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PNG TOO SHY TO REVEAL REAL STATE OF ECONOMY TO IMF

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by PAUL FLANAGAN PNG’s government must be embarrassed by the International Monetary Fund’s (IMF) assessment of its economic performance. In an extraordinary step, and the first time in PNG’s 41 year history of Independence, the PNG government has refused to release the IMF’s 2016 summary of the PNG economy. 98% of countries agreed to release this information in 2015 – so the PNG government has moved to the bottom 2% of governments when it comes to economic transparency. In the IMF’s final press release (see here) before Christmas (generally seen as a good time to bury bad news), the International Monetary Fund indicated that “The [PNG] authorities need more time to consider the publication of the staff report and the related press release.” This appears to be polite IMF diplomatic speak for the PNG government not wanting to release the information. The IMF mission visited in mid-2016. An early draft asking for PNG government comments would have been provided about two months ago

PNG Economy – Forecasting Confusion Undermines Confidence but RECESSION CONFIRMED

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by P AUL FLANAGAN Executive Summary The 2017 Budget was a missed opportunity for restoring credibility in the Government’s economic management. Vastly different measures for GDP are included throughout the same Budget document – not a good look for international investors and credit rating agencies LNG values are assumed to increase in the 2017 Budget by 16% while recent World Bank forecasts indicate a fall of 35%. Using official BPNG figures, and updating them for the lower growth forecasts in the 2017 budget, a recession is confirmed: (using the measure most relevant for measuring progress on PNG’s living standards) real non-resource GDP per capita is expected to fall from K2,479 in 2013 to K2,282 in 201 7 this is a fall of 8% in average living standards in PNG. According to official estimates from Treasury and BPNG, it will now take until past 2023 to get back to 2013 standards of living (see graph below).  PNG is officially facing another lost decad

A SPECIAL REPORT ON THE 2017 BUDGET TO BE HANDED THIS WEEK - A BUDGET STRUCTURED FOR FAILURE TO KEEP PNC IN POWER

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by JASON P KANGOMA Treasurer Patrick Pruaitch is scheduled to hand down the 2017 Budget in Parliament this week. Given that 2017 is election year, the Budget is certain to be dominated by the usual O’Neill Regime spin and deceit, along with wasteful and irresponsible spending measures. But the central feature will be drastic cuts to essential social services such as health and education, and further suffering for ordinary Papua New Guineans. Every successive O’Neill Budget has been a failure, creating more problems than they solve, and driving the nation further towards total collapse. This special PNG Blogs report reveals the ongoing damage Prime Minister Peter O’Neill’s corruption, greed and mismanagement is doing to Papua New Guinea.   POVERTY INCREASING UNDER O’NEILL REGIME The new announcement by the O’Neill Regime that it has obtained a K1 billion rescue package from the Asian Development Bank proves that Prime Minister Peter O’Neill’s economic and finan

PNG IS IN A ECONOMIC RECESSION - LEADING ECONOMIST

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PNGBLOGS Papua New Guinea is in economic recession, according to leading Australian academic economist Paul Flanagan, who is an expert on PNG. This is revealed in his analysis (at his www.pngeconomics.org blog) of the latest official numbers from the Bank of Papua New Guinea and the National Statistics Office. The official numbers show Prime Minister Peter O’Neill, Treasurer Patrick Pruaitch and Finance Minister James Marape are telling lies when they say the economic is healthy and everything is under control. Mr Flanagan says the recession began in early 2014, and the official numbers show that it is  continuing. This means Papua New Guineans’ standard of living has been falling since 2014. In other words, O’Neill has wasted the riches flowing from PNG LNG and the three years of high GDP growth he experienced when he became Prime Minister. Papua New Guineans are poorer today than they were at the start of 2014 because of O’Neill’s waste, corruption and mismanagement.   Fla