By Bryant Allen

During a major El Niño event, such as appears to be occurring in 1997, rather than unstable, moist air predominating over the highlands of PNG resulting in massive cloud build up during the day and rain at night, cool, relatively dry air masses predominate, which result in clear night skies and lower than normal rainfall over most of the country.

There is plenty of evidence that the El Niño phenomenon has been occurring for hundreds, if not thousands, of years. So droughts in the lowlands and frosts in the high valleys, are not new to PNGeans and they have developed a wide range of coping strategies.

In addition, today people have access to cash from the sale of export tree crops and fresh vegetables. In most coastal areas people can use either cash reserves, or can produce copra in order to earn cash, and purchase supplementary foods such as rice and flour.

In the lowlands a wide variety of ‘wild’ foods, including self sown Chinese taro, cassava and yams, and sago and coconuts, prevent people from starving, even if staple foods are not available for some time. Village water supplies will become severely reduced, and people may have to dig for water in stream beds. Life will become difficult, but it is unlikely to become life threatening for most people. On some small offshore islands and in some particular environments, things can become serious. These places are likely to be places which already have severe dry seasons and those mid-altitude places which do not have sago and coconuts.

In the highlands, above the altitude at which coconuts and sago will grow, there are many other so-called ‘famine foods’ available in the forest and in gardens. Again the staple food, sweet potato will be in short supply. Life will be hard and difficult, but people are unlikely to be starving. An important ‘wild’ food is karuka, the Pandanus tree, which often produces excellent harvests after a dry period. The two species of this tree will begin producing towards the end of January. People in the main highlands valleys, and importantly, those in the high valleys, have access to this food source.

In all cases, places with low cash incomes will be disdavantaged.

Above 2,100 m above sea level however, clear night skies result in air temperatures falling to below 4 degrees C which results in ground frosts. The high valleys and plateaux were occupied first only about 300 years ago, when sweet potato became available. Sweet potato will grow and produce at these altitudes. It is a plant that produces tubers beneath the soil, but has succulent vines, which are damaged or destroyed by frosts.

The early colonists of the high valleys must have encountered frosts soon after they settled these areas and they too have developed well tried coping strategies. The most widespread of these is to migrate to lower areas, to live with people with whom they have maintained strong social and economic ties as an insurance against frost.

One good frost will kill off the sweet potato vines in the worst affected areas, valley bottoms and hollows. On hillsides cold air will drain away causing only minor damage. Another frost coping strategy is to plant a number of gardens, some on the flats and some on the valley sides. Another is to grow Irish potatoes, which are less susceptible to frost damage.

Sweet potato is planted continuously, so that an average family will have sweet potato gardens at all stages of maturity, from just planted to just harvested. At these high altitudes sweet potato takes almost 12 months to produce a crop, but harvesting is selective (large tubers are removed without disturbing the growing plant) and begins after about 9 months from planting.

A single frost affects sweet potato plants at various stages of development differently. A frost one month after planting will retard the crop reaching maturity by between 1 and 3 months. A frost six months from planting will retard maturity by up to 5 months in severely affected plants. Six to 9 months after planting a frost will cause tubers to rot almost immediately. Unless they can be harvested quickly they are lost, and because many are not yet mature, total loss of this planting can occur. But a frost 9 to 12 months after planting often does little damage to the tubers, which can be harvested for up to 3 months after the frost.

It is easy to understand how one frost can be easily coped with, but how a number of frosts, 6 to 8 weeks apart, can completely destroy sweet potato production in the high altitude valleys. In the past when this occurred, people left these areas, leaving behind to die, old people who were too frail to make the journey. After living for up to a year with hosts in lower altitude areas, using pigs which grow extremely well in the high valleys as a form of rent, they would then move back and forth to their high valley lands, carrying sweet potato vines with which to replant their gardens. Once the first sweet potato plantings were producing, the whole family and the pigs could be moved back. People remained away from their homes for up to 3 years.

Frost is a fickle thing and sometimes devastates one valley and leaves another relatively unscathed. It is not possible to know what the pattern of damage has been, and what future food supplies will be, without making on the ground inspections of gardens and talking with farmers.

In historical times, severe droughts have occurred in PNG in 1885, 1896, 1902, 1910, 1914, 1940-41, 1955-56, 1961, 1965, 1972, 1982, 1987 and now again in 1997. These droughts are reported in the colonial and mission literature as being associated with forest fires, ‘scarcity of food’, ‘semi-starvation’ and in isolated places ‘famine’. In 1914 it is believed that New Ireland was particularly badly affected, with many deaths occurring as a result. A serious famine appears to have occurred in part of the Southern Highlands around 1935, but is associated with too much, rather than too little rain. But like the severe drought and frosts of 1940-41, this event was not observed by people who were literate and there are no written records. The 1940-41 event in the highlands became known through patrol reports from the high valleys recounting village stories of frosts. In the lowlands however, there are many written reports of water supply problems, food shortages and large forest fires during this event.

The 1972 event occurred immediately before PNG became self-governing. Thus it was the first event to become politicized. In June 1972 there began a series of frosts which ended in early October. There was also a countrywide drought. In order to support a lowlands Chief Minister against highlanders who did not want self-government, the Australian government put into place a major food relief program in the highlands. By the end of November 1972 almost 150 000 people were being fed full rations. By August 1973 when the program ceased around 25 000 people in the Kandep area were still being assisted. The program had two distinct parts: provision of food and provision of replanting materials, the first to eliminate the risk of famine and the second to speed a return to self-sufficiency. The food ration for most of the period was 0.45kg of rice per day per adult. For part of the program tinned fish was supplied free, but this ceased in December 1972. The food ration was reduced as gardens were replanted and began producing again. The program was based on WHO recommendations, which in turn, were based on African experiences, and on the assumption that communities receiving migrants from the high valleys, who themselves had been badly hit by the drought, would be unable to cope with the additional population. The program was criticized after the event for not recognizing the capability of the affected people to cope with what was for them, a familiar problem. On the other hand, two experienced agricultural officers involved in the assessments of when and how many to feed, said they believed many people would have died without the program, and that they were working in ignorance of both the agricultural systems and the adaptive coping networks of the high valley peoples.

In 1980 and 1981, frost occurred in some places in the high valleys and a severe dry spell caused problems in the lowlands. These events occurred immediately before a national election, and food aid become mixed up with national and local politics. An Emergency Relief Committee (ERC) was given K0.5 million to spend, and politicians co-opted the UNDP and the UN World Food program (WFP), effectively side-stepping the public service. In February 1981, the ERC formally applied to the UN for 3 months UN/FAO/WFP Emergency Project food aid for 39,597 people in the frost zones. UNDRO offered PNG US$10 000 for food and transport and the UNWFP US$974 000 worth of rice. The UN gave PNG 6 weeks in which to respond to this offer. The PNG Department of Foreign Affairs, the National Planning Office and the National Emergency Service was surprised by the international offer, and conducted its own investigations which found there was ‘conflicting information’ about the seriousness of the situation and that ‘no objective survey’ had been made. A 3 week survey of the highlands and of coastal areas affected by drought was carried out and on the basis of this survey, PNG formally declined the UN offer. The survey found among other things, that public servants and the military had taken instructions directly from politicians to hand out food in their electorates. The food distributed was inadequate to feed the populations to whom it was given, it was given to people who least needed it and it was given before the need became greatest. People in the high valleys waited to be fed, but when the program proved inadequate, they migrated again. The delay in moving jeopardized the welfare of some people.

In 1982, frosts occurred for 3 or 4 nights in succession in June, August, September and October. A countrywide drought resulted in the cessation of all shipping on the Fly River, (the first time since 1972). The PNG government was much more cautious than it had been in 1980-81. There was an attitude in some quarters that village people had "cried wolf" in 1980-81and that they were scheming and manipulative and were not the helpless victims that had been previously portrayed to be. This was unfair to some people who were badly affected. Much greater efforts were made to objectively assess local needs. A completely inadequate survey by the Defence Force, which had become responsible for National Emergencies, that recommended spending K1.1 million on the purchase and distribution of food, was rejected.

This year signs of problems began early. The Southern Oscillation Index nose-dived in late January and predications from the Australian Bureau of Meteorology were for ‘strong El Niño conditions for the rest of year, with spring rainfall ‘significantly below average’. In PNG, lowest rainfalls on record were reported from more than one area, shipping went aground in the Fly River and large bush fires and frosts were reported. Reports that people were facing food shortages began to appear in the PNG newspapers in July, and were picked up in the Australian media in August.

These reports aside, we have no objective assessment of the dimensions of this event. We do not know how many frosts have occurred, nor where they have occurred and we do not know, outside of the high valleys, where conditions may be life threatening. On the basis of past events we can suggest where there may be life threatening problems with food supply:

• all occupied areas above 2,200 m above sea level;
• small offshore islands and atolls, particularly if weather conditions have restricted fishing;
• areas which experience a regular severe dry season, and where there are few cash earning opportunities, in particular Goodenough Island and some parts of the mainland in Milne Bay, and the Sialum coast on the Huon Peninsula;
• inland areas with poor access to cash and on or above the altitudinal limits of coconuts and sago, such as the Kaintiba District in Gulf Province, the Oksapmin area of West Sepik Province, the Goilala area of central province, the inland Huon Peninsula and inland East New Britain.

Conversely, while the drought may cause hardship, it will probably not be life threatening in areas:

• with access to sago or to sago and coconuts;
• where Chinese taro and possibly cassava are important staple foods;
• with relatively high cash incomes from coffee (the main highlands valleys), cocoa (the Gazelle Peninsula and Madang) or oil palm (Hoskins, Bialla and Popondetta, and areas with plentiful coconuts and access to a copra marketing point (most coastal areas);
• with good access to main urban areas, where there will be relatively large amounts of cash available from wages or the marketing of food crops;

An easy option is to immediately begin handing out food and cash to people who say they are affected. There are a number of disadvantages to this response:

• it may reduce the ability of people to cope using traditional skills and creates communities which see themselves as reliant on government for their well being;
• it concentrates people around feeding points which may restrict them from dispersing to seek food from traditional sources;
• these events have occurred in the past and will occur again in the future - making people reliant on food relief will create long term expectations which may not be able to be met in the future, when the rural population will be larger, or the financial circumstances poorer;
• food aid creates opportunities for dishonesty, theft and losses through mismanagement;
• it will almost certainly be impossible to supply food equitably to all people who believe they are affected;
• a food aid program may take skilled people away from more important tasks, for example, preparing replanting materials;

The advantages of food aid are:

• without it some people may suffer hunger and severe hardship;
• it deters migration and to some extent allows a quicker rehabiliation of gardens

If it is decided to provide food aid, then the program should meet the following criteria:

• it should not undermine traditional or newer means of coping by people themselves;
• it should be aimed at only the most needy - mass feeding for political expediency should be avoided;
• it should be carefully managed to minimize losses and costs;
• in order to feed only the most needy, a method of monitoring to provide an objective measure of food supply and its effects on people must be employed;
• food should be given to people in exchange for something, such as community work on local schools, or roads, and only when no other alternative food sources are available.
• as a general rule, food aid should be the least attractive option, to ensure that people do everything possible to help themselves before falling back upon government assistance;

A food aid program based on these requirements is much more difficult than handing out food to everyone, and always has the dangers of collapsing into a mass feeding program.

In addition to food aid, the government should assist with the supply of replanting materials when the time is right for replanting and rehabilitation.

Bryant Allen
Department of Human Geography, Research School of Pacific Studies, The Australian National University

11 September 1997.