An International Monetary Fund report on the Papua New Guinea economy in 2016 is yet to be released by the government despite assurances from PNG's prime minister Peter O'Neill that it would be released soon.
The Papua New Guinea Prime Minister Peter O'Neill. Photo: AFP / Peter Parks
Listen to Koroi Hawkins's report on Dateline Pacific
Earlier, the Bank of Papua New Guinea had refused to approve the release of the 2016 Article IV report which the IMF completed in November last year.
The bank outlined six areas of concern including the IMF's calculation of PNG's debt-to-GDP ratio, its months of import cover and its foreign exchange market.
The gist of the complaint being that the IMF's methodology and choice of baseline data painted Papua New Guinea in a very negative light.
This includes the IMF figures pointing to a government's debt-to-GDP ratio of above 30 percent and the IMF report stating that PNG had only enough import cover for a three month period throughout 2015 - which suggests dangerously low foreign exchange reserves - and the IMF's reccomendation for a major depreciation of the PNG kina to encourage agriculture production and export - with which the Bank of PNG disagrees citing cacpacity constraints in the Agriculture sector and the longer time it takes to react to the exchange rate.
But Australian economist Paul Flanagan, who worked with the PNG Treasury Department, said PNG's opposition to, and witholding of the report reflected badly on both the government and the Central Bank.
However he said he is not surprised - given it is an election year - at the objections to the IMF's findings.
"Indeed PNG has moved into its worst recession in the non-resource economy since the crisis of the late 1990s it started printing money again, it has lost control of the foreign exchange market that is really hurting growth.
"These are things that the government wouldn't have wanted an independent arbitrator to come out and say that there are indeed serious problems with economic management."
The PNG Cental Bank says its figures are based on GDP extrapolated out to 2021 and this shows a public debt to GDP ratio well below the 30 percent figure.
It says the IMF chose to use other, older data.
The PNG Government meanwhile says amendments to the PNG Fiscal Responsibility Act 2006 now mean that a Debt to GDP ratio of over 30% would not necessarily be a breach or a violation of the Act