land & population
Papua’s land area is almost 420,000 km squared. It is made up of 21% of the total land area of Indonesia, but is home to only 1% of its population. The whole island of New Guinea is the second largest island of earth, after Greenland. The population in Maluku is almost 2.6 million people (roughly 50% native, 50% migrants from other parts of Indonesia. The national language is officially Bahasa Indonesia. But, there are 264 languages of different tribes. The harsh and difficult environment, uneven surface of land isolates tribe communities and creates a diversity of different languages. West Papua has a population of 1,800,000 of which approximately 900,000 are native West Papuans and 900,000 are Indonesians. The West Papuans are Melanesians containing at least 240 different tribes. Different Indonesian groups that settled in West Papua from the past 50 years compose the remainder of the population. The rate of population growth of the Indonesian groups is increasing rapidly. |