SUVA (Fiji) — At the back of the Suva Civic Centre in the commercial and political centre of Fiji, a line of at least 20 people snakes out of a hole-in-the wall, emerging between two huge grey gates onto the footpath outside the arts and entertainment building.

A couple of youngsters huddle together, laughing at something one of the girls in their group had said. In front of them, a few big, burly Fijian men wait in line patiently, shuffling a few steps forward every couple of minutes.

There is no identifying signboard out front to indicate what lay behind the gates. The wind blows. A distinctive aroma of wok-fried meat and spices drifts out.

This is the very nondescript location of Joji’s Chinese takeaway shop, owned by Singaporean Larry Tan, 42.

Mr Tan, who first came to Fiji to work at a garment factory in 1998, belongs to a small group of Singaporeans who have made the South Pacific island their home.

There are only 13 known Singaporeans (excluding their spouses and children) residing and working in Fiji, according to a list maintained by former Anglo-Chinese School teacher Mr S P Chung, who moved to Fiji in 1992. As the group’s unofficial honorary consul, Mr Chung rounds them all up for dinner at least twice a year when Singapore’s High Commissioner to Fiji, Mr Verghese Mathews, visits.

The size of the Singapore community is not static, however, as there may be several who have not registered with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, said Mr Mathews, who puts the number of Singapore individuals with businesses in Fiji at about 20.

The businesses owned by the Singaporeans in Fiji are wide-ranging. Mr Chung, 71, owns a foreign exchange agency with outlets in Abu Dhabi, London, Germany, Indonesia, China, Australia and New Zealand. A sports and golf shop is located within his foreign exchange outlet in Fiji, along with an Internet cafe.

Another Singaporean TODAY met, Mr Chia Yong Seng, moved to Fiji in 1995 and owns Southtex, the garment factory that originally took Joji’s Mr Tan to the island. Nike is one of Southtex’s customers.

The rest of the Singaporean group are in property, fish processing, retail, and auto parts trading.

THE HUB CONNECTION

Fiji is made up of about 333 islands, with less than 900,000 people spread across 18,000sqkm of land, making it about 25 times the size of Singapore. The population is made up of indigenous Fijians, Indians, Chinese, Europeans and South Pacific Islanders. English is one of their three official languages.

On April 5, direct flights started between Fiji and Singapore, opening up huge opportunities for tourism and trade between the two countries. With the twice-weekly flights, about 28,400 people in Singapore will now be able to fly to Fiji each a year. This compares with 649 Singapore visitors who arrived on Fiji’s shores last year.

“Singapore is very important to us strategically speaking,” said Mr Aiyaz Sayed-Khaiyum, Fiji’s Attorney-General and Minister for Finance, Public Enterprises, Civil Service and Communications.

“From a civil aviation perspective, Singapore is a major hub. Changi Airport has a throughput in access of 50 million people and this is going to expand even further. So it is very important for us to have that connectivity with Singapore because it opens up the gateway to South-east Asia. It opens up the gateway also to parts of the Middle East and onwards to Europe.”

Fiji had been trying for seven years internally to establish a direct connection to Singapore before it finally happened in April with national carrier Fiji Airways’ twice-weekly flights. While Fiji recognises the commercial challenges associated with opening up new routes — it took a couple of years before the direct flights to Hong Kong, which began in 2009, became profitable — the government is confident the opportunities this direct link brings will pay off in the long term.

CODESHARING TALKS WITH SINGAPORE AIRLINES

“It opens up Fiji to the rest of the world. One of the sayings we have coined is that once we start flying to Singapore, we’ll be flying to every single continent that rims the Pacific Ocean, except South America,” said Mr Sayed-Khaiyum.

Fiji Airways has been pursuing opportunities to codeshare with Singapore Airlines (SIA), but the negotiations have met with some challenges, revealed Mr Sayed-Khaiyum.

“I understand there’s been tough negotiations and a couple of other airlines are objecting to us codesharing with Singapore. But hopefully that will come through,” he said. “Singapore Airlines does partner with Virgin and Air New Zealand and perhaps that’s where the challenges are coming from, but we don’t know. We believe that Singapore Airlines codesharing with Fiji Airways does not pose a threat to those two partners of theirs. It’s a new route. I don’t think we will be in any way cannibalising any of the existing routes that Singapore Airlines has with Air New Zealand or Virgin.”

When approached for comment, SIA said it conducts regular discussions with various companies, but does “not comment on talks that may or may not be taking place with individual airlines”. SIA added that there are no plans for the carrier to launch flights between Singapore and Fiji at this point.

Meanwhile, Fiji Airways and Jetstar announced on May 26 an interline partnership that will provide seamless, single-ticket air travel from 21 destinations in Asia to Fiji, and onwards in the South Pacific, via Singapore. Customers from both Fiji Airways and Jetstar will be able to book flights and check-through baggage when buying tickets from Fiji Airways’ sales channels, including its website and online travel sites.

EMULATING SINGAPORE

The ties between Singapore and Fiji go back a long way. Singapore and Fiji established diplomatic relations in 1971, and the leaders of both countries meet at regular intervals.

The late Mr Lee Kuan Yew was friends with the late Fijian Prime Minister and President Ratu Sir Kamisese Mara, who is considered the founding father of modern Fiji. In a 1986 speech in Fiji, Mr Lee talked of the “excellent” bilateral relationship between Fiji and Singapore, and of his good fortune in enjoying Mr Mara’s friendship over the years.

After Mr Lee’s death, current Fijian Prime Minister Josaia Voreqe Bainimarama paid tribute to Mr Lee’s vision and commitment to building Singapore into “a nation now envied across the globe” in a condolence message.

Fiji and Singapore share several similarities: Both are island countries, both are former British colonies, and both have had bouts of ethnic and political tensions.

The Fijian government considers Singapore a model for its development: The housing authority is modelled after Singapore’s Housing and Development Board (HDB), as is the Fiji National Provident Fund, whose reform was based on input from Singapore’s Central Provident Fund.

The prison chiefs of the two countries were friends who later both became police commissioners, and that friendship led to Fiji successfully adapting the Singapore-conceived Yellow Ribbon Project for ex-prisoners, said Mr Mathews

“We enjoy warm relations with Fiji … We are not new friends,” added Mr Mathews. “An area of immense bilateral significance is our Singapore Cooperation Programme outreach. More than 1,100 officials from Fiji have participated in various courses including finance, governance, economic development and civil aviation,” he added.

Singapore, too, has in the past, offered airport ground service to Fiji on top of assistance in areas of port development and management, and the Singapore Mediation Centre has conducted courses in mediation for senior legal officers in Fiji.

Going forward, the Fijian government is seeking even more avenues to work with its Singaporean counterparts.

“Singapore is the way we want to be. Unashamedly so,” said a source close to the government.

Mr Sayed-Khaiyum, who travels to Singapore quite frequently, said Fiji is in talks with the housing authorities in Singapore as part of its efforts to increase home ownership.

“Singapore’s leadership is quite visionary in the sense that they started home ownership ... back in the 1960s. So they are way ahead of the game and have mastered the art of providing HDB type of housing, whereas we are playing catch-up ... We’re exploring some options with the commercial arm to see how HDB does things,” said Mr Sayed-Khaiyum.

Singapore’s Land Transport Authority in April also signed a memorandum of understanding with its Fijian counterpart to exchange and share information in the field of transportation and other subjects of common interest between the parties.

Officials from Fiji’s Agriculture Ministry have also met with the Singapore’s Agri-Food and Veterinary Authority to discuss opportunities for Fiji to start exporting fresh and processed agriculture and fisheries commodities to Singapore, the Fiji Sun newspaper reported.

EXPANSION OF FIJI-SINGAPORE TRADE TIES

Bilateral trade between Fiji and Singapore was just under S$250.8 million last year, according to data from International Enterprise Singapore, down 51.8 per cent from about S$520 million in 2014. This was mainly due to a 58.7 per cent decrease in the value of oil exports to Fiji.

Nevertheless, Singapore has remained Fiji’s largest import source market, reaching S$245.6 million last year. Fuel makes up about 90 per cent of all imports from Singapore to Fiji.

While Fiji exports palm oil, coconut, jewellery and mineral water to Singapore, the base is limited and there is potential for this to expand.

There has been a lot of interest from the Fijian manufacturing and agro-processing sectors, said Fiji’s Minister of Industry, Trade and Tourism, Mr Faiyaz Siddiq Koya.

“Singapore is a fantastic market for Fiji because Singapore imports everything. There’s a lot of scope for us to expand our trade ties with Singapore,” said Mr Koya.

One company looking forward to closer ties with Singapore is Golden Ocean, which operates two fresh and frozen processing plants in Fiji. Their business is focused on the export of super frozen sashimi-grade tuna and the processing of fresh and frozen tuna as well as a variety of value-added products produced in the Pacific.

Singapore currently accounts for a very small portion of their business; their biggest export markets are Japan, the US and Europe.

But its managing director Du Xuejun is hoping to change that. Golden Ocean currently exports mainly frozen raw materials to seafood company Far Ocean in Singapore, but said that the direct flights will open up an opportunity for them to export fresh fish not only to Singapore, but to nearby countries including Thailand.

“In the past, we could not send by airfreight because it was too costly ... There are a lot of Chinese people in Singapore. Chinese people like fresh; they do not like frozen,” said Mr Du.

FIJI IS OPEN FOR BUSINESS

Fiji is enjoying strong growth momentum, due to higher investment, robust tourism and strong remittances, supported by an improvement in the terms of trade, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) said in a report earlier this year.

In 2015, Fiji’s economy entered its third year of above 4 per cent annual growth, which also represented the sixth consecutive year of expansion.

Since the return to electoral democracy in 2014, relations with development partners have normalised, further boosting investor and consumer confidence, said the IMF.

“Fiji is open for business,” said Mr Koya. “We haven’t had too much investment from Singapore but we always welcome it.”

Between 2010 and 2015, 12 Singaporean investment projects were registered in Fiji, with investment value at around FJ$250 million (S$163 million). For Singaporean investors and businesses, Fiji could be the gateway for them to access opportunities not only on the island but the entire the Pacific region, which is home to 10 million people.

Pockets of opportunities are present in healthcare, tourism, services and retirement homes.

Fiji, for the most part, does not have very good healthcare; the country bought its first MRI machine only a few years ago and the local residents and foreigners say they have to travel to Australia or New Zealand for advanced medical services. This is a major drawback for people who may want to retire in Fiji but refrain from doing so due to health considerations.

“If either one of us had a heart attack here, there is nobody in Fiji who would be able to do an open heart surgery,” said Mr Sayed-Khaiyum. “We obviously need that to ensure that Fijians have access to first-class medical care. We want the medical facilities and care to increase exponentially in Fiji in a very short period of time because we don’t have full tertiary care,” said Mr Sayed-Khaiyum.

With enhanced medical facilities, Fiji could be an attractive location for the Australians and New Zealanders, who make up just under 70 per cent of their arrivals, to do some elective surgery and recuperate at the same time, said Mr Sayed-Khaiyum.

There is also an opportunity for nursing and retirement homes. Singapore solar-generated equipment designer Grenzone, which completed a nursing home project in the capital city of Suva in 2014, is in the initial stages of negotiations to develop a retirement home for priests, said Mr Johnathan Oh, general manager of Grenzone.

Tourism — which accounts for about 32 per cent of Fiji’s GDP — presents another huge opportunity.

The country was hit by a devastating cyclone in February that reportedly left entire villages flattened and 44 people dead. The damage from Cyclone Winston was widespread, and initial estimates by the Fijian government had estimated the cost of damage at FJ$1 billion.

However, various industries, especially the tourism industry, bounced back faster than expected. In the first quarter of 2016, Fiji received 158,069 visitors, an increase of 10.2 per cent compared to the same period last year.

“We want to also target the tourism sector. It does not mean that we want people to come only as tourists, but they could also be tourism companies that may be interested in investing in this part of the world,” said Mr Sayed-Khaiyum.

“Fiji’s a real melting pot. Businesses that are looking at Fiji for investment should also realise that by having a base in Fiji, it gives them easier access into the other Pacific Island countries. In the long-term too, opportunities into Australia and New Zealand from Fiji are also possible given their proximity to Fiji,” he said.