NATIONAL SUSTAINABLE TOURISM FRAMEWORK
We are currently leading the formulation of Fiji’s National Sustainable Tourism Framework, as a successor plan of the Fijian Tourism 2021 strategy.
The 10-year Framework aims to provide a roadmap to revitalize and enhance the Fijian Tourism industry’s competitive positioning and to anticipate the future needs.
The formulation of the Framework is led by a public-private Steering Committee that includes the Ministry of Tourism and Civil Aviation, tourism associations and development partners.
PHASE A – SETTING A STRATEGIC FOUNDATION
This report provides an overview of Phase A of the framework’s development, including background research and outcomes from the first set of stakeholder consultations, and captures the emerging priorities of the industry to be reflected in the final framework.
These priorities were validated by the MTCA, Tourism Fiji and the Fiji Hotel and Tourism Association (FHTA) during an Ideation Workshop in May 2023 as the concluding activity of Phase A.
Phase A therefore provides a summary of the views of the industry to inform and initiate discussions with the public sector and wider tourism stakeholders.
THE NATIONAL SUSTAINABLE TOURISM FRAMEWORK
Based on Phase A, we have launched Fiji’s National Sustainable Tourism Framework 2024–2034 with theme, ‘Navigating Towards Fiji’s Sustainable Tourism Future’.
The NSTF presents the collective vision and goals of the Fijian tourism industry. It outlines the overarching vision of transforming the sector to ensure a sustainable future that has the economic and social wellbeing of our people, our ocean, our environment, and our culture at its heart.
Private Public Dialogues
In addition to various focus group discussions, we have held thirteen public sessions with close to 600 stakeholders. You can view these below.
- Overview: The Here and Now
- Walking the Talk – Private sector sustainability initiatives
- Inclusivity in Tourism : Enabling respectful and equitable workplaces
- Embedding Resilience In Future Tourism Planning
- MSMEs – Financial Challenges and Solutions
- Development Goals and Public Infrastructure
- Tourism as a Preferred Employer
- Greening the Tourism Industry
- Strengthening Tourism Linkages
- Product and Experience Development
- The Growth of Airbnb in Fiji
- Cruise Ship Market
- The Future Opportunities for Tourism Entrepreneurs
Fijian Tourism 2021
The Fijian Tourism 2021 (FT 2021) is a comprehensive development plan prepared by the Fijian Government to grow Fiji’s tourism industry from $1.9 billion in 2017 to an industry worth $2.2 billion by the end of 2021.
The overarching focus of the plan is to maximize tourism yield while achieving a sustainable rate of visitor arrivals growth.
Strategies outlined in the FT 2021 are aligned to the overall vision of the Fijian Government, which is to provide the enabling environment to elevate the tourism sector to provide livelihood, income and to benefit all Fijians.
In summary, the key strategies focus on:
- Building an industry that is resilient, productive and focuses on quality.
- Marketing of the Fijian brand in the traditional markets to explore the untapped potential, and also targeting new and emerging markets of Asia.
- Investments in infrastructure that will lead to investment in the tourism industry.
- Influencing quality investment to grow the industry in a sustainable manner. Provision of the best tourism industry incentives.
- Rolling out business support programmes that will provide tourism businesses (especially micro, small and medium business) with the opportunity to enhance their capability to promote their businesses, taking advantage of international online platforms.
- Capacity building in the tourism industry to enable improvement in standards. We will also target specialised training and address skills shortages in the tourism industry.
- Enhanced coordination between Government Ministries and promotion agencies to, firstly, collectively and better market the place with the Fijian Brand and, secondly, ensure that the benefits from the tourism sector are spread further in the economy.
- Leveraging international events, better targeting benefits to Fiji.
- Finally, ensure the Industry is prepared for climate change, global economic shocks and other risks.
Code of Conduct
The establishment of the Code of Conduct is a strategy in the Fijian Tourism Plan (FT2021) to address the need for higher standards of service for tourism operators, especially when engaging with clients, other businesses and host communities in their daily business operations. The key objectives of the Code of Conduct are to:
- Provide a benchmark in terms of expected ethical conduct of service providers when interacting with visitors, other businesses, host communities, employees and the environment;
- Ensure that Tourism service providers conduct activities in harmony with respect to the laws and regulations of public authorities while maintaining standards;
- Encourage a safe, fair and competitive market; and
- Safeguard the integrity of the tourism industry and the image of Fiji as a tourism destination.