The National Fire Authority (NFA) generated more than $400,000 in revenue from fire safety compliance inspections and training in the micro, small and medium-sized enterprises (MSMEs) last year alone.

In 2023, the NFA inspected 4518 MSME establishments in the country, and 80 per cent of those businesses were compliant.

NFA manager Legal Esala Radio revealed this at the recent inaugural MSME Conference in Suva and said that compliance coverage was a record number for the authority.

He said with the new businesses registered every year, “we hope that number (revenue) will grow again from this year”.

However, Mr Radio said there was still a huge gap in the number of registered MSMEs and those that had been inspected for compliance.

Fiji Revenue and Customs Service (FRCS) manager MSME Shaheen Hussain said a total of 116,000 MSMEs were registered with the FRCS. She said out of that only 22,000 were already paying back to the economy to the tune of $59.4million.

“That’s a substantial amount they are contributing to the economy,” Ms Hussain said.

“Looking at the data presented by FRCS, there is a big gap and there is a lot of work for us to do,” Mr Radio said.

He said there was a lot of inspections to be conducted.

“We can all agree that compliance is very important to all MSMEs and to all businesses for that matter. Protect your investments through fire safety compliance.”