PORT MORESBY – A major commercial bank has given Papua New Guinea the thumbs up, saying its economic future is positive.

The Australia and New Zealand (ANZ) Bank said yesterday that despite the doom and gloom painted by critics on the economic outlook, PNG was not the only country affected by the downturn in commodity prices

ANZ Bank PNG chief executive officer Mark Baker said the bank was confident that this “temporary situation” will pass soon.

“We have a very positive view, certainly in the long term,” he added.

“PNG is not alone in that, commodity prices globally have fallen so some of the issues faced in PNG is similar the world over.

“There are issues to be worked through, as many other countries in the world are working through at the moment who rely on courtesy exports, so those issues are being worked through.

“But if you start looking out basically in the medium term from 2017 onwards, the future is very bright,” Baker said.

Prime Minister Peter O’Neill this week also expressed similar positive remarks on the state of the economy while noting that high commodity prices had affected the National Budget.

O’Neill is trying to deflect damage caused by the comments made in the media this week by a former PNG Treasury staff member Paul Flanagan, who is now an academic at the Australian National University.

He was commenting on the PNG’s Treasury’s Mid Year Economic and Fiscal Outlook report, which charted the impact of plummeting commodity prices on the resource-dependent nation.

The report was described by Flanagan as “PNG’s frightening fiscal figures” in a story by Fairfax journalist John Garnaut who likened PNG’s outlook to the economic meltdown of Greece.

“Yes, the downturn in commodity prices has affected our budget, bottom-line this year – but our economy is proving resilient and can absorb these shocks,” O’Neill retaliated this week, accusing both the economist and the journalist of spreading “doom and gloom”.

“These challenges have certainly impacted on our economic growth – but these changes have not stopped our economic growth.”

O’Neill said the fundamentals of the economy were “very sound”, adding that the gross domestic product growth was currently at around 11 per cent and he was confident it would end up between 11 and 15 per cent towards the end of the year.

“Our inflation remains very stable at around four per cent and our foreign exchange reserves are stable covering almost nine months of increase.

“That is higher than many parts of the world where usually many import cover is only around three months.

“Our foreign exchange rates with our trading partners are very stable.

Papua New Guinea is not the only country suffering from the downturn in oil and commodity prices but also those in the Pacific and Asian countries, the Post-Courier newspaper has reported in the aftermath of attack on PNG’s financial credibility.

The Solomon Islands, Vanuatu, Tonga, Timor-Leste, Kiribati, Samoa and other specific Asian countries are affected as well, it reports.