Papua’s Rigo Comes

Out Of The Back-Blocks

From a Special Correspondent

Things have been happening

down at Rigo lately, and from being a back-block area now it

suddenly finds itself literally at

the back door of Port Moresby, r[E key to this almost overnight transformation is the re-opening and reconstruction of the old wartime track from Port Moresby to Rigo, which, for a good weather run, puts the district no more than a 2 1 hour road trip out of Moresby.

Previously, sea travel has been the only means of transport, Rigo at times could be a very long way from Moresby and few travellers could count on less than a day for a one-way trip. Now trucks move daily over the road, despite occasional bad patches in wet weather,

Papuans Awakening

Not the least surprising result has been a rapid awakening on the part of the Rigo Papuans to the new opportunity for cash cropping.

Nobody has yet been able to tally all the market garden produce trucked out of the Rigo area, but a fairly solid estimate is that the

n is now supplying around 70 cent, of the requirements of Moresby’s Koki market, lagers who formerly drowsed the sleepy hours after they put in subsistence food gardens, low up and hard at it cultivat ommercial sized holdings, le, some produce used to go by ship before the road was It, but it wasn’t a service that ied right to their villages. And •ing will always be important that way, especially for move of the big stuff, sre’s another big change at and that is the transfer of the Ugo station to a new site at ila, about 12 or 15 miles in- The old station had no for expansion, and it was a long way from the inland e.

Important Bridge

v that a bridge has been built the Kemp Welch River (it is argest single span bridge in i-New Guinea, and it was illy opened in December), the will be pushed out into what strictly foot travel country, dy survey work has been done le first over-the-river roads. j new Kwikila station is in country, and already it has w District Office and staff s. The Papuans got in first their own club house or com ;y centre, which opened last mber, but by Christmas the >eans of the district had their lub opened at the station, and gives a social centre for the scattered Europeans of the ■ club was built by voluntary r and subscriptions from club iers, ire is another type of club has become very popular and active in the Rigo sub-district the past year. These are the

village women’s clubs, which, as elsewhere in the Territory, have given a great lift to the life of the womenfolk in the villages.

Impressive Influence

The European plantations in the area have of course always been the backbone of the sub-district, and if someone could tally all the copra and rubber which have been shipped out since the first properties came into production in the early years of this century, it would be an impressive total.

Now the trend is to plant up new areas, and the first com mercial block of plantation cocoa is just coming into bearing, with others to follow shortly.

Locally milled timber is in demand for the new buildings at Kwikila, and there’s a market in Port Moresby for any output above local needs.

As for the future, there is a lot of good agricultural land awaiting development, and there are a lot of villages coming under the influence of Agricultural Extension Division activities which in time can con tribute such crops as copra and coffee to the Territory’s export shipments.

All in all, things are moving down at Rigo.

Mrs. Mary Wardrop, of Poligolo Plantation, Rigo District, conducts a regular weekly clinic for wives and children of plantation employees.

Since she started the clinic there has been a marked fall in the incidence of sickness among the children.

Her work ensures that serious cases go promptly to hospital.

Photo: K. Vellacott-Jones