Fiji Hotel and Tourism Association

FHTA, 14 January 2022 – Our borders have been open for over six weeks now and while we have seen some lows, we can attest to the wonderful affirmative stories and highlights that far outweigh everything else since the industry switched to “operational” mode.
Indications from Tourism Fiji (TF) was for the arrival of 30,000 visitors in December 2021 and around 40,000 visitors are expected this month and into February; which are rather surprising outcomes in themselves; all things being considered.

While the International Visitor Survey (IVS) will eventually bear this out, (if people filled out their Arrival Forms correctly), anecdotal reports indicate a very large number of returning Fijians took the reopening of borders as an opportunity to make the long-awaited homecoming to see friends and family.

But their support for their country of origin has not gone unnoticed and along with the other thousands of visitors, have put the smiles back on the faces of our many tourism workers and suppliers.

Social media and mainstream media has carried stories of tourism staff being back at what they love most and ready with their Bula smiles and it has certainly been a hectic but generally positive first six weeks that even culminated in a depression that dumped more rain over 3 days than we had seen in our wettest times of the year resulting in flooded bridges and roads around the western parts of the main island.

Many visitors who got a ride on a fire engine, military or police truck through flooded roads to get to the airport have had an experience unlikely to be repeated in their lifetimes.

In the background of a well-received reopening of borders and the influx of visitors looking for much needed R&R, was an industry trying its best to apply all the new COVID-safe protocols that seemed to be constantly changing and adjusting.

Hotels eventually got used to testing, reminding guests to test, chasing up results, reporting the results to health authorities and then dealing with first a handful of positive cases that slowly escalated.

This meant further reviewing of the processes, rolling out the isolation protocols, convincing healthy and asymptomatic guests that the test results meant they suddenly had to stay in their rooms and couldn’t mix with others, and then deal with the repercussions.

This included managing suddenly impacted room inventory because guests had to be separated from negative family members, dealing with travel insurance and supporting guests to ask for support from home if this was insufficient.

Staff rallied with trying to make guests comfortable, running errands and shopping on their behalf with some hotels going the extra mile with care packs, lists of online options for food, shopping and even souvenirs.

And despite all the care taken, the inevitable happened with more and more staff testing positive and everyone in the industry feeling the impact of a critically reduced workforce – hotels, airline, transport, airport operations, retail and even the support from supplier chains.

Administration, finance and HR staff were suddenly front-line staff fronting guests trying to organise test results, changing airline bookings and helping them make their way home.

While in restaurants and kitchens; casual staff were suddenly taking orders and delivering food before tackling the cleaning tasks they were otherwise assigned to.

At the height of things looking like they may just be settling down with reviewed isolation time frames and labs scrambling to meet the sharply increased testing demand, a tropical depression decided to settle over the country and dump the biggest rainfall ever, so that rivers burst their banks, roads became impassable for 36 hours and flights and transport came to a stop.

As used to this scenario as Fiji is, and with deepening expectation that this may just turn into a Category 1 cyclone, guest and staff safety kicked up a higher notch with cyclone preparations taking precedence, large generators kicking in as power went out nation-wide and all movement stopped to give Mother Nature her respectful berth.

A few days later, as the weather cleared up, water levels moved rapidly back down to expose mostly damage to road infrastructure and power lines, and the welcome appearance of the sun reminded us why Fiji is such a popular destination.

The relief on the faces of our staff was heart-warming, along with the appreciative cheers from the patiently waiting guests.

Resorts report that guests are leaving to go back home but will be replaced with almost just as many guests immediately and that despite the challenges of testing and isolation and late results and getting stuck because of the rain and floods; many guests are even extending their stay here.

We put this down to the hard-working staff who having been brought back to work, are working longer hours to fill in for colleagues that tested positive and must therefore isolate despite being asymptomatic.

A shout out also to the behind-the-scenes medical and testing laboratory staff, military and police personnel providing support and assistance and even the firefighters for bringing their fire truck to the party.

International travellers are warned often enough about the risks of travelling right now and Fiji’s reopening did, unfortunately, coincide with the start of the third wave in many countries around the world.

What we have seen so far from many of our visitors is a mix of confidence in Fiji’s safety precautions being put into place, the burning need to take a holiday after numerous lockdowns (and why not somewhere close and tropical), as well as some blissful unawareness of the risks of returning a positive result with the numerous times everyone has to get tested (despite widespread communication).

And there is no doubt that added to these many complicated layers, it was after all the festive season, and with an overwhelming increase in the number of personal and social events that took place, the rest was probably more predictable than we were willing to admit.

But even as infections continue in the Fijian communities on the mainland, up in our northern regions and as far as the beautiful islands of Lau; we are buoyed by the fact that a majority of eligible citizens have been fully vaccinated and thus far no visitors or tourism staff have been severely ill or hospitalised.

If we check rising infections with our international neighbours despite differing stances on how state and national Governments implement their health and protection programs, we might recognise that many changes being implemented now are actually what Fiji is already practising.

We admit we are making mistakes – these are after all extremely alien protocols that might be normal for medical staff, but that has been made a part of our hospitality practices and we are learning quickly from them.

And the learnings from these include the need to communicate often, really loudly and widely.

That what worked for the Delta strain that initially smashed us are not all necessarily help with the more infectious, but less deadly Omicron because apart from the obvious differences we are now operating in a more vaccinated and more “COVIDaware” environment.

Tourism workers are expected to be welcoming and friendly and provide great service but with masks on and stern reminders to scan in, sanitise, wear masks, keep distances, not shake hands or hug or share food and drinks.

So, we continue to remind them they must keep doing these things.

It is not difficult to appreciate why there is a hesitancy to review many restrictive measures downwards, and key amongst these is the difficulty with compliance and the tendency for complacency.

We really do “get it”, despite not being scientists and medical professionals but we are doing everything we can to live it, enforce it, and demand the compliance around it.

Every. Single. Day.

And six weeks on, Fiji is still holding it together. By no means an easy feat.

By: Fantasha Lockington – CEO, FHTA (Published in the Fiji Times on 14 January 2022)

FHTA, 23 December 2021 – “Vakavinavinaka” or being grateful is said to make you more optimistic, improve your mood and even lower rates of stress and depression.This might be a good time to remind ourselves why we need to practice this more often.

Around this time last year, Fiji was recovering from its second category 5 cyclone in a year, with Tropical Cyclone Yasa hitting hard on the 17th and 18th of December.

Borders were still closed, and a 60-day state of natural disaster was declared as the cyclone destroyed homes and displaced thousands with an estimated loss of nearly $250 million to infrastructure, livelihoods and agriculture.

But as cyclone experiences went, despite the destruction and upheavals, we still considered ourselves lucky and blessed even, that we emerged with the larger populated areas of the country going relatively unscathed.

With only local tourism to look forward to in the early months of 2021, many tourism businesses remain closed with flights still grounded and news emerging from around the region that the industry’s initial requests for tourism employers to be allowed to demand that staff be vaccinated appearing to be not as far-fetched as it might have seemed initially.

Globally as airlines, industries, then states and Governments came on board with the increasing scientific data arguing for mass vaccinations to keep entire populations safe; Fiji too quickly embraced the view that vaccinations needed to be a requirement for safer employment.

If 2020 was about how to survive by reducing your overhead costs, managing your staff and even mothballing your future plans for a while; 2021 was all about working towards a reopening of borders with an acceptable plan that would be considered safe.

Months dragged slowly and painfully by, as COVID safe guidelines were reviewed, the research and evolving science on the virus was devoured as soon as it was released, and each piece of evidence was critically examined for clues to how we were going to come back from an economic abyss that appeared to be growing bigger and deeper with mounting infection rates and deaths.

At the same time, Fiji raced undaunted into its vaccination program with the good doctor at the head of an unrelenting push to grow vaccination numbers, and keep a cool head even as our health system started to buckle.

And not just under the usual impact of overworked staff and failing systems under COVID; but also, under the pressure of criticism from all sectors that offered no support or alternative options for improvement.

Support instead came from unexpected areas; industries like tourism pooling resources, sanitisers being made by alcohol suppliers, international neighbours and agencies that offered technical support, funding, vaccines and PPEs.

For many months, reopening frameworks and movement restrictions were discussed, discarded, redone and debated until frayed tempers and disagreements were soothed and started anew the next day.

COVID-19 has had undeniable and horrific consequences on people’s lives and the economy. With sickness, death and unemployment rates soaring almost everywhere on our planet, it was easy to despair.

But much has been learnt in the journey from April 2020 to 01 Dec 2021- 20 months that saw a nation move from vaccine hesitancy to embracing vaccination with approximately 92% of the adult population now fully vaccinated and many preparing eagerly to get booster shots now.

Yes, eagerly!

And we recognise that the Government push for “no jab, no job” had a lot to do with getting us here, but employers across a range of industries have agreed that to have waited for our population to choose to vaccinate in their own time would have seen far more deaths and desolation than our island nation could have afforded.

We are, after all, Fijian.

It does not sit easily with us to have any urgency for most things we cannot immediately see that there might have to be a mad rush for.

However, we dared to hope as a nation that we could pull ourselves out of the steeply climbing infection numbers and death rates, and as vaccination numbers took over the rising graphical inclines, so too did we finally see the flattening curve of those infections.

Whenever we look back on a nasty chapter of our lives, whether personal, business, political or economic; we are inevitably reminded that we should always take stock of where we came from, went through and that we should learn from these.

This helps us plan our next steps more carefully, review what we can do better and hopefully learn from our mistakes if we are humble enough to admit them.

And as nasty chapters go; there is nothing quite like 20 months of pain to help you remember how not to feel that way again.

So, what have we learnt that we can use to improve ourselves, our businesses, our lives and eventually our nation?

We learnt that as human beings we detested being isolated, but as Fijians, we found separation from loved ones, the inability to access food daily and the religious activities that are woven into the deep fabric of our ethnic, traditional and social lives left us physically and psychologically distressed.

Our environment benefited from our continued absence and allowed rejuvenations in wildlife, marine life and entire ecosystems.

And we were also reminded about kindness. Being kinder to one another and acknowledging that we needed to be more considerate of those around us, especially those who needed our help.

This positive outcome has been a rejuvenated sense of community and social cohesion.

Additionally, wider collaboration and consultation took place on a scale rarely seen, acknowledged or even expected.

COVID pushed together scientists, economists, accountants, lawyers, businessmen, disciplined forces and entire industries to work with the front-line medical staff who needed everyone’s support to tackle an ever-evolving enemy.

Perhaps it was our determination to beat the virus or the need to contribute more, but each brought their own expertise and regardless of how small or large their effort was, it was a step forward in getting our nation back its spirit.

As COVID became the biggest market disruptor, it led to unprecedented levels of innovation.

Commerce, education and administration amongst others, were challenged to rapidly digitize products, services and delivery mechanisms to continue to be relevant by reimagining their business models. .
Finally, as we move closer to Christmas, consider another “gift” that COVID has given us that is so appropriate at this time of the year. And that is a new sense of appreciation and gratefulness.
COVID has offered us a new perspective on everything we have taken for granted for so long – our freedoms, leisure, connections, work, family and friends. We have never questioned how life as we know it could be suddenly taken away from us.

We are therefore grateful for this and many other things.

For new beginnings.

For our health workers and their supporters in Border Control who show up daily for work despite the risks.

For the people who believed resolutely that Fiji could reopen safely.

And for everyone that heeds the need to continue to wear their masks in confined spaces despite how uncomfortable it is to wear them, who sanitise their hands frequently and scan in and out of shops, businesses and restaurants.

Because you too are doing your bit to keep us all safer.

By: Fantasha Lockington – CEO, FHTA (Published in the Fiji Times on 23 December 2021)

FHTA, 16 December 2021 – Seasonality has always been a key component of life in the Isles of Fiji (and the Pacific!)

We have specific seasons for fruits and vegetables, root crops, marine life, flora and animal breeding.

There are even fashion fads that come and go with the seasons, but it is at this time of the year that you pull out your loudest Bula shirt!

The most serious of Pacific periodic activity is the Cyclone season, which usually begins around November and ends in the first quarter of the new year.

The Fiji Met office had earlier estimated that Fiji should expect one or two severe tropical cyclones this season but has since updated that estimation to note that two out of the three would be very strong storms.

Storms or cyclones; either will have environmental impacts on populations, trade, food production and businesses that are located along with coastal areas, on islands and in heavily populated regions that are always impacted by heavy rainfalls.

While Category 3 formations and above have been historically worrying for Fiji because they could potentially cause catastrophic flooding, landslides and widespread loss of power throughout our islands; with growing populations and sea-level rise, even shorter bursts of heavy rains and heavy storm surges during full moons and higher than normal tides have brought climate change impacts more forcefully into our usually idyllic Pacific back yards.

Everyone in the country should have some sort of level of preparedness as we inch closer to a Tropical Depression or Cyclone forming around Fiji.

As Cyclone Ruby battered New Caledonia earlier this week, the tourism industry reviewed emergency plans even as it was dealing with increasing numbers of visitors coming in for holidays or to visit friends and families, they had not seen for nearly 2 years.

Even if we emerge from this season unscathed, there is still a lot of precipitation forecast for the next few months.

We know that hotels, event planners, ferry services and outdoor activities usually work with an alternative “rain” option factored in, even while ensuring that the proper measures and processes have been put into place to ensure that guest and staff safety is always paramount.

The last quarter of the year is typically the off-peak season for Fijian tourism for a few reasons, including the fact that this is our cyclone season.

Yachts and vessels of all sizes ensure they are never far from a “bolt hole” or cyclone berth, charters tend not to take place around this time and it is traditionally a time when potential visitors prefer to spend time at home with family and friends anyway.

But since the reopening of our borders from 1st December, we may be seeing a slight shift in tourism’s off-peak seasons due to a combination of availability, Fiji trending on the list of safer places to go to post-COVID and populations weary of lockdowns and travel restrictions.

Australians (mostly from New South Wales at the moment) are finding it easier to fly overseas than to visit family and friends in other Australian states and as a result, we are seeing family reunions and groups using Fiji as a meeting place.

On the cusp of the cyclone season, we prepare to farewell a year that tested everyone’s patience and respond to the vicissitudes of an industry that has been in a constant state of flux for almost 2 years.

As committed as we are to recovering lost ground and making the new but always evolving COVID safety measures work; at this time of the year especially, the industry starts to move to a different beat.

Staff rosters get adjusted as more staff and hours are factored in, furniture is moved around and marquees and wet weather alternatives start to pop up around resorts.

Everything starts to shift into a higher gear as orders for everything start to increase.

More wines, more food, more chairs, more transport, more flowers and entertainers, bigger speakers, brighter lights, longer days and even longer nights.

As the humidity spikes and temperatures soar, afternoon thunderstorms become the norm at this time of the year and event planners become weather watchers who can time when to rush tables in or umbrellas out.

This year the “silly season” will have even more challenges to deal with.

Adjusting to higher traffic from local and international visitors means everyone is tapping into suppliers at the same time, while the suppliers are dealing with freight and importation challenges exacerbated by decreased imports from China and reduced freight capacity around the world.

This is driving prices up so that the inroads made from the budget incentives from reduced tariffs and import taxes are being lost.

It is also during this time of the year and in the ensuing heat and humidity that electrical equipment ups and dies. Aided in no small way by the unexplained, but consistent power surges being experienced around the country.

Generators refuse to start; air conditioning units and coolers give up and sensitive equipment like server units and freezers are adversely affected by fluctuating power.

In the meantime, fresh food producers are not all ready for tourism’s increasing demand or were not aware that borders were reopening, so import substitutes are turned to that cost much more but are delivered in the quantities and quality expected.

More on this later.

But how can an industry so heavily relied on, get better support to access locally produced fruit, vegetables, meat and seafood in the quantities and quality it demands?

Back to the festive season and the preparations underway to be ready for cyclones in the medium term or sudden, crashing thunderstorms in the short term.

To keep customers safe within the COVID safe guidelines, remind visitors to get their rapid antigen or PCR tests while ensuring their passport numbers are filled in correctly for their departure confirmation while being on constant alert for social distancing and mask-wearing.

And as we count down to Christmas, to ensure everyone has a great time celebrating their get-togethers, special events, first holiday in 2 years or simply getting some time out after being locked up for so long.

All while ensuring there are sufficient amounts of food, drinks and sanitisers.

And of course, an overflowing abundance of our Bula Spirit is being shared widely.

Tis the season after all.

By: Fantasha Lockington – CEO, FHTA (Published in the Fiji Times on 16 December 2021)

FHTA, 09 December 2021 – Often referred to as the Fourth Estate, the media are often considered the watchdogs of society.

Their purpose is to provide (correct) information on current news both locally and internationally and this can include a wide spectrum of subjects, often given prominence based on what they believe the public and society want to or should know.

The media is supposed to be objective, but can often be subjective based on what they believe (rightly or wrongly) the public actually want to hear or read about.

The power of the media, therefore, cannot be overstated and in the increasing influencing power of social media, technology and lightning speed of most delivery platforms; never more powerful than it is now.

Its impact on the various aspects of our lives, regardless of where we work, what we do, or where we live, has been nothing short of phenomenal when we consider that we could educate and improve our knowledge, change our perspectives, beliefs and even our religions based on what we consume, believe we read, see or hear in the media.

How we decipher the nuances in the manner communication is delivered to us has been the subject of books, movies and far too many documentaries.

Destination marketing, on the other hand, is generally about promoting a destination’s attractiveness to specific overseas markets to increase visitor arrivals – a role that has evolved to ensure messaging opportunities can be cleverly dressed up as information, advertising and consumerism.

Simply putting up large billboards and full-page advertisements in magazines and newspapers is only a fraction of what is required to get peoples “real” attention now.

There are so much sensory overload and people have far too many things going on at the same time now, that to get someone’s attention for long enough to make an impact takes a lot more effort or as marketing people know – you have to repeat, repeat, repeat.

And not just in the same format to get your message across.

To get the undivided attention of people in the media, therefore, the Fiji Hotel and Tourism Association (FHTA) hosted members of Fiji’s major media organisations to its annual information session and discussion earlier this week.

This allows us to talk about what has been going on behind the scenes, what challenges we have faced and how we have been able to address them, and where relevant, the successes and milestones achieved.

By creating better awareness and understanding of tourism businesses and the environments they operate in, as well as highlighting the industry’s challenges and opportunities, we always hope that these sessions develop insight into how the many segments of the industry work and how each of these connects to the many ministries, agencies and regulatory bodies we are inextricably connected to.

And consequently, how this drives much of the focus for us as a private-sector organisation driving our tourism development strategies and the way these shape our lobbying efforts for tourism to remain a sustainable industry.

The media can contribute more positively towards shaping tourism into a responsible industry by promoting the protection of the environment and addressing the negative social impact of tourism as just a few examples of what it can do.

But they need to know where to look and why, and what questions to ask where and when.

And to do this effectively, they need context and background.

Because as those of us in the industry know, there is far more to this complex industry than luxurious hotels next to endless pristine beaches with swaying palm trees.

Local media organisations can explain through interesting local stories how tourism has a multiplier effect that can positively impact many other sectors, and how this can more actively tackle poverty through the demand for fresh produce in agriculture and aquaculture and also in energy, transportation and infrastructure.

There are stories to be told in labour mobility both internally and externally through our regions and how tourism affects small communities in our furthest islands.

And there are as yet many untold stories about import substitution that is being widely practised both by the industry as well as through the connections within the communities near tourism hubs that have yet to see the light of day, that could effectively balance the consistent cries for the industry to “buy more local”.

With a bit more innovative research, our local media could share with the public the reports provided by the International Finance Corporation (IFC – From the Farm to The Tourist’s Table), as just one example, that explains where the gaps in fresh produce production are that forces hotels and restaurants around Fiji (not just in tourism), and Fijians domestically, to use imported produce.

Sharing this information widely could incentivise new investors and existing farmers to venture into new business opportunities to close these already identified gaps and make a real difference to the often unconstructive criticism that completely misses the reasons for those gaps.

They would also help interested stakeholders and visitors understand the local, cultural, social and environmental issues that get discussed often but without offering possible solutions that often need collective discourse and wider support from our communities that contribute to the challenges, often without realising how they do so.

Discussions threw up many more compelling subjects and excellent opportunities for investigative journalism and qualitative research into how we address non-licensed accommodation providers flying “under the radar”, and whether Airbnb providers can be regulated because they are after all catering to demand in the market.

And more importantly, exactly whose actual responsibility these were in the grand scheme of things.

As expected in our media session, the interest zoomed in on the recent reopening and the industry’s expectations for 2022.

And why not?

Fiji so badly needed something positive to focus on as we emerged out of one of the country’s most testing, and darkest of 20 months.

But we also took the time to take participants through the often-arduous process and a seemingly unending list of challenges of getting to where we are today.

Convincing and then training hotels to replicate procedures usually performed in medical environments as they take on the responsibility of being diligent gatekeepers for the Ministry of Health, has tested an industry that is used to always planning for the worst and hoping for the best.

Despite the elated and heartfelt welcomes for our long-awaited visitors, we know we still have some way to go before we can relax our collective guards.

New protocols and processes are still being tested and fine-tuned until they become a part of those COVID safe “normal” operations that took 20 months to get used to after so many adjustments, given that the virus and our understanding of it kept evolving.

Tourism Fiji CEO Brent Hill was also invited to talk about the Care Fiji Commitment (CFC) for hotels and tourism suppliers and provide the much-anticipated expectations on forward bookings, how Fiji was trending with overseas markets and the recently released Destination Fiji marketing promotion with Rebel Wilson.

And of course, we discussed the new Omicron variant and how science still doesn’t have all the answers, so for now we follow what we do know – and that is to continue to practice everything we have learnt so far in terms of masking up in confined shared spaces, washing or sanitising hands often and social distancing where possible.

One thing is increasingly obvious in talking with non-industry people that are often forgotten.

That we are now operating in a highly vaccinated environment -completely different from where we were 10-20 months ago, and that the most highly vaccinated area in Fiji is the Western Division, or more specifically Nadi.

The planning, preparations, CFC compliance and certification and requirement for a minimum 3 night stay in a hotel for all incoming international visitors from green zone (partner) countries, with a 2nd-day rapid antigen test to provide the necessary oversight for our health ministry might appear overly cautious, with lots of checks along the way; but we accept that it is better than any alternative requiring full and formal quarantine.

So, we continue to support and work hard on getting it right, as uneasy as this new responsibility rests so heavily on our collective shoulders.

But one we are taking ever so seriously nonetheless. We can only hope that our communication is being effective enough and that the time we’re spending working hard on getting our messaging right is going to be worth it.

Getting the media onboard to support efforts would be icing on a cake we hope everyone can get a slice of.

Ensuring the context is understood by sharing background and opening up about our real challenges will we hope, get the real stories about tourism out there for the Fijian population to appreciate, understand and be proud of.

Our success in getting this right is eventually Fiji’s success, and we know the world watches ever so critically.

By: Fantasha Lockington – CEO, FHTA (Published in the Fiji Times on 09 December 2021)

FHTA, 02 December 2021 – After 20 long months, Fiji is now finally open.

Cautiously perhaps, but open nonetheless.

International visitors from Travel Partner countries started flying into Fiji yesterday (Wednesday 1st Dec) to enjoy our famous Fijian hospitality after almost two years of being forced to isolate from the world.

Our tourism industry has logged many hours during the lockdowns, in meaningful discussions and meetings to try and stem the flow.

Many people from different sections work together and focus on one common goal – reopening safely in a new COVID world.

For supporting the industry to survive the crisis when it hit us hard early last year, we owe deep gratitude to the Fiji Revenue & Customs Service, the Land Transport Authority, the Reserve Bank of Fiji, the Association of Banks in Fiji, the iTaukei Land Trust Board and the Maritime Safety Authority of Fiji.

Then working closely with the industry and its wide range of stakeholders to develop safe guidelines that evolved to become what has become a critical part of our Reopening Framework.

For this, we are grateful for the understanding and support from our honourable Government leaders including the Prime Minister, the Minister for Economy, the Minister for Commerce, Trade, Tourism & Transport, the Permanent Secretaries for Health, Tourism and Economy and the many Directors and ministerial support staff that we engaged closely with to provide industry background and context to roll our often complicated protocols within the hospitality space in collective efforts to manage safety and control the risks.

Gratitude for the collaboration and support would not be complete without also mentioning the huge teams of people who were constantly on the ground managing the operational aspects of the mammoth exercise that contained COVID became.

These included the Ministry of Health’s many doctors and nurses, the military and navy personnel that joined the Fiji Police, Immigration, airport and security people to form the very effective Border Control group under the Ministry of Defense.

Working alongside the Border Control has been the High Commissioners for Australia, New Zealand, USA and India, amongst others, to provide Fiji with the critically needed vaccines that allowed Fiji to reach its high vaccination record.

And it goes without saying that the national airline Fiji Airways, our hard-working national tourism office staff at Tourism Fiji (TF), hundreds of tourism businesses and the thousands that support them have all been part of this exhausting journey that often seemed like it would not end.

Vinaka vakalevu! To all of these people and the supporting agencies, too many to mention, who provided resources, funding and technical expertise to get us to where we are now.

As countries around the world react strongly to the new Omicron variant, Fiji’s reopening is continuing as planned because we believe our preparation to this point can support what the science has determined thus far – that more research was still required but that the basics were still required even in this new scenario.

While Omicron must be taken seriously because its features are worrying, there are still large gaps in what we know so far.

Further analyses are still needed that will take two weeks at the very least to get the first indicative updates, but strong medical advice is that the variant should be controlled with testing, tracing isolation, applying known public health measures, and ongoing surveillance.

And that is what we already have in place in Fiji, and prepared and trained for.

This is even more reason for continued vigilance and to not let our guards down. And this has been exactly what has been the hardest part of the COVID “journey” – complacency.

At each stage of the many challenges in this long trek through COVID that we have felt we gained even the smallest win; we have inadvertently relaxed our guards.

From unpopular hotel quarantines that were never designed to accommodate this as an option, complex lockdowns, curfews that started at 6pm (remember those?) and the range of “new” requirements that eventually simply become part of our lives.

These included downloading the CareFiji App, scanning in and out everywhere, sanitizing, social distancing (or never leaving home), long queues that made us rethink our reasons for leaving home, masking up and as much as possible -remaining in our bubbles.

Turns out that the best advice for staying safe has actually not changed much at all.

Stay home, wash your hands frequently, mask up in confined spaces, sanitize and keep your distance – are all still very much applicable even with new strains Hotels have taken vaccination verification, the Care Fiji Commitment (CFC) protocols, second-day guest & monthly staff testing protocols, enhanced sanitation, social distancing and mask-wearing measures as part of their responsibilities now.

We could quarantine all our incoming visitors for three days and make them miserable; or we could provide them with some freedom of movement within CFC-confirmed areas until they return a negative Rapid Antigen Test on their second day and make the hotels responsible (remind the guests, manage the tests, provide results) so that the Ministry of Health can continue to have the oversight of all incoming visitors for at least the first three days in Fiji.

We chose to do the latter. Hence, our constant reminders for everyone’s continued commitment and compliance to support keeping Fiji safe, keeping in mind the many sacrifices and the collective efforts of getting us to where we are now.

With Fiji’s reopening announced, there was only one change to the framework that had already been put into place when Omicron was acknowledged as a virus “of concern”.

For Non-Partner (Red Zone) Countries; quarantine timeframes that had been reduced to 10 days were returned to 14 days.
Returning Australian citizens now also need to home isolate for a few days and while this caused some consternation initially, did not eventually cause a discernable impact on inbound bookings.

The new COVID variant Omicron that sounds like it was named after a nasty robot, has early reports indicating that it may be more transmissible or virulent than the Delta variant that plagued Fiji not too long ago.

Only real data will tell, and any predictions about this new COVID variant’s virulence and impact remains speculative at this stage.

However, Fiji is in a very different position now when compared to April 2021.

We did not have vaccines then, whereas we are now over 90% fully vaccinated with children getting vaccinated now and booster shots confirmed as being available.

Our COVID-safe protocols weren’t as robust as they are now and businesses have accepted the new COVID safe rules as part of their “new normal”.

Now we need everybody, not just the tourism industry workers, to continue to get vaccinated, continue wearing masks, continue social distancing and continue to wear masks.

We experienced first-hand what happens when a process or a step is not followed and being a small island nation, we saw how quickly things could get out of control.

All the necessary steps have been taken to ensure that international visitors can be received in a safe and controlled manner.

The Reopening Framework is just that, a framework.

Preparations and alternatives are already in place to review processes and make improvements where required.

Our tourism front-liners have been briefed and have been training for the past few months.

Our industry colleagues at TF have a comprehensive FAQ section that you should refer to for clarity around general travel requirements.

This can be accessed on fiji.travel/FAQ and includes information on booking conditions, vaccination rates, travelling with children, selecting resorts, testing and returning home, amongst other information.

Everybody should have a read of the information and be aware of what is expected from the guests, the hotels and the workers.

Our compliance and support of these measures as an industry ensure we remain committed to getting tourism back up again, while keeping the people we are responsible for as safe as possible.

All of our members and tourism stakeholder are reminded that embedding layers of controls against pandemic disease into their businesses, such as safe air and masking when needed, will make it far more likely that your business will remain open, not be subject to disruptions, nor lose key staff or clients to illness.

This is because, despite vaccination levels, all controls are important to protect health as immunity to the vaccine wanes, and reduce transmission that can occur despite vaccination.

For now, all incoming traffic from green countries will spend three nights in CFC-certified hotels while free to move around the hotel premises.

They will do a Rapid Antigen Test on 48 hours or the second day and will be free to travel to green zones freely after a negative result.

They will need RT-PCR tests to return (to Australia) or do Rapid Antigen tests (to return to the USA) so they must organise this in advance so there isn’t a bottleneck at testing facilities around the tourism hotspots.
I
f we all play our parts, we CAN make this work.

You only have to hear our famous Bula! song to agree.

By: Fantasha Lockington – CEO, FHTA (Published in the Fiji Times on 02 December 2021)

FHTA, 25 November 2021 – With only a few days to go to 1 December, the Fiji Tourism industry is buzzing.

Busy and abuzz with anticipation and some trepidation that they can roll out the myriad lists of health and safety protocols, as well as the usual nerves with the opening to a full house after almost 2 years of intermittent opening and closing with reduced room inventories and smaller staff numbers.

We have been planning for this since March 2020 when flights stopped because the borders were closed and hotels and resorts and most businesses dependent on international tourism were forced to close their doors or only open a fraction of their usual operations.

It has been a long road to get to where we are today, with months of uncertainty and our own version of lockdowns eventually giving way to some glimmer of hope as vaccination numbers increased and infections and deaths decreased.

The global pandemic has changed the face of travel everywhere and Fiji is no different. A quick review of how countries around the world are planning to, or have reopened show that current challenges, difficult to understand reasoning around introduced protocols and the eventual settling down into what becomes everyone’s “new normal” is not unusual.

But protesting change apparently is normal.

The entire world protested the introduced heightened protocols for safe travel post 9/11, but now we all stand in line and take off our shoes, belts, remove our laptops, toss out our liquids and succumb to the frisking, scanning and pat-downs required at airports globally.

And that was 20 years ago!

From the early days when Fiji would send COVID-19 tests overseas to the present time where our Ministry of Health (MOHMS) and Fiji Centre for Disease Control (FCDC) can conduct their own C19 testing at high quantities and faster turnaround times.

This ability and our COVID-safe Protocols have almost flatlined our second wave and buoyed Tourism’s efforts to bolster its planning for the eventual reopening of borders.

The Fiji Hotel and Tourism Association (FHTA), as we have continually shared in this forum, has strived to work with Government and other related stakeholders to ensure that our industry is ready to come on 1st December.

And that means that we work together to get the industry and our economy back on track.

The overall counter for the amount of in-person and virtual meetings to hash out all things related to the tourism framework for reopening is in the red as we have logged thousands of hours of discussion, debate and consultation.

Tourism Fiji’s (TF) Care Fiji Commitment (CFC) is in high gear as every accommodation provider preparing for opening by 01 December comes on board and the certification process gets rolled out; and this is being followed by training for all interested restaurants, transport providers, retailers and suppliers to the industry who want to be able to be instantly recognized by our international visitors as being confirmed as a safe business.

Launched in October 2020, the CFC program ensures that tourism businesses adopt enhanced safety standards by upskilling operators in COVID-19 mitigation practices and protocols to ensure guest and staff safety.

In the last 6 months, added layers to the protocols now ensure hotels can support the Ministry of Health with post-arrival and pre-departure testing requirements with COVID safe practices built into guest comfort, services and experiences.

Statutory bodies and NGOs have come forward to tender their interest in conducting training for tourism staff and we are currently in the process of planning this exercise for as many workers as possible.

This is tourism’s collective commitment to reopening safely.

We have been working hard to ensure that all the necessary steps have been taken so that international guests and returning Fijians, can be welcomed back safely and in a controlled manner.

To that end, we have sought to understand the many new health, immigration, airline and country requirements, and then break these down through training, procedural explanations or planning logistics around how they can take place as efficiently as possible.

Flexibility will be key as we adapt to the new way of doing things and we have no doubt there will be teething problems, the need to re-evaluate some areas and improve, refine or downgrade others moving forward.

While we celebrate Fiji’s 90 percent and rising vaccination figures, the embedded controls are considered vitally important to protect the health of tourism staff, visitors and our communities, as immunity to the vaccines is expected to wane and more variants emerge.

But, with every new risk that COVID never seems to run out; new mitigative measures and solutions have also emerged including recommendations for booster shots, mandated vaccinations in countries initially against this as an option and the consistent reminders that we not become complacent and get used to this new way of going about our lives.

In the same way, we simply got used to travelling internationally the way we do now through metal detectors and X-ray machines that see through everything.

You might need to spend 3 days in a hotel on your arrival to ensure you can get a Rapid Antigen Test on your second day before you can travel further afield, but at least you can move about and enjoy restaurants and activities in the highly vaccinated areas in
and around your CFC approved hotel. And this is the same for anyone coming in from a partner or “green” country – international visitor or returning Fijian.

Travelling from a non-partner or “red” zone country requires a stay in a managed quarantine facility regardless of whether you are an international visitor or returning Fijian.

This and other travel-related information is covered in Tourism Fiji’s very comprehensive website under the FAQ’s section, to assist potential travellers to understand the new rules around travel.

And just like other countries opening up around the world, there will be challenges with finding accommodation for both managed quarantine as well as holiday options adding to people’s frustrations on trying to get to Fiji earlier, to return to loved ones and to get on with their normal lives.

But we are not “normal” anymore, so we must be aware of the new rules and try to understand why we are reopening more cautiously than larger nations with far better health systems than ours.

There is no room for complacency and more than the usual reasons for getting on board with compliance.

By: Fantasha Lockington – CEO, FHTA (Published in the Fiji Times on 25 November 2021)