New Caledonia is administered for the French Republic by a governor assisted by a privy council consisting of the heads of military, judicial and other services and of two notables of the colony appointed by the President of the Republic. There are also a general secretary and 5 administrators in charge of the arrondissements. There is also an elective general council. The capital Noumea has a municipality and the other centres are administered by municipal commissions.
There are public and private elementary schools. In 1925 there were 55 public and private primary schools and 74 native schools.
The College La Perouse at Noumea gives some technical instruc tion in its general curriculum. There are extensive pasture and cultivated lands with some 5oo sq.m. of forest. There is a native reserve, ruled in the main by native custom. Coffee, cotton, manioc, copra, maize, tobacco and bananas are among the agricul tural products. Cattle and sheep are also important. There are blast furnaces for nickel smelting. A hydro-electric factory was set up in 1926. In 1925 20,715 tons of chrome; 4,400 tons of nickel and 10,000 tons of phosphates were exported. Coffee, cotton, copra and guano are also among the exports. Wine, coal, flour and rice are imported. A narrow gauge railway connects Noumea to Paita and it is proposed to extend the line to Bourail. There are internal telegraph and telephone communications. The roads are on the whole poor.
New Caledonia has the central government for the Isle of Pines, the Wallis Archipelago, the Loyalty islands, the Huon islands and Futuna and Alofu.
The Loyalty group, a chain of small islands parallel to it, and at a distance of between 5o and 'co miles from the north-east coast of New Caledonia, is composed of three larger islands, Mare, Lifu (Lifou) and Uvea, and of some islets and rocks, are coral islands of comparatively recent elevation, and nowhere rise more than 25o ft. above sea-level. Mare, the south-east island of the group, has a flat and barren top, between 200 and 30o ft. above the sea, with occasional slopes and terraces, indicative of several successive elevations ; but there is an abundant growth of coconut palm on the sea-coast. Lifu, the central and largest island of the group (area 65o miles), its greatest length about 33 miles and greatest width about 28 miles, appears from the sea as a succes sion of plains. Uvea, the north-westernmost of the three principal
Loyalty islands, is a typical coral-atoll carrying on its rim many closely-connected islets and, on its eastern face, carrying the much larger island to which the name Uvea (or Halgam) island properly belongs. The Loyalty islanders are Melanesians. The group was discovered at the beginning of the 19th century. Christianity was introduced into Mare by native teachers from Rarotonga and Samoa. From 1864 the French have considered the island a dependency of New Caledonia. Coco-nuts are cultivated, while copra and rubber are exported.
Norfolk island lies about Boo m. east of the nearest point of New South Wales, in 29° S., 167° 56' E. Pop. (1931) 992. It stands on a submarine table-land extending about 18 m. to the north and 25 m. to the south and has itself an area of about 13 sq.m.
The islets of Nepean and Philip lie near it. Its high cliff-bound coast is difficult of access. With a general elevation of 400 ft.
above the sea the island rises in the north-west to 1,050 ft. in the double summit of Mount Pitt. The soil, of decomposed basalt, is wonderfully fertile. Oranges, lemons, grapes, passion fruit, figs, pineapples, guavas and other fruits grow abundantly ; while potatoes, onions, maize and arrowroot can be cultivated. The Nor folk island pine (Araucaria excelsa) is a magnificent tree. The flora is most closely associated with that of New Zealand, and the avifauna indicates the same connection rather than one with Australia. The climate is subtropical, the thermometer rarely sinking below 65°. The island was discovered in 1774 by Capt. Cook, and from 1788 to 1813 and again from 1825 to 1855 was used as a penal settlement in connection with that at New South Wales. In 1856 the descendants of the mutineers of the Bounty Were transferred to Norfolk island from Pitcairn. The settlement remained under the authority of New South Wales till 1914, since when the administration has been in the hands of the Common wealth Government. The imports (mostly from Australia) were valued (1924-25) at Li 7,190 and the exports at £3,960.