Country Overview
Papua New Guinea has a reasonable level of recent infrastructure activity for the size of its economy, with overall investment at 5.4% of GDP per annum. However, its financial markets lack depth and its permits and planning of infrastructure could be reformed. Papua New Guinea could benefit from publishing a pipeline of infrastructure projects and an overarching national infrastructure plan. It could also set formal requirements for environmental impact statements, improve the quality of land administration, and better prepare for infrastructure and PPP market processes to attract better quality infrastructure investment.
See Full Overview Data
GDP per capita
3,050 USD
Population
9.0 million persons

Driver Overview

This section shows a country’s rank, ranking change and score for each of the eight drivers. It also categorises each country’s driver performance on a scale from “Emerging” (score from 0-20) to “Global Leader” (score from 80-100).

Driver
Score /100
Emerging Aspiring Contender Top performer Global Leader

Rank

Score /100

Best practice

47.9
-
33.5
-
27.0
-
56.1
-
42.3
-

Metric Overview

Strengths

Financial stability

Papua New Guinea’s financial stability is similar to the average of 83 for Lower Middle Income Countries. Stable financial markets facilitate the smooth flow of funds between infrastructure assets and investors. However, the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic is a concern.

Gross government debt

Papua New Guinea’s gross government debt amounts to 41% of GDP, lower than the Lower Middle Income Countries’ average of 54%. However, its credit rating is only B, and the COVID-19 pandemic may increase debt levels.

Infrastructure investment

Investment in infrastructure is high in Papua New Guinea, at 5.4% of GDP per annum. The COVID-19 pandemic may impact these efforts.

Financial stability

Papua New Guinea’s financial stability is similar to the average of 83 for Lower Middle Income Countries. Stable financial markets facilitate the smooth flow of funds between infrastructure assets and investors. However, the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic is a concern.

Gross government debt

Papua New Guinea’s gross government debt amounts to 41% of GDP, lower than the Lower Middle Income Countries’ average of 54%. However, its credit rating is only B, and the COVID-19 pandemic may increase debt levels.

Infrastructure investment

Investment in infrastructure is high in Papua New Guinea, at 5.4% of GDP per annum. The COVID-19 pandemic may impact these efforts.

Top Performing Metrics

Top Performing Metrics

This is defined by the metrics with the highest unweighted score out of 100. 

Lower-middle income country average

Financial markets:
Financial stability

Funding capacity:
Gross government debt

Opportunities to Grow

Published project pipeline

Papua New Guinea does not currently publish an infrastructure pipeline of projects. The addition of an infrastructure pipeline could help provide infrastructure participants with a clear indication of prospective and confirmed infrastructure activity.

Published infrastructure plan

Papua New Guinea does not have a national or sub-national infrastructure plan. The addition of an infrastructure plan could highlight infrastructure challenges and opportunities for investment, as well as detail the government's planned responses.

Environmental impact analysis

According to the World Bank, Papua New Guinea does not have a regulated requirement for environmental impact assessment. Undertaking environmental feasibility studies can help countries understand and balance environmental and infrastructure outcomes.

Published project pipeline

Papua New Guinea does not currently publish an infrastructure pipeline of projects. The addition of an infrastructure pipeline could help provide infrastructure participants with a clear indication of prospective and confirmed infrastructure activity.

Published infrastructure plan

Papua New Guinea does not have a national or sub-national infrastructure plan. The addition of an infrastructure plan could highlight infrastructure challenges and opportunities for investment, as well as detail the government's planned responses.

Environmental impact analysis

According to the World Bank, Papua New Guinea does not have a regulated requirement for environmental impact assessment. Undertaking environmental feasibility studies can help countries understand and balance environmental and infrastructure outcomes.

Metrics to Improve

Metrics to Improve

This is defined by the metrics with the lowest weighted score out of 100, such that these metrics would have the greatest impact on the overall score.

For metrics that have binary outcomes (yes=100/no=0), no comparative income group average is reported.

Lower-middle income country average

Detailed Data

This section shows country data for each of the 41 metrics. The figures in brackets denote the change in score since InfraCompass 2017. 

Note that all data has been normalised on a scale of 1-100. For raw metric data, please download the complete InfraCompass 2020 dataset. 

Where relevant, some metric scores have been inverted, such that all metrics have positive relationships with good infrastructure outcomes. For example, since lower compliance costs make it easier to invest in infrastructure, the normalised value of ‘number of procedures to start a business’ has been reversed such that lower number of procedures are scored closer to 100, and higher numbers closer to 0. In other words, a score of 0 indicates a poor performance, rather than 0 number of procedures.

Governance Regulatory Permits Planning Procurement Activity Funding Financial
Driver
Score /100
Emerging Aspiring Contender Top performer Global Leader

Metric

Papua New Guinea

Lower-middle Income Countries Average

Source Link

28.2%

Recovery rate

The recovery rate is recorded as cents on the dollar recovered by secured creditors through reorganisation, liquidation or debt enforcement (foreclosure or receivership) proceedings.

24.9
31.4

20.7%

Rule of law

World Governance Composite Indicator reflecting perceptions of the extent to which agents have confidence in and abide by the rules of society, and in particular the quality of contract enforcement, property rights, the police, and the courts, as well as the likelihood of crime and violence. The rule of law reflects whether the law imposes limits of power on the state, private sector and individuals.

34.7 (+0.2)
41.5

18.1%

Post-completion reviews

Whether the country conducts post-completion reviews on infrastructure projects to ensure the forecast outcomes are being achieved.

Yes
-

15.1%

Shareholder governance

Measures the governance practices that protect shareholders through three dimensions: the extent of shareholder rights index (shareholders’ rights and role in major corporate decisions), the extent of ownership and control index (governance safeguards protecting shareholders from undue board control and entrenchment), and the extent of corporate transparency index (corporate transparency on ownership stakes).

36.7 (+3.3)
34.2

12.8%

Political stability and absence of violence score

Measures perceptions of the likelihood of political instability and/or politically-motivated violence, including terrorism. Estimate gives the country's score on the aggregate indicator, in units of a standard normal distribution i.e. ranging from approximately -2.5 to 2.5.

38.9 (-2.7)
38.7

5%

Infrastructure or PPP agency

Whether an infrastructure agency exists to coordinate an integrated approach to infrastructure delivery and policy.

Yes
-

Papua New Guinea

Lower-middle Income Countries Average

24.9
31.4
34.7 (+0.2)
41.5
Yes
-
36.7 (+3.3)
34.2
38.9 (-2.7)
38.7
Yes
-

Country Overview Data

Papua New Guinea has a reasonable level of recent infrastructure activity for the size of its economy, with overall investment at 5.4% of GDP per annum. However, its financial markets lack depth and its permits and planning of infrastructure could be reformed. Papua New Guinea could benefit from publishing a pipeline of infrastructure projects and an overarching national infrastructure plan. It could also set formal requirements for environmental impact statements, improve the quality of land administration, and better prepare for infrastructure and PPP market processes to attract better quality infrastructure investment.
GDP per capita

3,050 USD

Population

9.0 million persons

GDP

23.6 USD billion

GDP growth rate

5.0%

GDP per capita growth rate

-0.3%

Gini coefficient

41.9 (0-100 worst)

Gross Government Debt

41.0% of GDP

Inflation rate

3.9%

Summary credit rating

30.0 (0-100 best)

Unemployment rate

2.4%

Urbanisation ratio

13.0% of total population

Digital Adoption Index

0.3 (0-1 best)