What is special about New Guinea?
Papua New Guinea Hosts 5% Of The Global Biodiversity Papua New Guinea has 5 percent of the world’s biodiversity, even though it only covers 1 percent of Earth’s total land area. It has more than 20,000 plant species, 800 species of coral, 600 species of fish, and 750 species of birds.
What is New Guinea called today?
Papua New Guinea
Papua New Guinea (PNG), 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 Irian Jaya).
What was Papua New Guinea called before?
British New Guinea
The administration of British New Guinea was passed to Australia in 1904, and its name was changed to the Territory of Papua.
Why is New Guinea divided half?
The island of New Guinea was divided up by Dutch, German, and British colonialists in the middle of the last century. Like many such divisions, it showed little regard for ethnic or religious groupings. The Western half of the island, formerly Dutch New Guinea, became a province of Indonesia in the 1960s.
Why is Papua New Guinea rainforest important?
Its forests provide the habitat for about 200 species of mammals, 20,000 species of plants, 1,500 species of trees and 750 species of birds, half of which are endemic to the island. It has been estimated that between 5 and 7% of the known species in the world live in PNG.
What are the 3 largest rainforest in the world?
The world’s largest rainforests
- The Amazon Rainforest. NASA Landsat satellite image of the Amazon rainforest.
- The Congo rainforest. NASA Landsat satellite image of the Congo rainforest.
- Australiasia. NASA Landsat satellite image of the Australiasia rainforest.
- Sundaland.
- Indo-Burma.
Did Australia control Papua New Guinea?
It is worth remembering that Australia was the country that granted independence to Papua New Guinea. For almost 70 years, Australia maintained colonial rule over the eastern half of New Guinea. Unfortunately, this fact is largely absent in contemporary discussions of relations between the countries.
Do they speak German in Papua New Guinea?
German. From 1884 to 1914, the northern half of the present-day country was a German colony known as German New Guinea, in which German was the official language. Tok Pisin derives some vocabulary from German as a result of this influence. Today however, German is not a generally spoken language in Papua New Guinea.
What is the rainforest in PNG called?
The Southeastern Papuan rain forests is a tropical moist forest ecoregion in southeastern New Guinea. The ecoregion covers the mountainous center and coastal lowlands of the Papuan Peninsula. Southeastern Papuan rain forests. Owen Stanley Range.
What cities are in New Guinea?
Port Moresby. John Moresby,an English Captain,visited the Island of Papua New Guinea in 1837 and claimed it for Britain and named it after his father.
How did New Guinea get its name?
“New Guinea” (Nueva Guinea) was the name coined by the Spanish explorer Yñigo Ortiz de Retez. In 1545, he noted the resemblance of the people to those he had earlier seen along the Guinea coast of Africa. Guinea, in its turn, is etymologically derived from the Portuguese word Guiné.
What continent is New Guinea part of?
Papua New Guinea is an island off the coast if mainland Australia, and it is linked to Australia by undersea continental shelf which was exposed during the last ice age. So it is part of the Australian continent in the same way that Britain is part of Europe. It is not in a continent.
Where is New Guinea map?
Land. An unbroken chain of mountains with peaks above 13,000 feet (4,000 metres) in elevation extends across New Guinea from the northwest to the southeast,rising to 16,024 feet (4,884