Papua New Guinea's contribution to World History

By Joseph Ketan.

GREAT nations of the world have made significant progress in technological and economic development. Japan, UK, Germany and the US have certainly something to boast about in the fields of transport and communication technology that has helped make the world better, faster and smaller.

The greatest nations, however, are those that have contributed to human knowledge in the fields of science, technology and culture. The ancient Mesopotamians, Egyptians, Africans and Meso-Americans have left their footprints behind in construction, government, medicine, and food.

Among the greatest of all is a little known country that we know here as Papua New Guinea. Imagining PNG as one of the few greatest countries on earth would be unthinkable to most people, even laughable to some, but wait till you hear the rest of this story.

The academic world has always known about our country’s great contributions to human knowledge and to world history, but some sections of the profession have either deliberately, or inadvertently, downplayed PNG’s gifts to the global community for various reasons.

Until now, the world, at large, does not know that the people of Papua New Guinea have made significant contributions to the world in the fields of seafaring, agricultural technology, food crop domestication, conservation management, good governance, conflict resolution, and social welfare.
• We were the first people in the world to travel across the vast Pacific Ocean using sails and the outrigger canoe technology.
• We were one of only three countries in the world to develop agriculture independently. And we gave the world major economic crops in sugarcane, bananas, and Pacific staples (taro and yams).
• In our kinship and extended family system, we provide the best social welfare system. We do not throw our old folks into retirement centres like white people do.
• We are among the very few who protect the ecosystem, after having recognized that we are part of the environment, rather than being masters over it.
• In the way we distribute economic resources during large-scale ceremonial exchanges, we have consistently demonstrated transparency and accountability in our dealings, thereby demonstrating that we practice good governance while the World Bank only preaches about it.

I could go on and on about it, but it suffices to say that we now have the perfect opportunity provided by the APEC summit to showcase our contributions to human knowledge.

Our Prime Minister will now be able to stand as tall as the President of the US and other global leaders that his country has a remarkable history, not as a tribe of belligerent headhunters or hunters and gatherers, but as settled farmers, peacemakers, conservators, governors, and global trend-setters. It is not a coincident that the world is coming here. They were destined to be here at some stage. We just did not know when. Now that they are here, Prime Minister Peter O’Neill needs to tell them that his country laid the foundation – in agriculture – for the world to thrive on and grow into what it is today. President Donald Trump and other leaders need to know from our leaders that the greatest human transformation from nomadic life, based on hunting and gathering, to permanent settlement, based on farming, was made in Papua New Guinea.

In the words of my countryman, George Bopi, to me, it is very simple: we are not a country of primitive people; rather, we are a country with a rich cultural heritage, with the Kuk World Heritage site as its flagship. We are, essentially, are very civilized country.

We need good man to stand up and speak boldly for PNG. I am thinking of men like the indomitable Thomas Laka, Professor Michael Mel with his eloquent oratory, George Bopi with his passion for excellence, Dr John Muke with his eye to detail, and the unassuming Tiri Kuimbakul. I have met some great people, including Sir Rabbie Namaliu, Sir Mekere Morauta, Dame Meg Taylor, Sam Koim, John Toguata, Ila Geno, Brown Bai, Robert Igara, Anton Goi, John Momis, and numerous others, but it is the forgotten men and women of PNG who really do give a damn about this country. Not the great ones. Not even the greatest.

I send my best wishes and warmest regards to the true Papua New Guineans out there in isolated pockets of the country. Your country is great. That is my simple message!