. The information is drawn from two main sources: a project completed in 1999, known as the Mapping Agricultural Systems of PNG (MASP) project, which identified, described, documented and mapped smallholder …