Compensation for Resource Development in Papua New Guinea.

Abstract

Compensation, as payment for wrongdoing causing harm or loss, is a well-used customary concept in Papua New Guinea and can be seen as a form of conflict management. Demands for high compensation payments in exchange for the use of land have become a problem hindering development. The claims are engendered by what may be described broadly as environmental presence on the part of developers. Claimants are landowners and the communal land tenure system in Papua New Guinea means that virtually native citizens are landowners. Land is owned by kin groups and is passed on to successive generations. So people alive at any time are custodians and have the right to use land but not necessarily dispose of it permanently. This volume deals with land compensation as it applies to resource development and is therefore essential reading for potential developers and investors in Papua New Guinea. It is part of a research project, which expects to propose guidelines, possibly leading to legal reform, for solving issues surrounding the need to compensate landowner groups for the use of their land.