Papua New Guinea | Good News For Humankind

Coral underwater, for article on marine protected area

Papua New Guinea announces one of the world’s largest no-take marine reserves

By Peter Schulte / May 31, 2026 / Good News For Humankind

Papua New Guinea just pledged to protect roughly 200,000 square kilometers of Pacific Ocean — an expanse nearly the size of the United Kingdom.
The proposed Western Manus Marine Protected Area sits inside the Coral Triangle, often called the Amazon of the seas, and a 2024 National Geographic Pristine Seas expedition there documented deep-sea species never before recorded in PNG waters — including the elusive yokozuna slickhead. Researchers also noticed fewer large predators than expected, a quiet signal that even these remote waters need a break from fishing pressure.
If Papua New Guinea follows through with real enforcement, this single reserve would mark a meaningful step toward the global goal of protecting 30% of the ocean by 2030 — and a hopeful model for ocean stewardship everywhere.

Papua New Guinea creates two massive new Marine Protected Areas

By Peter Schulte / December 14, 2023 / Good news links

Together they cover more than 6,200 square miles, tripling the country’s marine area under protection, and are the country’s first to be co-managed by Indigenous communities.

Growing crops, for article on New Guinea agriculture

New Guineans independently develop agriculture, transforming the Pacific

By Peter Schulte / January 10, 0001 / Archive of Human Genius

New Guinea agriculture began around 10,000 years ago, when highland communities started draining swamps and cultivating taro, banana, and yam entirely on their own. The Kuk Swamp site, now a UNESCO World Heritage site, preserves the planting pits and water channels that document this slow transition. It’s one of only a handful of places on Earth where farming was independently invented.

Cut sugarcane, for article on sugarcane domestication

Papuans in New Guinea domesticate sugarcane, sweetening the world forever

By Peter Schulte / January 9, 0001 / Archive of Human Genius

Sugarcane domestication began around 4000 B.C.E. in the highlands of New Guinea, where Papuan farmers selectively bred a wild grass into the ancestor of the world’s sweetest crop. Curiously, they first grew it as pig feed. Thousands of years later, that same plant sweetens billions of morning cups across every tropical continent.