Budget and Recovery

Nausori

The budget announcement will be made soon and the consultation efforts for the 2020/21 Budget is underway.

Many who have lost their jobs or are on reduced hours and even have days off will be looking forward to this year’s budget.

This budget should be one to help us recover from the effects of COVID-19 and revive Fiji’s agriculture.

Australia and New Zealand thrive from their agriculture secto. NZ has the largest lamb/ sheep production for meat and wool, while Australia has apple and orange farms. NZ too has grape and other orchard farms on a very large scale.

Fiji can be self sufficient in many ways. We have a lot of land and our population is small. We lack manpower and machinery when it comes to the agriculture sector.

I hope this budget will help agriculture more than it has done for the Fiji Roads Authority.

One thing is certain. We will recover well because of lock downs and curfew people are hungry for sports and socialising.

Once things become normal money will be spent like water. Boredom of being home will catch up and tourists will flock to Fiji and other countries. It will be like releasing a chained dog.

Recovery will occur at a sonic boom but for those that come from an average family or are poor, it will take months to years for them to recover lost money during COVID-19.

Since expenditure is there for them but cash flow or incoming money is less or zero.

I hope this budget gives agriculture a chance to revive. Recovery depends on our goat, rice, coconut, sugarcane, cassava, taro, pineapple and the lost gold crop of Fiji Cocoa beans. We need to revive all these crops for commercial export.

This will be the turning point in Fiji’s agriculture sector.