Papua New Guinea, in Tok Pisin: Papua Niugini, officially the Independent State of Papua New Guinea, is a country in Oceania, occupying the eastern half of the island of New Guinea and numerous offshore islands (the western portion of the island is occupied by the Indonesian provinces of Papua and West Papua). It is located in the southwestern Pacific Ocean, in a region defined since the early 19th century as Melanesia. Its capital, and one of its few major cities, is Port Moresby. It is one of the most diverse countries on Earth, with over 850 indigenous languages and at least as many traditional societies, out of a population of just under 6 million. It is also one of the most rural, with only 18 per cent of its people living in urban centres. The country is also one of the world's least explored, culturally and geographically, and many undiscovered species of plants and animals are thought to exist in the interior of Papua New Guinea.

Area
462,840 sq km (178,704 sq miles).

Population
5,586,000 (2002).

Population Density
12.1 per sq km.

Capital
Port Moresby. Population: 254,158 (2000).

Geography
Papua New Guinea consists of over 600 islands and lies in the middle of the long chain of islands stretching from mainland South East Asia. It lies in the South Pacific, 160km (100 miles) north of Australia. The country occupies the eastern half of the second-largest non-continental island in the world, as well as the smaller islands of the Bismarck Archipelago (Admiralty Island, Bougainville, New Britain and New Ireland), the DEntrecasteaux Island group and the three islands of the Louisiade Archipelago. The main island shares a land border with Irian Jaya, a province of Indonesia. The mainland and larger islands are mountainous and rugged, divided by large fertile upland valleys. Fast-flowing rivers from the highlands descend to the coastal plains. A line of active volcanoes stretches along the north coast of the mainland and continues on the island of New Britain. To the north and south of this central mountain range on the main island lie vast stretches of mangrove swamps and coastal river deltas. Volcanoes and thermal pools are also found in the southeast of other islands. Papua New Guinea offers the greatest variety of terrestrial ecosystems in the South Pacific, including five types of lowland rainforest, 13 types of montane rainforest, five varieties of palm and swamp forest and three different mangrove forests. Two-thirds of the world’s species of orchids come from Papua New Guinea. Birds include 38 species of the bird-of-paradise, and the megapode and cassowary. Marsupials and mammals include cuscus, tree kangaroos, wallabies, bandicoots, spiny anteaters and, in the coastal waters, the dugong. There are between 170 and 200 species of frog and 450 species of butterfly.

Language
The official language is English, which is widely used in business and government circles. Pidgin English and Hiri Motu are more commonly used (an estimated 742 other languages and dialects are also spoken).