RICES of basic food stuff in rural areas of Morobe Province have gone through the roof that people are finding that money no longer has any value.
Food items like rice, sugar, tinned fish and fuel like kerosene are so expensive that people in the hinterlands of Finschhafen have gone back to living like their ancestors.
“I can’t spend the K50 I get as my monthly allowance because the price of goods here are so expensive. This money is worthless,” a pastor in the area, Peket Bekos said last week.
This correspondent who took a two-day walk from Pindu to Finschhafen found on the way that a one kilogram packet of rice was going for K10, a one kilogram of sugar was going for K15.00, a litre of Kerosine for K20, a big tinned fish for K8 and a 500 ml cooking oil for K8.
“Our hurricane lamps are collecting dust in our houses. We can use them because the price of kerosene is too high,” Robert Williong, a community leader from Kulungtufu said.
People in the area said the collapse of the Pindu-Finschhafen road in 2007 brought about the hardship faced by the people because cargo from Gagidu in Finschhafen was no longer reaching the villages in the hinterlands.
There are six big villages between Finschhafen and Pindu and more than 40,000 people living in the area.
The villagers said walking to Finschhafen and back would take four days and over difficult terrain and mountains.
“We can take our coffee to the markets so there is no new money coming into the community.
“There is very little economic activity here,” Mr Williong said.
The people said the destruction of the only road linking Pindu to the outside world had also affected social services provided by the church and government.
The people said teachers were not taking up postings in schools in the area while health workers had left.
“You can’t blame them. They can’t live in hardships like this. We can’t go anywhere so we have to make do with our situation here,” Pastor Bekos said.
The Pindu-Finschhafen road was destroyed in 2007 when heavy rain caused floods and landslides that took away several bridges including the bridge at the Mongi river.
The World Bank was putting money into this road and had engaged a local contractor to fix the road when the natural disaster occurred, forcing the donor to abandoned the project because of cost blow out.
The people said the Morobe Provincial Government and Waigani should take a serious look at life in many rural areas of Papua New Guinea because people were suffering sliently.
They said roads and bridges were vital to rural communities because without them, they would continue to suffer.
They said airstrips were okay but they could not solve the problem because of the high cost of fares as well as the limited cargo they could carry.

http://www.postcourier.com.pg/20080819/tuhome.htm

Sad Sad Sad!!...infrastructure is da key, all there needs is a link, naturally economic activity would start.