Results for Pacific Islands

Following the Fiji Government's sudden arrest and deportation of Vice-Chancellor of the University of the South Pacific Professor Pal Ahluwalia, the USP Council on Friday, appointed Tonga’s Dr Masasso Paunga as interim Acting Vice-Chancellor. Tonga’s USP representatives are part of sub-committee looking into the deportation issues.

Tonga has opted out of New Zealand’s new seasonal workers scheme this year, due to not being able to meet certain criteria including a guaranteed return flight home at the end of the season.

152 seasonal workers left Tonga on a chartered flight for Tasmania in Australia this afternoon, January 22.

Air New Zealand has announced the start of services from Rarotonga, Cook Islands, to New Zealand after the recent announcement of a one-way quarantine-free travel route, stating “this is the first step of the phased approach to two-way quarantine-free travel between the two nations.”

An estimated 161 babies will be born in the Pacific islands* on New Year’s Day, according to UNICEF. As the calendar turns to 2021, UNICEF is again celebrating the new lives being brought into the world on January 1. Samoa, in the Pacific, will welcome 2021’s first baby. Niue, its last. Regionally, the highest number of births are estimated to take place in three countries: Solomon Islands (53), Fiji (45), and Vanuatu (22). Statistically, Tonga expects six New Year babies, who may expect to live to the age of 80 years.

A Fiji $2 million grant to help Fiji recover from the devastating impact of Cyclone Yasa was dispatched by the Asian Development Bank on 24 December. Damage assessments indicated that about 93,000 people, or 10% of the population were directly affected.

Digicel, the largest mobile business in the Western Pacific, owned by the Irish billionaire Denis O’Brien, “is being crawled over by buyers who see an opportunity to buy the key infrastructure, which is suffering from high debt levels and weak earnings because of the pandemic”, reported the Australian Financial Review on 18 December.

Key management measures were rolled over to secure the tuna fishery for the coming year, said Pacific Island Forum Fisheries Agency (FFA) Director General, Dr Manu Tupou-Roosen. This was after a virtual meeting of the Western and Central Pacific Fisheries Commission (WCPFC) last week.

The New Zealand Government will purchase COVID-19 vaccines from pharmaceutical companies AstraZeneca and Novavax, meaning every New Zealander will be able to be vaccinated, Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern announced today. “We have secured more than enough doses to cover our entire population plus the Pacific,” she said. Vaccinations for the public are on track to start in mid-2021.