this integrated world, we perish – simple as that. how do we raise the productivity in our export sector? clearly, business as usual is not the answer. we must change how we do things. productivity in the cane fields and the sugar mills are critical to the sugar reform. we must change how we work our agricultural sector. the existing model is clearly not working. our land is fertile. we have the best pawpaw in the world, the tastiest bananas and the sweetest pineapples. but alas we are not even supplying enough of these to our hotels and supermarkets. our oceans are large yet the price of local fish keeps rising. our mahogany forests are mature, yet we are not exporting high valued timber products. obviously, something is seriously wrong and we need to correct that urgently. we talk a lot about the potential of small businesses to raise growth and provide incomes and employment. again, while we continue to talk, we see very little progress in this important area. are we following the right model? where is the bottle neck? lessons are there if you look in the right places and be prepared to accept them. benchmarking is a powerful tool to use. there are lessons abound from our asian neighbours. i am pleased that we have several international speakers with us today and we look forward to the lessons that they will leave with us. ladies and gentlemen, the point that i want to make is this : we should acknowledge and accept the significant role that productivity and competitiveness can play in overcoming many of our economic challenges that we face particularly that of lifting economic growth, attracting investment and supporting exports. more importantly, we need to do something about this now at all levels, micro as well as macro. measurement we know what we want to achieve and that is to raise productivity. we must now measure it. when i pose the question of productivity data, the usual answer i get is that we are working at it. i know that productivity is a complex indicator to measure but we should be taking some indicative measurement now. keep it simple. the crude measure that we use at the bank is calculating the total output per worker. this is obviously a very high level indicator of productivity and has many shortcomings. but for this morning ’ s purpose the broad message is what we want. using this measure, we calculate productivity growth in fiji to average 1 percent over the ten year period from 1996 to 2006. when compared to other countries, we are somewhere

savenaca narube : the economic challenges and lessons to raise fiji ’ s competitiveness presentation by mr savenaca narube, governor of the reserve bank of fiji, to the tpaf ’ s productivity symposium, suva, 5 june 2008. * * * the director general of tpaf, mr. jone usamate ; fellow speakers ; ladies and gentlemen introduction it is that time of the year again where we elevate productivity to the national level for one week. we have held this annual event for some years now. i have been speaking at almost each one of them. but it seems to be the only time of the year that i hear people talking about productivity. and that to me is simply not often enough. this symposium is a wonderful idea. we should continue to engage each other at this level to talk about productivity, share views and reignite our passion for progress. it is essential but unfortunately not sufficient. i have said this many times in the past and i will say it again today that we must make productivity a national vision. the national leaders must get excited about productivity. everyone at whatever level can make a difference on how we do business irrespective of whether you are in the public or the private sector or in between. i have also noted that in past conferences such as this, there is a lot of waiting for government to do something – introduce more incentives, set up committees, appoint think tanks, make laws – you name it – before we can do our own thing. but if i may boldly tell you this morning – this waiting around is a waste of time and money! productivity is one of the few things that we can do something about without any help from anyone. the ball is clearly in our court. economic growth i have been asked to talk on “ the economic challenges and lessons to raise fiji ’ s competitiveness ”. let me start with the economic challenges. there are many. but in my view, our major economic challenge is that the growth rate of our economy is extremely low. i spoke recently at the national micro, small and medium enterprise forum. my message today is no different – we need to raise economic growth. our average growth rate from 2001 to 2007 was 1. 7 percent. the next three years will be no different with a projected average growth rate of below 2 percent. i have said this in the past that with a growth rate this low, we will double the size of our economy in