Papua New Guinea Casino and Card Room Gaming

Papua New Guinea passed the Gaming Control Bill on 1 May 2007. It authorized the building of casinos and created the National Gaming Control Board to regulate the industry. Although the Gaming Control Act 2007 provides a legal framework for casinos, for many years no large-scale casino operated, and earlier proposals were shelved amid political and regulatory concerns. In 2025–2026, the government approved a tightly controlled “satellite casino” at the Paga Hill Special Economic Zone in Port Moresby, with Prime Minister James Marape stressing that it is targeted at high-income locals and tourists, subject to strict entry, income, and harm-minimization rules and oversight by the NGCB.