Plans are afoot to expand the tourism industry to 12 other provinces, says Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Tourism Viliame Gavoka while speaking on The Fiji Times’ online platform, The Lens@177 on Wednesday.
He shared this while responding to queries on whether tourism or agriculture should be Fiji’s main focus in terms of growing the nation’s economy.
He said tourism had the potential to bring in more overseas travellers and investments.
“You have to mix all the sectors; I don’t think any of the sectors can replace tourism and I’m talking about $3.2 billion right now.”
He believed other sectors such as agriculture could also grow but tourism remained one of the main contributors to the local economy.
“Agriculture is supposedly still under 10 per cent of GDP including sugar, so it has a long way to go but like everyone else, I’d like to see that become dominant. “But going back to what I said, tourism is still limited to only two provinces.
“The other 12 provinces, when they kick in, you have all provinces when they kick in, there’s no beating tourism, it’s just going to grow and I don’t think any other sector can match tourism in that sense.”
