When a leading industry collapsed under the weight of Government mismanagement, many were unaware that millions of dollars continued to be raised in its name.
Now a shadow of its once buoyant status, tuna was once the country’s third leading industry, to tourism and sugar.
Four years after Prime Minister Sitiveni Rabuka’s government arrived like a rising tide, the tuna industry is holding out for deliverance.
If his administration announces its plans to rectify the injustice of its predecessor to revive the industry, Rabuka and his Cabinet can all be heroes.
But as it stands, his Government has withheld the tuna stablisation fund.
Designed to assist locally-owned and controlled tuna fishing companies, the funding programme was unaccounted for in the last administration, even as funding specifically for the programme poured in.
If the current administration does not release the funds now, it could be setting itself up as an industry target.
Like the metaphorical leak in the hull – which was the tuna stock depletion owed largely to overfishing by foreign vessels – to a now sunken ship, that is the collapse of the local industry, the country is a long way from salvaging its once renowned tuna industry.
But its worth another fighting chance in the name of what is rightfully Fiji’s very own.
Fiji Fish director, Grahame Southwick said the Government had a right to use its two cents, not the industry’s four cents.
The fund, established in 2014, was the brainchild of Fiji Fish director, Grahame Southwick.
More than a decade ago, he convinced the Cabinet to endorse the fund, which it did.
But the good intentions that founded the programme went to naught, as fishing licenses were misused, in a distribution process that some have likened to handing out of lollies.
“The collapse – owed to mismanagement by fisheries authorities and the non release of the desperately needed TSF – cost thousands of locals jobs, most after 20 to 25 years of loyal service,” Mr Southwick said yesterday.
“There is still as sliver of hope in reviving the industry if the funds are released.”
Not that Mr Southwick needs the money, but for the multitude of locals who want to their jobs back.
Six cents: Government’s Response
Former Fisheries minister Semi Koroilavesau said the funding programme was established as a revolving fund available for Fiji’s tuna private shareholders.
“The source of funds was a levy of US four cents on all foreign flagged fishing vessels that come into Fiji to bunker for fuel and reprovisioned,” Mr Koroilavesau said.
“The six cents were levied for every liter of fuel purchased.
“The split from the six cents was; two cents to the Government as revenue, and four cents was to go to the revolving funds.
“Levy is still being deducted, but funds have not been transferred to the revolving funds.”
But Mr Southwick said, “Of course the Government had the right to use its two cents, but not our four cents”.
Questions sent to the Ministry of Fisheries were unanswered days before this publication.