Anoek Photojournalist

JOURNEYS: Papua New Guinea

Papua New Guinea is the largest developing country in the South Pacific region and in the possession of a most linguistically diverse area in the world with 826 different languages.

PNG's population has suffered significant declines in living standards in recent years due to worsening economic performance, poor health and social indicators show that poverty is a real problem.

A Huli wigmen from Lake kopiago wearing a decorative woven wig of human hair adorned with bird of paradise feathers poses for a photo on the way to the Parliament House in Port Moresby, August 14 2007. The Huli men weave their wigs from their own hair grown while living in isolation before they marry
   
Huli wigmen from Lake Kopiago and Tari walk on the stairs of Papua New Guinea's Parliament House in Port Moresby, August 14, 2007, to welcome the newly elected members of government Sir Julius Chan
   
A Huli wigman from Lake Kopiago waits at the door of Papua New Guinea's Parliament House in Port Moresby, 14 August 2007, to welcome the newly elected members of government Sir Julius Chan who is expected to be elected following the re-election of Michael Somare as PNG Prime Minister
     
  
Former Papua New Guinean prime minister Sir Julius Chan sits on the stairs at Parliament House in Port Moresby, 14 August 2007. Sir Julius is expected to be elected as the new leader of the Opposition following the re-election of Grand Chief Sir Michael Somare as Papua New Guinean Prime Minister
   
A woman walks around the shops in the empty streets of Mount Hagen
   
A man walks by the shops in the empty streets of Mount Hagen
     
  
A Man burns garbage around the shops in the impoverished streets at Mount Hagen on August 8, 2007.
   
Motuan children play at the debris of the 'plastic tide' lapping beneath traditional stilt houses in Hanuabada village near Port Moresby on August 16, 2007. The original wood and thatched houses were destroyed by fire during World War II and have been rebuilt using corrugated iron and timber planks. The Motu are a sea-faring Melanesian people who settled along the Gulf of Papua coast around 2,000 years ago
   
Papua New Guinea is the largest developing country in the South Pacific region and still has limited primary health care. Infectious diseases are claiming many lives, and there are serious public health risks from endemic diseases such as malaria, and an emerging HIV/AIDS epidemic. An estimated 2% of people in PNG carry the virus. Morgue attendant Gideon Mati displays the corpses of 38 babies wrapped in rags in a refrigerated shipping container outside Port Moresby General Hospital on August 16, 2007. If health officials don't complete the paperwork on time, the unclaimed bodies will be placed in individual coffins and buried in a mass grave
     
  
PNG still has limited primary health care. Infectious diseases are claiming many lives, and there are serious public health risks from endemic diseases such as malaria, and an emerging HIV/AIDS epidemic. An estimated 2% of people in PNG carry the virus. A unclaimed dead body is wrapped in a rag in a refrigerated shipping container outside Port Moresby at the morgue of the General Hospital on August 16, 2007. If health officials don't complete the paperwork on time, the unclaimed bodies will be placed in individual coffins and buried in a mass grave
   
A Papuan man sits in the back of a car on the road at Port Moresby
   
A boy waits for his mother to finnish working at the coffee plantage in the highlands around Mount Hagen on August 18, 2007. Coffee is the most important agricultural export for the native people of Papua New Guinea