About 50,000 reading books from Australia last month would fill the shelves and hearts of many young children and schools around the country.
The Fiji book drive charity organisation has helped more than 170 schools around the country by donation books for their libraries.
Founder and CEO Fiona Luth said her dream to start the book drive began after visiting a primary school on Kadavu Island.
“I was in Kadavu in 2011 after the death of my second parent,” she recalled.
“I was looking at this beautiful tropical scene and I had a flash of inspiration that I wanted to help as many people as possible.
“I went to see the district school in Kadavu and found out that English was compulsory in school.
“This particular school had about 10 books and they were in such bad condition so I said to myself, ‘well, I’ll do something about it’ and ten years later here we are.”
She said as a former teacher, she wanted children living in the remote areas in Fiji to experience the pleasure of reading stories from around the world.
“I used to be an English teacher so I know about books and I understand Fijian culture very well.
“So I guess that’s my one way of trying to create some a little bit of justice and to help kids.”
She said despite the many challenges, she tried to reach as many schools as possible.
“People say to me, a lot of Fijians think that urban schools don’t have a need, but actually they do.
“But it’s not just them it is really the remote schools in places such as Vanua Levu or Kioa Island that don’t have the pleasure to own books.
“And I understand why because it’s very expensive to get to these places.
“So I want kids to have access to quality books and then from that I wanted them to develop a joy of reading, but also to become readers.
” Fiji Book Drive operations manager Lavenia Tamani said they surveyed the schools and assessed what was needed and the infrastructure available.
“We get so many requests from schools in Fiji for reading books,” she said.
“When new schools want to apply for books, we have to go check their library, assess how many children are enrolled at the school and so forth. Only then can we arrange how many books will be delivered to the school.”
