In December of 2019, with 98.31% percent of the vote, the inhabitants of Bougainville overwhelmingly voted in favour of independence. Bougainville is an autonomous province of Papua New Guinea that consists of the main Bougainville Island and a handful of tinier islands. Bougainville contains an enormous copper mine, Pagua Mine, that once provided over 40% of the entire GDP of Papua New Guinea.

In 1975, Bougainville declared independence but unsuccessfully repelled an invasion from the central government. In 1988 conflict again broke out, as the natives of Bougainville felt angry that the central government had caused too much environmental damage from the copper mining, and because the Bougainese felt that they had not received a fair share of the mine’s profits. In 1997, New Zealand established an agreement that allowed the Bougainese to establish their own autonomous state and offered a potential independence vote, so the civil war ended.

Since the beginning of the civil war, Pagua has been closed. When Bougainville becomes an independent nation, they hope to use the proceeds from the mine to fund their national development. To this extent, China has already sent officials to the island in hopes of setting up potential business deals and to gain more influence in the pacific. Moreover, China may hope to gain another ally in the UN General Assembly and continue to whittle down on the number of countries recognizing Taiwan in the pacific.

If Bougainville is to be successful, they ought to balance their economic portfolio and use their initial copper windfall to diversify into other economic sectors such as tourism or electricity generation. Additionally, they must make sure to not be overly reliant on any one country such as China or Australia in order to maintain their political and economic independence.

It is the initial years of a country that define its future prosperity: to this extent, the Bougainvillese must elect a competent and virtuous president in their upcoming presidential election who can guide Bougainville in independence talks with the central Papuan government and carry out the economic development of their island.