Fiji Visitors Bureau is in charge of branding Fiji abroad but we recently read that the Minister for Tourism said there was "a need for FVB to re-look at their functions and contributions to the nation". Could you enlighten us on this issue?
We would like our core function to be primarily marketing Fiji Overseas, we understand that this is our role. The Act under which we operate is worked in a way that we can do almost anything, like programs in Fiji on tourism awareness. If we are involved in all sorts of tourism issues in the country we cannot focus all we would like to in a quality marketing of Fiji Overseas. We are now dealing with tourism awareness in the country, with educational programmes, with antilitter campaigns, providing information in Fiji, etc. We cannot be doing everything about tourism, we want to be focused on bringing people into the country. What the Minister was saying is that we need to re-look at the core functions of the Bureau. We are looking at focusing primarily on marketing. We have an office in Suva providing information for Suva, we have another office in Nadi meeting the people that arrives to the country and that is the airport's responsibility, not our responsibility. I have people there saying "Welcome to Fiji" on a 24 hour basis, that is the responsibility of the city council. Our core functions are being redirected so that our efforts are focused more on bringing tourists into Fiji.


"Towards a billion dollar industry" is the theme of the last Tourism National Summit. FVB's efforts are not just branding Fiji abroad but we have seen some in-house work like the national campaign "Bula spirit". What are your plans to achieve such a task?

There are two elements we should observe at this point. The First one is that we are preparing the world for Fiji and the second one is that we are preparing Fiji for the world. The "Bula Spirit" is to prepare ourselves for the world that is coming to visit us. We have to be able to deliver the dreams that we normally promise overseas, this is the bottom line of the program. It is working quite well, my nine year old kid can understand it and that is good because the main target was children, the Fiji's future main asset. We basically worked on Primary Schools and Secondary Schools but we have also worked with other sectors of the society because there is another impact of the tourism growth. If we look at tourism at this point, it is primarily focused on the Western Part of the country, Nadi, The Mamanuca Islands, The Yasawas, etc. Our challenge is to convince the whole country of the benefits that everyone can get out of this kind of industry. We held the Tourism National Summit in Savu-Savu, in the island of Vanua Levu, because there is a huge potential over there. From there you can go to Lomaiviti, the Lau Group or the northern part of Tailevu. But as we start developing that area we want to make sure that the domestic population is fully receptive towards tourism. At the some time we have to bear in mind that the population is very attached to their environment, they believe they are part of it, something you also find in other parts of the Pacific and Asia. A lot of them are very concerned with the eco-system and they want to make sure that whatever comes in fits into the way they do things as opposes to developments coming in and taking over totally. I think that for the long term this is healthy for the country.


What would be your advice for foreign investors who want to come in those areas and develop the tourism industry?

The people in those areas are way receptive. We want partnerships, not only financially but also with the eco-system. We want people understanding the culture and the local traditions. When you go around Fiji you notice that all the developments are out in rural areas. Beqa island, Musket Cove, etc. are out in the villages and that is remarkable because to make that happen there is a very strong partnership between the investor and the rural community. If you go to Suva, the business capital of the country, you can see that there are not many hotels, it is the urban area where other things are better developed. Tourism is out in the rural areas and this is very unique.


You are branding Fiji as "The truly relaxing tropical getaway", Why?

If we go back in time a little bit we will be aware of what we have done. We have done a global research on December 1999 and we tried to understand what motivates people to travel to Fiji. We studied the markets of US, Europe and UK and also Australia, New Zealand, etc. When you say "Fiji", it brings up an exotic image in some parts of the world but in Australia and New Zealand this exotic attribute is not present so therefore we could not use "exotic" as the main quality in our strategy. One word that continued to fit in all the markets was "relaxation". This was developed back in year 2000 but at the moment, with all that is happening around the world, there is a lot of uncertainty and true relaxation is what people is looking for when they go on holidays and that they will find if they come to Fiji. Therefore, this will continue to be our brand.


Tourism will probably lead Fiji's economy in the future. We have seen there is a debate in the sector: Fiji needs more tourists vs. Fiji needs to attract more top end of the sector Tourists, what is your opinion?

We at FVB are not looking so much at the number or the type of tourists but more at the length of stay. We have already attracted people to be here and stay another day and the impact of that is huge for the industry and this is how we will be able to reach the "billion-dollar" industry. But first of all, we do not have the capacity during the high seasons and that is one of the challenges, to increase the capacity for certain times of the year. But instead of focusing too much on the numbers of visitor arrivals we must focus on the length of stay, because if you have 400,000 visitors a year with a current length of stay of about 4 days you get extra revenue close to 200 million by just increasing the length of stay one more day. There are other obstacles to this and it is that they cannot stay an extra day because there are no flights the next day. This problem, with Air Pacific's new capacity increase for our major markets, will disappear and that would be possible.


If we compare Fiji to other destinations we see that other destinations have done better in the past, like Bali. How do you explain this and what are your plans to change the situation?

Some 16 years ago, there were more Australians visiting Fiji than Bali but then Bali went on a strong campaign and now they have about 4 times more visitors and the growth in capacity has been spectacular. Bali made the choice to increase tremendously the number of rooms, if we had done this at that time we would be in a different situation right now. Our growth target will not be realized if we do not grow inventory. From around June to October, we cannot get any rooms in those places. Fiji has the potential and the capacity to grow but we need to be a little bit cautious sometimes as the resources are limited. We need to grow in Human Resources and in infrastructure but prioritizing on what to put emphasis on. But now the whole concept is changing quite dramatically. Now tourism is the savior of the nation.

Looking at the way government is going about it, extremely motivating hotel projects, etc. Recently the government certified a loan of the European Development Bank for a Hotel investment project, it is the first time in Fiji's tourism history that a guarantee has been discussed and approved in parliament for a hotel project and to me that is a very positive step. It is a sign that this government is putting its weight behind developing projects instead of waiting for the private sector to do everything. It is what we have all been wanting all this time.

How is the Tourism sector in Fiji related to this government's "Look North Policy"?

In tourism, it is always good to increase your portfolio of visitors. China and India are particularly interesting markets for us. We are making efforts with these countries because as Australia and New Zealand are also there, it helps that we piggyback on what they do in those two emerging markets. It is always a chicken and egg situation. People say that Chinese and Indians are different markets, that they look for other things like better shopping, casinos and all that but same thing was said about the Japanese and the Koreans and they already come to Fiji. As soon as the number of visitors from those countries grew in Fiji the people here were able to provide facilities for them. Fiji people can quickly adapt themselves to everything. I have a lot of faith that Fiji will put up facilities to suit the Chinese when they start arriving as we have already done with the Japanese and the Koreans. We have a hospitable population and if you need Chinese interpreters you can find a lot of Mandarin speaking people here and with the Indian community there would be not a problem. The Indian television divulged a lot of information on the coup and later on we made a survey to see who would want to go to Fiji. They said they would only spend two days here but once they came here and saw the cultural links they stayed longer. But right now, Fiji is very much part of the Australia and New Zealand trip even though we have a lot more to offer.


Diversification is a key word for the future economy of Fiji. Tourism is more diversified than what people might think, Fiji is more than just sun and sea, right?

Exactly. People tend to think of Fiji as just sun, sand and sea. We have tried to add more to that whilst we have to look for other areas. Eco tourism is very much a core part of our business. Fiji offers the sort of adventure type holidays and our goal is focused a lot in the UK market. The backpackers industry in Fiji has grown to about $45 million FJD this year. Five years ago it was only around two to three million FJD. I would say that $45 million FJD is still a conservative figure considering the potential of the backpackers industry but it is not a bad figure if we consider that five years ago it was virtually nonexistent. There is a company in the eco-tourism in Fiji "Fiji Experience" that make tours all around Fiji. There are companies that have developed and other that are growing. The diversification is not coming only from the government but also from people in Fiji who are active and that entrepreneurship is very satisfying to see. It became a niche five years ago and the industry moved from 12 operators to about 100 now. The evolution of the internet has contributed a lot to this growth as before, Fiji was not available and now it is at a "click" distance.


The need to increase investments was one of the resolutions in the tourism summit in Savu-Savu. What's your message to our foreign readership about the Fiji Islands as a tourism investment destination?

Tourism is now 40 years old in Fiji. We started in 1961 and we have had 41 years of learning, making mistakes, setting up, etc. Fiji is now ready to be launched into space. I believe that the platform has been set in this 41 years. We have had our coups, cyclones, flooding, etc but we had 41 years of learning. It is the right time to come and put some money on the ground. My message is "Do it now, the time is now!". The spaceship is there and all it needs is the fuel to take off.


Last October 2nd you launched in Australia the Matai Islands Specialist Program designed to increase awareness about the sites in the Islands. What is the Matai Islands Specialist Program?

Matai means "know it all". One of the problems you find in abroad when people sell Fiji is that the agencies choose Fiji is the first overseas destination that a trainee sell. Someone who is coming from high school into college is thrown into a traveling agency and the knowledge that they have is quite little. They select certain key destinations but they cannot develop other segments. With the Matai we want them to be experts about Fiji. The type of knowledge we want the Matai to have is how long does it take to go from Suva to Yanuca Island, how can I get there, what will I find there, details like that. We are also trying to have the tourist expanding the length of stay because the Matai will be able to convince the potential client to spend another more day in Fiji. There are 4,000 travel agents in Australia but we have focused in 200 where most of the visitors come from. When we had our problems back in the year 2000, we had started with the Matai in the US market. When nobody else was sending visitors to Fiji, the Matai would continue to send visitors to Fiji because they knew Fiji, they knew that the situation was safe and fine. They knew that there were some small problems in Suva but nothing in the West and other areas. This is what we are trying to do in Australia, we will continue with New Zealand and early 2003/2004 with UK and Europe. Japan and Korea are the next ones to be considered.


After the events of May 2000, what was the contribution of the Tourism industry to change the perception of Fiji abroad?

Tourism is very resilient. It is an amazing industry. I was in London early this month in a tourism industry event. There are very bad things in the world nowadays but tourism does not believe in that. Tourism is just tourism. You bring out the best of your people. In countries with problems, the tourism is the best way to go beyond troubles. Tourism is a link between people from all over the world. Two coups in 1987 and another one in 2000. No one can destroy the tourism because it appeals to the essence of mankind and tourism knows no boundaries. When you go to a country you bring the best of your country and receive the best of the place you visit. Fiji is fortunate to have tourism playing a vital role of the economy. That has helped in a big way after the coup. We have shown to the people of Fiji that all these problems shall be resolved by us because this country is linked to the global community and in two years we are already seeing the positive results. I believe in the goodness of people and that has been very important to achieve this.