MANAGALAS PLATEAU CONSERVATION AREA PROJECT

The Managalas Plateau is a raised valley lying between 600 to 1000 metres altitude above the coastal plain of Oro Province, Papua New Guinea. It sits between the Owen Stanley Ranges to the south and west, the Sibium Ranges to the south-east and Mount Lamington and the Hydrographers to the north and east. The 300,000 hectares of the Plateau encompass an extraordinary diversity of environments including alpine heath at 3,800 metres, montane and hill forest, savanna, anthropogenic grassland and gardens.

Like many of the mountainous mid-altitude valleys of PNG, the Plateau is an area of high quality agricultural land and relatively dense populations. The surrounding mountains, by contrast, are generally infertile and little populated. 15,000 people from around 150 clan groups live in 40 village communities on the Managalas Plateau. These are largely subsistence farmers and depend almost exclusively on the environment for their livelihood. Ten dialects are found on the plateau that together make up three broad languages (Barai, Managalas and Aomie).

The Managalas Plateau is relatively isolated and remote from urban Papua New Guinea. It is linked to the Oro Provincial Capital, Popondetta, by a poor quality four-wheel drive road and by two airstrips as well as by foot-tracks. This allows a limited sale of coffee and other produce during dry conditions but high freight costs and poor maintenance prevent regular trade.

Government services are restricted to a number of community schools, a top up school, two aid posts and a station and Health Centre at Afore. The Summer Institute of Linguistics (SIL) introduced an adult literacy program to the Plateau in the 1960¹s and this has provided an important foundation for many of the development processes now taking place on the Plateau.

Over the past decade a number of proposals for timber extraction, oil palm and mining development have been presented to the Managalas Plateau. While welcoming the opportunity for development, Managalas communities are actively opposing many of these projects due to the poor consultation with resource owners and the failure to guarantee benefits or environmental protection.