Points East

New Guinea Diary

Notes Made In The Highlands-And

By R. W. Robson

Gosford Hamstrings Goroka's

Passion-Pulo Industrv P “ fTVALKING of private enterprise X and the accursed uncertainties of politician-ridden governments: The world produces no bigger or better passionfruit than the New Guinea Highlands. There is a great and growing world market for canned passionfruit pulp.

Some six years ago, Messrs. Cottee, “of Australia, joined with Mr.

Greathead, a Goroka planter (like lan Downs, he was a DO of muchtoo-individualistic a character for the Administration, so got out, for mutual comfort) and they established a large pulping factory in Goroka.

Natives were encouraged to grow the easy passionfruit, and it came in in tons, which gave the natives an excellent profit. The grading, washing, cutting, de-seeding pro-

cesses were all automatic (a clever mechanical arrangement) and the air companies gave a low backload ing rate to Madang and Lae.

The Australian food processors took all the canned passionfruit pulp the factory could produce.

Then the passionfruit-growers of Gosford (NSW) sat up on their tails in a solid line, and howled, They claimed they were being ad versely affected by the product of “cheap, black labour.”

The Gosford area is politically border-line: the MP who doesn’t please the middle-men goes out, Politicians don’t reason why, when seats are in danger. No one pointed out that, if the Gosford fruit could not compete against a product that was carried thousands of miles from Central New Guinea (part of the way by air) it did not deserve a market. There were threats of a tariff.

Cottees could not afford to risk all

th & t expensive equipment in the Highlands. So production has been greatly reduced, so as to force manufacturers to buy the local stuff; and the Gosford snarling has dwindled away. George Greathead now is producing a . good deal of coffee, and remains happy.

If the Goroka passionfruit can be diverted effectively from Aus tralia, to become a dollar-eamer in United States—still hungry for the famous fruit—that Gosford howl eventually may benefit rather than harm the new Goroka industry.—

Rwr.

Editorial Note:

Australians who frequently shed crocodile tears about the troubles of Brown Brother and swallow all the sentimental flap-doodle that is issued about them, have no conscience when their pockets are involved.

None of the so-called “capitalists’ ’ will suffer over this passionfruit business, you will note. But the poor benighted natives of the Highlands, who have not a glimmering about agricultural economics, only know that they have apparently been sold a pup: First, they were encouraged to plant and sell passionfruit ; now they are discouraged. They have no idea why, so like most of us in

a like predicament, they “blame tin Government” —so hang goes Euro c pean prestige in that part of th\ Territory.

So far as we can remember, Cottee ' did not start the Goroka venture in order to get cheap passionfruii hut because they could not ge adequate supplies at that time. . few years ago passionfruii wa bringing fantastic prices in Aus. tralia, and growers preferred to ses on the open market and not ft processors.

High prices inevitably encourage e more people into the industry wift the natural result that the ope l , market could not take all the frui offering, and growers were then again looking to processors to tak the surplus. They were annoyea of course, to find that some of th slack had been taken up by Ne i Guinea and South Africa in W meantime. Result: a squeal to th Tariff Board to put a prohibit™ duty on the article.

If when they found they coul not buy passionfruii at a reasonabi price locally, Cottees had decide that they would fust gracefully re tire from business, this would, c course, have been accepted by Aw: tralians who, by and large, subscril to the theory that it is better i sell nothing at a high price, tha. a lot at a lower price.

New Freshwater Fish in

The Highlands

IjWERYONE knows that, in J dietetic sense, the New Guine natives’ most urgent need protein. The birds and the beast, long since, have been almost cleare out of most of the jungles near tW heavily populated areas. Some trib»c are notorious for the fact that who grandma reaches the end of hr usefulness,, she may be tapped o the head, and fricasseed. These tribe usually eat their dead.

In recent years, the Administer tion has sought to meet this prr tein need by introducing the Tilapc pond-fish—a freshwater creatux which flourishes in ponds, is easii; maintained, and grows to a satu factory eight or ten inches. It is < good food, which the natives like In recent years, these fish ha i been spread all over the Territon and under the direction of Agn; culture and other District officiaf their culture is making most satii; factory progress. I found them many ponds maintained by privae S6ttl6rs So long as the ponds are nn cleaned out —so that the minuj vegetable and aquatic life m:r flourish —the fish take care of then selves. They are likely to becom an important article of native did Slowly, but surely, the varioo types of trout which have been i:i troduced are establishing then; selves in the mountain streams

There are increasing reports of good fish being sighted—they got a 4pounder in an Eastern Highlands river recently. So far, nothing preys on them —neither natives, nor the pestiferous cormorants, which slaughter them in temperate climes.

The day may come when these pleasant, cool Highlands will be an anglers’ resort.

Famous Smiths (Ex-Sydney) are in Goroka PRESENTED as an interesting coincidence: The appearance among Goroka’s respected new settlers of a Joynton Smith and a Kingsford-Smith.

Young Joynton Smith (now pre sident of the powerful Growers’

Association) is a son of Sydney’s famous Mayor of World War I— he raised a million pounds for war funds, and he financed Claude McKay and Robert Clive Packer in founding Smiths Weekly and the Daily Guardian.

Kingsford-Smith is another Sydneysider—a nephew of the re

nowned Australian air pioneer. The young man is on the Highlands land —where, if there were no Hasluck dictatorship, hundreds more of similar kidney would be settled, for the Highlands good.

The Bright Ideas of

An Old-Timer

THERE was something vaguely familiar about a greying man sitting in a corner of the Goroka Hotel bar, a bottle of cold beer be side him. As soon as I noticed that one blue eye was of glass, I placed him as Old-timer Bill Tracey—the man who will be for ever famous for his method of keeping native labourers at work in his absence.

When he had a job on, and wished to go elsewhere, he gave certain in structions; took out his glass eye and placed it on a stump, and told it to watch the labourers and re port; and departed. Under that cold and implacable stare, the boys kept to their tasks, and all was well. Many people, hearing of the procedure, dismissed it as a funny story; but it was quite true.

Although the sequel to the story is to the effect that the eye lost its power when some bright lad thought to drop a hat over the eye.

Ingenious Bill Tracey now has a new idea. Near where he lives in the Highlands, some 38 miles from Goroka, are the vast and un

explored Chuave Caves. The caves, lor countless centuries, have housed millions of bats.

The floors carry a considerable thickness of bat droppings; and Tracey has suggested that the Goroka agriculturists, always seeking supplies of fertilisers, might find these accumulations of manure of interest and value. So a few bags of bat contributions are being tested by the planters.

Bill did a good job in this tough region during the war, and now lives partly on a well-earned pension, and

partly on the turn-over of his isolated trade-store.

A Film of the New

Highlands Road

INTO Goroka on August 1, in a large Land Rover which bore marks of travail, came Kathleen Vellacott Jones (Territory’s Public Relations Officer) with an Aus tralian Departmental film unit con sisting of Mr. Frank McKechnie, well-known cameraman and Mr.

John Morris, a young producer.

They are making a 10-minutes’ documentary to be called “The Road to the Highlands”, or something like that; it is in the new Cinemato scope dimension; and, if it is effectively produced, it should be a certain winner around the world.

The road from Lae to Wabag— via Kainantu, Goroka, the Chimbu country and Mount Hagen —is packed with beauty, colour, variety and human interest.

The party learned the hard way about the bridges which are not yet built across three or four streams in the Markham-Ramu Divide, and which are all that remain before the Lae-Wabag road is complete.

When 60 natives, hauling the big jeep through the biggest ford, un expectedly swung their long tow rope, they nearly put finis to a dis tinguished cineman’s career. Mc- Kechnie, busily filming the crossing, escaped destruction by a kind of

dive —from which he was comforted to learn that his camera is quite waterproof.

Cinema Men on the Sepik f |IHERE were so many filming X parties circulating in New Guinea in July-August that it was difficult to keep track of them.

Most passed through Angoram (to get shots of the Sepik) and, of course, stayed at Peter England’s Hotel. Peter writes: “We have not only had Irving Johnson’s brigantine Yankee party (the Yankee went a little distance further up the Sepik, before re turning to the open sea and the

northwards track) but also two film units.

“The Southern International Film Company are the Chips Rafferty- Robinson lot. and are seeking Sepik scenes: and now we have the unit featuring Lowell Thomas, a big-shot in American Television.

“These units are still with us, and now have combined their forces to go up the Sepik at the end of July in a fleet consisting of the motor vessels Tangalooma, Taynna, Wiribirra and various out board canoes.”

Glamorous Camera Artist

Penetrates the Sepik

HAVING —through no fault of her own—missed the Burns Philp ship by which she was to travel m June from Santo (New Hebrides) to Honiara (Solomons) and thence by air to Lae and Dutch New Guinea, Madame Ingeborg de Beausacq, notable New York photographer, was marooned for a while in Malekula (New Hebrides).

Finally, she got transport to Noumea; connected there with the

French airline to Brisbane; and arrived in Lae with considerable equipment (and much bitterness against Australian transport organisers) in mid-July.

Madame’s arrangements for visiting isolated places in Duteh New Guinea now were “shot to nieces”

She got passage from hfe to Madang in a Lutheran mission schooner; and presently arrived with

pplppi

the various international film units -was arranging to go far up the Sepik in somewhat primitive craft, to get the kind of photos with which

she won fo ma rT B^nLn PP6r mazon • Beausacc b a beautiful ° the°hl’ rather C 3S nard-boiled Europeans , en sh ® arrived and StS'?nSn^? Ut i he ? for l ai ' cln and practical planning SSattoS"* reSpeCt and co ' Lae Custom*

made herpa? heavv dS

man, because it may force her to return to Lai. She had Slrmld to go on to Dutch New GiS .nS home via Manilla. (Cent. coi. 3, p. 45*

46,000 Highlanders Have

Worked "Outside"

WHEN the New Guinea Admin istration, in 1948-9, finally de cided to make Highlands' labour available to employers in the coastal areas of New Guinea and Papua, one argument in favour was

that the time-expired workers, re turning to the Highlands with a knowledge of “foreign” ways, would have considerable influence in “civil ising” the Highlanders.

Since then, no less than 46,000 Highlands’ men have gone out to labour contracts, and the great majority have been duly returned.

But one can see little evidence of social or cultural change. Perhaps a few more men now wear a lap lap instead of the swaying string kilt and the bunch of green leaves perched over the backside; but the latter costume still is general among the men, and universal among the women.

They seem cheerful and con tented; they speak little of the Pidgin that they learned at the lesser altitudes; and they are quite friendly to Europeans.

These people are of some economic significance.

As they learn European living standards their needs grow. This in turn induces them to sell their labour. The labour potential in these Highlands’ valleys is very large.

For example, four years ago the population of the Eastern High lands was officially estimated at 218.000. The official figure now is 318.000, of whom all except about 10,000 actually have been counted.

As P-NG’s big industries grow, the coastal natives tend to become peasant cultivators, and the native labour reservoir shrinks.

P-NG’s main hope for additional new labour lies in the Highlands; but there is a strong body of opinion unfavourable to recruiting High lands labour for “outside”. It is said that (a) they are poor workers; (b) it is not easy to teach them even simple procedures; and (c) under the present Labour Ordinance, with its dependence on a civil contract,, they cannot be proceeded against if they fail to work properly—andi they soon learn of the employer’s helplessness.

In other words, the Highlander can be a useful worker in the High lands. He may not be particularly desirable “outside”.

"Keep the Papuans Out!"

r ERE is another side to the picture. Some old Highlands; residents do not like the labour ers who have been brought in from the coast.

“It is not sound practice to bring these sophisticated Papuans into the Highlands” one of the oldest residents of Goroka said to me.

“The local people are simple anc trusting, and have few of the wiles of the coastal natives. The Papuans take them down in all sorts of ways “ One of the worst things is the way they use the native Highland;] women. The Highlanders have their own code of sexual behaviour, which is not the coastal code. Some o:< the Papuans get a hold on thesis Highlands women, and the things (Over to Column 3, Page 47)

(Continued from Page 46) that go on are bad for the whole social set-up here.

“Generally, the Papuans are lazy and sly. They are a bad influence, and should be kept out. The High lander’s intelligence is quite high and, under European influence and tuition, he can be made a good and useful citizen. But not if this system of importing the sophisticated coastal natives—especially Papuans —is allowed to continue.”

Hasluck Land Settlement in

Operation

WHEN Minister Hasluck wiped out the Downs system of selecting and establishing settlers in the

New Guinea Highlands, it was stated by High Officialdom that a much better way of organising settlement, directed from Moresby, would be in troduced. It would be more scientific, and fairer to all. High officialdom begged for a little patience, and a fair trial.

That was four years ago. There is no evidence whatever of better settlement at a faster rate. But there is much evidence of increasing public discontent with Government instrumentalities.

I saw evidence of how the system works right here in Goroka to-day.

The Government’s “balanced team of experts” made six sections avail able, a couple of years ago. P. W.

Heilly and Co. got a block of 300 acres of excellent coffee land at Kigabah East—it was described as agriculturally good, but far removed from a road. No road was promised.

But Messrs Reilly proceeded to clear 150 acres. The native workers, carrying spades and all supplies, had to walk in—s miles. The lessees sought permission to build a direct road in —2l miles. This meant pass ing through, or by, certain native communal lands. The Administra tion sent out an official to interview the natives —a green cadet who had been only a few weeks in the country. The natives were hostile, and the youngster turned in a re

port accordingly—and the road per mit was refused, That never would have happened under the Downs system—the nur pose of the applicant, the suitable ness 0 f the land, its accessibility the co-operation of the natives in the are a—all these would have been settled before the European got possession, The Vocal Music of Massed M ..

Natives WHE New Guinea native IQ may JL call for a great deal of care and development, before he can line up other Glanders in many respects; but there is nothing wrong Wl^h his vocal cords, Nowhere in the South Pacific, at any time, have I heard finer com

munity singing than comes from the native picture theatre, alongside the Markham Road, in Lae, during church service on Sunday mornings.

Those film units, rushing around everywhere, all technique and directive science, spend hours get ting the natives into fancy paint and feathers, photographing their picturesque but very boring com munity dances, and recording their wearisome chants.

I have not heard recorded one of these Sunday morning church ser vices, where massed male choirs pro duce vocal music of a quality which has to be heard to be believed.

These natives have a natural feel ing for real music, and behind their community choruses is a suggestion of male virility that indicates—for one thing, at least —no weakening of the race. The timid boy that scrubs the hotel lavatories can, under direction, sing like an archangel.

Choice Packed Savouries— From Goroka WITHIN the last year or so, neat little cellophane packages of salted peanuts and potato chips have appeared in all Terri tory stores, and have been eagerly accepted by all Europeans, Chinese and mixed-race folk who like parties —and who does not?

This is the result of the enterprise

of a New Australian, Mr. L. Matus, who established himself in Goroka.

He saw an opportunity, and quickly developed it.

No better peanuts and few better potatoes are grown than those around Goroka. Mr. Matus went out into the villages and bought these vegetables from the natives. With

the simplest equipment, he cooked and flavoured and packaged the savouries; and he got the stuff— very light in its cellophane bags— away as backloading on the planes, 2d per pound, to all the Terri tones towns.

The delicious products caught on, and the industry grew rapidly.

Now, the business has been bought outright by Mr. and Mrs. Bob Sears, of Goroka; and they are developing it energetically.

Every visitor to Goroka wants to bring away some of the famous Highlands coffee. Mr. Sears, in addition to processing peanuts and potatoes, is getting the choicest local berries for roasting and grind ing; and his packaged coffee, in sizes handy for air travellers’ limited bags, will soon be as famous as the peanuts and potato chips.