PANGUNA

mining town and site of a large open-pit copper mine in the south-central interior of Bougainville Island, Papua New Guinea. Conzine Riotinto, an Australian mining company, began prospecting for copper in the Crown Prince Range at Panguna in the early 1960s. Subsequently, Bougainville Copper Ltd. was set up, and roads, a pipeline to convey the copper concentrate to the drying and loading installations at Loloho on Arawa Bay, and the nearby dormitory town of Arawa were built. The mine was brought into production in 1972 and has become one of the world's largest copper producers, with most of the concentrate exported to Japan and Germany. Gold is also extracted from the ore. Built in ribbon formation in the valleys of the Crown Prince Range, Panguna includes the company's administration offices, several housing areas, and canteens, all for the employees of the mining company and their dependents. Pop. (1980) 3,506.