The EconomistDecember 21st 2019 Asia 53T
he intended destination is not in
doubt.Fully97.7%ofvotersonthePa-
cificislandofBougainvilleoptedforinde-
pendencefromPapuaNewGuinea(png) in
a referendumheldinlateNovemberand
earlyDecember.Buthow—andhowfast—
theislandwillgetthereremainsfarfrom
clear.Theoutcomeofthepollisnotbind-
ingonthegovernment,whichinherited
Bougainville,partofthearchipelagothat
includestheSolomonIslands,asa quirkof
colonialmap-making.Therewillnowbea
lengthyconsultationbetweentheisland’s
autonomousadministrationandthena-
tionalauthorities.Theultimatesayrestswith png’s parliament.
There are many reasons for delay. Bertie
Ahern, a former Irish prime minister who
oversaw the referendum, says the island’s
300,000-odd people are not ready for inde-
pendence. James Marape, png’s prime
minister, argues that Bougainville’s econ-
omy is too weak and has promised greater
spending on infrastructure. The region’s
main powers, Australia and New Zealand,
fear the creation of a mendicant state on
their doorsteps, susceptible, in particular,
to Chinese bribes and blandishments.
Nearly all of Bougainville’s revenue comes
either from the central government or for-
eign aid.
That was not always the case. Bougain-
ville once boasted the third-largest copper
mine in the world. It delivered close to half
of png’s export revenues in the 1970s. But
arguments about the distribution of rev-
enue and jobs from the Panguna mine
sparked an insurgency in the late 1980s,
which forced the mine to close. png’s
armed forces struggled to establish control
over the island’s mountainous terrain and
hostile population. They withdrew in 1990,
and blockaded the island by sea instead.
When pnghired mercenaries from a firm
called Sandline International to restore or-
der, its own soldiers mutinied, prompting
the government of the day to fall and Aus-
tralia and New Zealand to step in to broker a
peace deal.
The agreement, signed in 2001, prom-
ised a referendum on independence by
2020 and self-government in the mean-
time. But the mine did not re-open, leaving
the autonomous administration starved of
cash. Other big mines and oil- and gasfields
were developed on the mainland, dimin-
ishing the central government’s incentive
to make autonomy work. National leaders’
main concern these days is that Bougain-
ville might inspire other secessionist re-
bellions, given png’s diversity (its 8.5m
citizens speak 839 languages), poverty, iso-
lating terrain and dire infrastructure.
The leader of the autonomous govern-
ment on Bougainville, John Momis, once
supported greater autonomy within png—
the other option on the ballot in the refer-
endum. But the stinginess of png’s fiscal
transfers and its broader neglect of Bou-
gainville drove him and other voters to-
wards independence instead. Few island-
ers have confidence in Mr Marape’s
promise to fix these problems, having
heard such pledges before.
In fact, there is a risk of lack of leader-
ship on both sides. Mr Momis is 81 and
must step down by June because of term
limits. He has no obvious successor. Bou-
gainville’s people, having voted so emphat-
ically for independence, presumably ex-
pect speedy change. The politicians seem
unlikely to gratify their desires. The
chances of further discord are high. 7WELLINGTON
PartofPapuaNewGuineahasvotedfor
independence,butmaynotgetitBougainvilleThe20-yearitch
W
ell beforethe current spate of bush-
fires started ravaging eastern Austra-
lia, they were already dying in droves.
Lachlan Gall has seen “several thousand”
kangaroo corpses splayed under trees or
bogged in the mud of dried-out reservoirs
on his 54,000 hectares (134,000 acres) in
outback New South Wales. “It’s distressing
for the animals,” he says. “And it’s distress-
ing for us to see.” Across Australia’s most
populous state, at least 5m kangaroos are
thought to have died gruesome deaths
since one of the country’s worst droughts
began nearly four years ago. The crisis has
prompted calls for changes to how Austra-
lia manages a national emblem.
“Roos” once shared the landscape only
with Aboriginals, who hunted them for
food and revered them in rock art. The ar-
rival of white settlers, and their sheep and
cattle, sparked a competition for space and
resources that remains unresolved. Aerial
surveys indicate Australia has more than
40m kangaroos, nearly twice the number
of humans. That marks a decline of about
16m in recent years, largely due to drought.
Rangelands in eastern Australia, home to
millions of kangaroos, have just had their
driest three-year period on record. On a re-
cent drive Geoff Wise, a veterinarian from
Dubbo, says he spotted a kangaroo dead of
hunger or thirst or killed by a passing vehi-
cle roughly every 200 metres.
Mr Wise chairs a body that recently con-
vened a symposium about managing the
kangaroo population better. State govern-
ments allow “commercial harvesting” of
four kangaroo species for meat and hides.
The kangaroo industry contributes about
A$250m ($170m) a year to Australia’s econ-
omy. George Wilson of the Australian Na-
tional University reckons it could be more
if farmers could see kangaroos as livestock,
not as competitors for the grass and water
consumed by cattle and sheep. Expanding
the industry this way would bring better
controls over roos’ welfare, and help the
environment. Kangaroos can survive on
about 1.5 litres of water a day, a fraction of
what cattle and sheep consume. They emit
far less methane, a greenhouse gas, than
cattle and sheep do. And their meat has less
fat and more protein than beef or lamb.
The states typically permit licensed
professionals to kill up to 15% of the total
kangaroo population. Last year, for in-
stance, the limit across the four states with
the biggest number of roos was set at 7m.But for some time, the kangaroo cullers
have used only a fraction of their quotas,
sometimes killing just 3.5% of the popula-
tion. That is because demand for kangaroo
meat and hides has been falling. A cam-
paign by animal-rights activists prompted
California, once a big market, to halt im-
ports three years ago. Mr Wilson says this
has made skins “worthless”, without bring-
ing any improvement in kangaroo welfare.
Sussan Ley, the federal environment
minister, attended Mr Wise’s symposium
and tut-tutted about the problem. Farmers
complain that the federal government and
the states are shirking responsibility for
animal welfare. As Mr Gall notes, there is
“inherent animal cruelty in allowing
drought to be the main population man-
agement tool for kangaroos”. 7DUBBO
Drought is killing Australia’s iconic
animal by the millionsKangaroosRoo pall