Author: Charlie

By 2015 the mismanagement of Kokoda tourism was patently obvious.

On the Trail itself illegal tour companies operated without fear of sanction; guides, porters and campsite owners continued to be exploited; villagers were mere spectators to a passing parade of trekkers because they had not been trained in providing goods and services to meet their needs; there were no management systems in place so the ‘law of the jungle’ prevailed along the Trail which led to disputes over campsites between trek groups; environmental degradation; and the desecration of heritage sites. And annua trekker numbers remained stuck 46 percent lower than when the DFAT Kokoda Initiative took control of the management from PNG in 2009.

It is difficult for the layman to stay abreast of reports and reviews commissioned by the DFAT Kokoda Initiative regarding the management of the Kokoda Trail.

In 2014 Oxford Policy Management, a London based international aid-constancy firm, contracted Cardno, a Brisbane based professional infrastructure and environmental services company, to conduct a ‘Kokoda Initiative Second Joint Understanding, Mid-term Review’.

The purpose of the Review was to ‘assess the success of the Kokoda Initiative/Joint Understanding 2 to date from both the PNG and Governments’ perspectives with sensitivity to the different cultural attitudes that define ‘success’ – whatever that means.