Solutions to poor service delivery in Papua New Guinea

The paper discusses the problems that have plagued service delivery in Papua New Guinea—both over the long term and with the rollout of the District Development Authority Act of 2014. Various principal/agent and moral hazard problems are identified as well as the persistent poor delivery of national government funds to the local level; the difficulty of recruiting civil service skills into positions in local-level government; and confirmation that the power to make decisions at the district level remains much the same as before with the composition and influence of the District Development Authority Boards little changed from the former arrangements. Looking at service delivery from a supply–demand perspective, ways are suggested in which improvements may be realised. It appears more likely that improvements will come from an emphasis on increasing the demand for better governance of service delivery rather than from continuing to seek improvements in the supply side of service delivery.