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CEO of Fiji Tourism, Jo Tuamoto, addressing visiting Tourism operators to Fiji.
November 19, 2009
Vessel purchase delights villagers
www.fijitimes.com - Thursday, November 19, 2009
A LAU businessman Epeli Draunidalo says news that the province has secured a vessel that is now berthed in Suva has brought happiness to villagers on the island.
"We are so happy to hear that the boat is in Suva because that problem of transportation to and from Viti Levu has always been a major issue for us and that problem has been there for a very long time," Mr Draunidalo told the Fiji Times from his Cicia home yesterday.
He said now villagers could be rest assured of normal shipping services to the island.
"This is especially so for us with small businesses, particularly since our income-generating commodity is copra, which we need to sell to buyers in Suva," Mr Draunidalo said.
"With the presence of the boat, all copra farmers should rest assured that vessels will be available at a certain time to transport our produce to Suva.
"Shipping has been the most number one problem and the presence of the boat will soon eliminate that problem, we can now be confident that vessels will be available at a certain time ton transport our produce to Suva," he added.
The vessel Lau Trader berthed in Suva Harbour early this month.
The former research boat was bought in New Zealand and brought to Fiji by a team of marine officials from the Marine department.
Yatu Lau Company Ltd chief executive Michael Makasiale said more seats would be installed on the vessel.
This he said would be done this week when the State slipway was available.
In earlier interview though, he said the vessel would be able to transport approximately 200 passengers.
The boat cost and its transportation to Suva cost a little over $1 million. It is expected to start its services in the first week of December
Mobile phone firm grows and grows
www.fijitimes.com - Thursday, November 19, 2009
A Digicel roadshow draws customers in the west
DIGICEL Carribean and Central America reported a 10 per cent increase in its half-year profit to more than $684million on revenues of $1.6billion.
The mobile phone company grew its subscriber base by 7 per cent over the past 12 months to 7.3 million.
Digicel is in direct competition to other mobile phone companies in the country, the major one being Vodafone.
Digicel Group chief executive Colm Delves said the results demonstrated a strong start to the financial year with Digicel increasing profits and subscribers even in a tough economic climate.
Digicel's revenues for the six months to September 30 grew by three per cent.
"We have demonstrated that with disciplined cost control and relentless focus on giving customers what they want, companies can continue to thrive even in challenging times," Mr Delves said.
Fiji Tourism Earnings Drop
www.fijivillage.com - 19 November 2009
Fiji's gross earnings from tourism for quarter 1, 2009 is provisionally estimated at $167.6million.
This is according to the latest figures from the Bureau of Statistics which states that this is a decrease of $25.4 million (or 13.2 percent from Quarter 1 last year.
The Bureau said the decrease is largely due to the 242,922 or 18.7 percent decrease in visitor days.
Tourism's second quarter earnings from the Bureau are yet to be released.
Meanwhile, the latest figures from Tourism Fiji showed that visitor arrivals for the first seven months of 2009, was recorded at 280,530, a 15% decrease from last year.
Tourism Fiji are expecting an increase to $24.5 million from $23.5 million last year for next year's budget of which $11 million would be used for branding campaigns and $13.5 million would be used for tactical marketing.
The 2010 National Budget will be announced next Friday by Prime Minister Commodore Voreqe Bainimarama.
Fiji's gross earnings from tourism for quarter 1, 2009 is provisionally estimated at $167.6million.
This is according to the latest figures from the Bureau of Statistics which states that this is a decrease of $25.4 million (or 13.2 percent from Quarter 1 last year.
The Bureau said the decrease is largely due to the 242,922 or 18.7 percent decrease in visitor days.
Tourism's second quarter earnings from the Bureau are yet to be released.
Meanwhile, the latest figures from Tourism Fiji showed that visitor arrivals for the first seven months of 2009, was recorded at 280,530, a 15% decrease from last year.
Tourism Fiji are expecting an increase to $24.5 million from $23.5 million last year for next year's budget of which $11 million would be used for branding campaigns and $13.5 million would be used for tactical marketing.
The 2010 National Budget will be announced next Friday by Prime Minister Commodore Voreqe Bainimarama.
November 18, 2009
Air price war looms
www.fijitimes.com - Wednesday, November 18, 2009
A MARKET share battle in the aviation industry will see price used as a tool to attract customers to Fiji.
Budget airline V Australia will commence flights to Nadi with a $AUD199 ($F347) one-way fare.
National carrier Air Pacific immediately matched the fare.
Air Pacific managing director John Campbell said the new fare would be applicable in the low season - predominantly late January, February and March.
"It was offered by Air Pacific and Virgin Blue, if one does it, the other one does it too," he said.
Mr Campbell said they would not reveal their plans to counter V Australia's offer.
"It is often better to keep a competitor guessing," he said.
He said the airline expected to carry around 70,000 people on its international flights for this month alone.
"That is around 70 per cent of the seats that we have on offer."
"Because we are halfway through November, bookings continue to flow in and the position today is not where it will be by the end of month."
V Australia is a full service airline of Virgin Blue Airlines.
Questions sent to V Australia regarding their inaugural flight to Fiji on December 18 remain unanswered.
FREE WEDDINGS
Business community breathes sigh of relief
November 17, 2009
Cruise firm welcomes extra airline seats to Fiji
www.fijitimes.com - Monday, November 16, 2009
THE announcement of new airline operators into Fiji and increased airline seats is good news to the tourism industry, says South Seas Cruises chief executive Kit Nixon.
He said the industry was only as good as the number of seats and the availability of passenger transport to get them to Fiji.
South Sea Cruises employs more than 200 staff based in Denarau, where it operates its daily boat transfers and day trips to island resorts.
Mr Nixon said the company also had a program that ran to the Yasawas through Awesome Adventures, its sister company that operates out of Mana Island through Sea Spray, and also ran water sports.
He said the more seats on airlines operating into Fiji the better it was for everyone and with Air Pacific to start flights to Hong Kong next month, it meant progress for the country.
He said devaluation of the dollar elped boost the tourism industry by bringing families to Fiji over the school holidays.
"The cost of holidaying in Fiji is reasonable. Fiji is a place where you can spend what you can afford," he said.
"We at South Sea Cruises are happy with our pricing and think our company offers people great value for money in getting out to the islands and we will continue to promote it that way.
"We play a big part in the marketing of Fiji internationally for the company and for the Mamanuca Group."
Mr Nixon said the year had been tough, especially after the January floods, and it had taken time to rebuild.
However, in the past few months the company had seen a highly-successful holiday period from Australia and New Zealand.
"We hope that over November and December we will have people consistantly coming into the country and we will get ready for some good growth next year," he said.
Fiji Hotel Room Occupancy Declines
www.fijitimes.com - Monday, November 16, 2009
OCCUPANCY rates in hotels, resorts and licensed accommodations in the country averaged 38 per cent in the second quarter of this year, compared to 45.1 per cent for the same period in 2008.
This is revealed in the Fiji Islands Bureau of Statistics "Provisional Hotels and Tourist Accomodation Statistics, Quarter 2, 2009".
In the second quarter of this year, there were 862,512 rooms available but 331,373 were sold.
There were more than 1.9million beds available but 650,685 were sold.
The bed occupancy rate was 33.4 per cent compared to 37.6 per cent for the same quarter last year.
According to the bureau, earnings from accommodation, sales of food, liquor, telephone and other miscellaneous charges for the quarter was $118.3m compared to the 2008 second quarter earnings of $119.1m.
However, paid employment in the hotel sector increased by 8.1 per cent when compared to the same period in 2008.
In terms of regions, Suva's room occupancy rate of 40.5 per cent was almost similar to last year's figure of 41.7 per cent. In the first quarter of this year, the occupancy rate for the city was 36.3 per cent compared to 33.1 per cent in 2008.
The Nadi occupancy rate of 45.5 per cent was actually more than the first quarter rate of 41.9 per cent but lesser than quarter two 2008 rate of 51.1 per cent.
Lautoka accommodation occupancy rate for the second quarter was 18.3 per cent, a decline from the 24.7 per cent recorded last year for the same period.
Coral Coast experienced an 18 per cent decline, recording 40 per cent occupancy compared to 58 per cent for the same period last year.
The Mamanuca improved with an occupancy rate of 42.2 per cent from the 2008 figure of 40 per cent.
Fiji Visitor Arrivals drop
www.fijitimes.com - Monday, November 16, 2009
Taking in the sights ... tourists enjoy sun, surf and sand on Mana Island in the Yasawa Group. Arrival figures and occupanyc rates have dropped in the second quarter of the year, says the Fiji Islands Bureau of Statistics
THE visitor arrivals for May decreased by 15 per cent at 37,666 when compared to the 2008 period, the Fiji Islands Bureau of Statistics reveal.
Fiji's traditional markets, New Zealand and Australia recorded "significant" decreases of over 14 per cent and 16 per cent respectively.
Decreases were also recorded for visitors from South Korea and Japan.
South Korean visitors declined by 42.7 per cent to 416 while Japanese visitors were down by 41.4 per cent to 756.
For the United States market, there were 3316 visitors compared to 4401 for the same period in 2008.
The United Kingdom visitors numbered 2314 compared to 2904 in 2008.
Increases were recorded for Pacific Islands visitors which increased from 2771 to 3195.
Visitors from continental Europe also increased from 2348 to 2410.
For the six month period to May, Australians still top our visitor list making up 43 per cent of the total 227,658 visitors that arrived on our shores this year.
A total of 27,548 visitors from New Zealand arrived in the country in the six months of 2009 compared to 35,306 for the same period last year. For the six months to May this year, the bureau said visitors declined by 14.7 per cent, with arrivals falling from 267,547 to 227,658
November 16, 2009
FDB will support national development: CEO
www.fijilive.com - November 16, 2009
The Fiji Development Bank expects its role as a development banker will not overshadow its need to survive.
FDB chief executive officer Ratu Deve Toganivalu told Fiji Live it was important that the bank, as a government-owned entity, continued to support the nation’s development.
“For commercial banks, I’d say that achieving their bottom line would be one of the main things. It’s the same for FDB, but not as much as a commercial bank would do. We’d like to have a little bit of bottom line, we want to be sustainable but the key thing is development.
“We are here as government’s arm to prop the economic development of the nation. And we are owned by the government. So we’ve managed so far to survive as an organization, we’ve taken care of ourselves pretty well since our inception and I think we’re heading into a bright future with a lot of development work in store,” Toganivalu said when asked how FDB fared when having to balance its development role and survival, a dilemma that development banks worldwide are increasingly facing.
“But then again, we don’t want to jeopardize our fighting for development and jeopardize our bottom line. We must make sure that we’re sustainable that we can operate, financially viable,” he added.
But maintaining a role as a development banker does have its price, as FDB would be seen to service loans that commercial banks would not normally touch.
“I’ve heard a lot of complaints about banks asking for too much deposit and they need a lot of security, these are high risk loans.”
“But we need to help people out in the rural, “ he said.
Toganivalu gave an example of a $2000 loan to improve a farm, which would cost the FDB $1000 to service.
“I give $2000 and try to manage that account for $1000 a year, which would be the cost of me running there, supervising and trying to collect. And then a hurricane happens and all the crops are gone, where will they get their return from?
“Those are the small things that people don’t realize why there are certain pre-requisites that we want met before we lend. So if the hurricane hit the farmer and crops are not harvested, he’s stuck with the loan, and the bank is left with the debt,” Toganivalu said.
The FDB, he said, avoids being caught in its high risk ventures by following a prudent balancing ratio in accordance with its corporate plan.
In its latest annual report, FDB’s loan portolio sees most of its funds lent to the real estate sector (27.4 percent), private individuals (14.8 percent), wholesale/retail/restaurant (14.3 percent) and Building/Construction (14.1 percent)
November 13, 2009
State to seek additional loan from China
FIJI Water wins again
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Cabinet approves Gaming Decree
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Support SMEs
Support SMEs, microfinance: Naiyaga
www.fijilive.com - November 12, 2009
The chief advisor to the governor of the Reserve Bank of Fiji, Inia Naiyaga, is throwing his weight behind the development of microfinance and small and medium sized businesses.
In an interview with Fijlive, Naiyaga said achieving a vibrant microfinance and SME sector was the best way to spread wealth around to reach ordinary people.
“These Small and Micro enterprises and also the financing of these projects are very important because they are catering for a group of people that normally don’t have access to the kind of financing that you and I have, like banks. So this sector is serving a very useful purpose and the results have been so far, we’ve seen the improvement in the standards and livelihood of people,” Naiyaga said.
“I think the more support and recognition we give to these types of small and micro businesses, the more it will contribute to the economy of Fiji, because it’s widespread, which means that the wealth can be shared to the ordinary people not only to a few like in the big businessmen in the cities and towns. So to me it’s going to play a very important role as we move into the future,” he added.
Last week, the Reserve Bank met with stakeholders from the SME, microfinance and financial sectors in a public symposium where it hoped to gauge how best the two sectors could be developed.
Specifically, the RBF wanted an indication of the progress made by commercial banks as they were required in April to put in place microfinance facilities by January next year.
“We are still working with them on that,” Naiyaga said.
At last week’s workshop, RBF governor Sada Reddy stressed the importance of getting the poor and those considered unbankable to have access to savings and credit facilities, as this would ultimately help in reducing poverty.
Reddy said commercial banks played an influential role in addressing this through financial inclusion initiatives.
A crucial outcome of the workshop would be an Action Plan to guide the development of the sector, he said
Academic links FNPF to poverty
www.fijilive.com - November 13, 2009
Imprudent management of the country’s only public superannuation fund can trigger a worsening of Fiji’s poverty situation, a local economist said.
In an interview with FijiLive, University of the South Pacific lecturer Dr Sunil Kumar said it was important that the Fiji National Provident Fund, being the only form of savings that most workers have, be properly managed as its poor performance or even collapse can lead to widespread poverty.
This comes amid continuing public concern on the management of the pension fund’s massive $3 billion investment portfolio, equivalent to half the country’s GDP.
“I think the concerns that have been raised are legitimate ones and because FNPF is a superannuation fund, people who are coming out of work, who are retiring, they need those funds,” said Kumar.
“I believe that the government and those in the drivers’ seat need to take some initiatives to act on the concerns that have been raised and take some initiatives to act on them and make sure that due diligence is observed in terms of the use of those funds,” he added.
If the FNPF did get into financial trouble, it would mean that those who are retiring may get less money or none at all, which would increase Fiji’s poverty population.
“The management of the FNPF has direct implications to Fiji’s poverty level, as the people who will come out of their jobs after retirement would have their livelihood affected drastically if the fund collapses,” Kumar said.
The FNPF recently announced a consolidation of its investment policy in a bid to cut costs and streamline its investment policies as it continues its struggle to sell off non-performing assets as well as spread its entire $3 billion portfolio in a narrow domestic market.
At the close of its 2007 financial year - in June 2007 - FNPF reported it had just over 340,000 members.
The Fund is yet to release its 2008 annual report
World Bank to advise Fiji on economy
www.fijilive.com - November 12, 2009
The World Bank expects to play a supportive advisory role in Fiji’s return to economic prosperity, a spokesperson accompanying an International Monetary Fund (IMF) team to Fiji has said.
The World Bank’s Sydney-based communications officer Aleta Moriarty told FijiLive she was accompanying the IMF team to carry out its regular economic review that it provided to its member countries.
“This aim of this visit is to analyse the economic situation in the country. The livelihood of the people of Fiji depends upon economic stability. To this end the World Bank will be looking closely at the economic conditions in the country and will provide suggestions on how best to improve the economic conditions for the people of Fiji,” said Moriarty.
The IMF part of the delegation is here to conduct its 2009 Article IV Mission, a regular economic appraisal process that it performs for its member countries, and it announced on Tuesday that its team will review Fiji’s macroeconomic developments and the outlook, as well as discuss related government policies.
Fiji’s Prime Minister Commodore Voreqe Bainimarama, who met with the delegation early this week, said yesterday that the Article IV Mission would assist Fiji in preparatory work on an Economic Reform Program that the government has already planned for.
Fiji’s challenge, he said, was to lift its dismal growth rates of below two per cent in the past to five per cent in the next three to five years and the only way this was possible was through reforms in a number of sectors.
The last publicly released result of an IMF Article IV Mission to Fiji was in 2004, where IMF directors expressed concerns about the increase in public debt - which at the time was over 40 percent of GDP and considered too high - and the deterioration in the external position due to rising imports, among other things.
They also urged the authorities then to make “a front-loaded effort to carry fiscal consolidation forward more rapidly.”
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