Australian Consulate-General, Noumea Australian Consulate-General, Noumea The Australian Consulate-General in Noumea, New Caledonia represents the Commonwealth of Australia in New Caledonia, a special collectivity of France, and is also accredited to the Pacific French Overseas collectivities, French Polynesia and Wallis and Futuna. The Consul-General also serves as Australia's representative to the Noumea-based Secretariat of the Pacific Community. The Consulate-General, one of four in New Caledonia (alongside New Zealand, Indonesia and Vanuatu), has since 1976 had its offices at 19 avenue du Maréchal Foch, Nouméa. Since 1990, there has existed an Honorary Consulate in Papeete, French Polynesia, currently held by Marc Siu, which reports
Nickel mining in New Caledonia of the total value of exports. New Caledonia has the longest history of mining in the Pacific islands. Nickel was found in New Caledonia in 1864 by the engineer Jules Garnier. It was distributed in the ore layers which cover about one third of the area of the main island of New Caledonia. The nickel concentration was inhomogeneous and also varied with the depth. Whereas its usual concentration was 2–5 percent, it could reach 10–15 percent in scattered deposits of green garnierite. Those areas were developed first using primitive manual extraction methods and were gradually depleted, resulting in the present