50 Vatu XXIV Summer Olympics

Vanuatu gained independence from joint British-French colonial administration in 1980, making this 1988 issue just the eighth year the Reserve Bank had existed as a sovereign institution. The Los Angeles-based summer games had already passed in 1984; this coin commemorates Seoul, where 160 nations competed under an Olympic flag for the first time since the politically fractured boycott years of 1980 and 1984.

Produced for the collector market rather than circulation — Vanuatu's remote archipelago economy ran largely on lower-denomination coinage — most examples survive in original packaging.