Fiji cannot grow properly unless it urgently fixes basic infrastructure and removes immigration bottlenecks holding back investment.
Chairman of the Fiscal Review Committee and prominent Suva lawyer Richard Naidu made the comments yesterday, saying Government should be concerned that Fiji remained “critically behind” in the development of its water and sewage infrastructure.
Mr Naidu said Fiji should look at the transformation of the former Fiji Electricity Authority into Energy Fiji Ltd as an example of how essential services could become financially sustainable.
However, he said the Water Authority of Fiji (WAF) remained far behind that model.
“WAF is way behind it, does not have financial autonomy, does not have the ability to invest, and is chronically underfunded.”
He said Fiji had not treated water and sewage issues with the urgency required.
“One of those bottles of water, you can pour about 1400 of those down the sink and pay 15 cents. That’s what you’re paying for your water, most of us in this room.”
He said even to get water services to a reasonable level, where there was sufficient revenue, Fiji was “just not there”.
“We have not addressed the water and sewage issues with urgency at all, in terms of the propertisation of the water.”
Mr Naidu said another major issue affecting development was immigration.
He said while there had been discussions about helping the private sector and moving Fiji’s investment pipeline forward, that pipeline appeared to be growing but also becoming more clogged.
“It was $3billion, then it was $5billion, now I think we’re talking about a $7billion pipeline. I’m not sure about that. But to move that pipeline along, to actually make things develop, we need to get skills into the factory.”
Mr Naidu said Fiji needed skilled workers to move investment projects forward.
“And I’ve been disappointed that we have not been able to improve and make the immigration system more effective, so that we can get those skills in quickly.”
