Papua New Guinea is a land of unique experiences and an inspiring cultural heritage. This nation is home to breathtakingly beautiful diving sites with rich coral reefs, marine life, and underwater wrecks of ships and aeroplanes from the war. Papua New Guinea’s network of white sand beaches is extensive and its native flora and fauna are among the most intriguing to be found anywhere in the Pacific Ocean. The diversity in this country's waters is truly amazing with turquoise-fringed sapphire lagoon and exquisite Ocean fronts. The most astonishing feature of Papua New Guinea is its cultural harmony which sublimes the cacophony of 700 different indigenous languages and at least as many ethnic societies. Amazingly, visitors will discover two provinces to be alike in any sense of cultural expressions. Port Moresby is the capital of Papua New Guinea and was named after Admiral Sir Fairfax Moresby. Lae and Mount Hagen are other two significant cities of the island nation.
Papua New Guinea occupies the eastern half of the island of New Guinea that is situated over the southwestern Pacific Ocean. The Indonesian province of Papua and Irian Jaya form the only international land boundary of the country to the west. Papua New Guinea is basically a group of islands at south-eastern corner of Asia, between the Coral Sea and the South Pacific Ocean. The New Ireland, New Britain and Bougainville are the major islands of this group. Riverbanks, mountainous terrains and vast tropical rainforests dominate the topography of the country. Due to Papua New Guinea’s location by the “Ring of Fire’ or geological fault line the country brings in snowfall in the elevated regions of Papua New Guinea.
Papua New Guinea is a multicultural and developing country with a teeming population count of more than 5 million people. Papuan, Melanesian, and Negrito tribes were the first inhabitants of the region that later scattered into different communities and gave birth to hundreds of distinct cultures. The migratory population has defined under the broader title of Austronesian speaking community. Spanish and Portuguese explorers first explored the regions of Papua New Guinea in the sixteenth century but no recoded and definite historical timeline is available till nineteenth century. After brief Dutch occupation, Germany formally annexed the northern coast of Papua New Guinea in 1885 and it came to be known as the German New Guinea. Meanwhile the southern part remained in possession of Australia. This region was popularly known as Papua and politically described as the British New Guinea. After the First World War Australia gained control of the German territory under a League of Nations mandate. This meant that Papua and New Guinea had entirely separate administrations but both were controlled by Australia. Following Japanese confrontation of Second World War, the regions were combined and called the Territory of Papua and New Guinea. On September 1975, Papua New Guinea achieved complete independence from Australia.
Papua New Guinea is now a member of the Commonwealth of Nations and the British Monarch acts as the chief of state in the country. A governor general represents the monarch in the nation and a prime minister along with his deputy prime minister heads the executive body. The unicameral National Parliament of Papua New Guinea consists of 109 seats, of which 89 are elected from open electorates for five years and 20 from provincial electorates.
Agriculture is the mainstay of the economy in Papua New Guinea. The country is also rich in natural resources, oil, copper, and gold. However, tourism earns the maximum foreign currency for Papua New Guinea.