Fiji’S Population
pp. 38-39 · Read in the full issue
Startling Birth-Rate of Indians
AT the end of 1953, the popula tion of Fiji, officially estimated, was 320,801—an.increase of 8,123 in the year. The community factors which contributed to that 8,123 make the new total very interesting.
Here they are, as on December 31 last:
The Fijian death-rate was 10.60; that of the Indians, 8.12.
Actually, the figures insofar as they refer to Fijians alone are quite good, as compared with other native communities in the South Pacific.
The Fijians’ net annual increase is steady. It is only in comparison with the Indian birth-rate and death-rate that the Fijian com munity becomes overshadowed.
In 1926 there were 12,000 more Fijians than Indians; in 1936 their numbers were about equal; in 1956, there will be at least 20,000 more Indians than Fijians.
Gloomy Population Picture
SUVA, March 1.
WITHIN a few decades, Fiji’s population will have gone past the half-million mark, with the Indian community outnumber ing all the other races combined.
And none has the faintest idea of how everybody then will make a living.
Food production can be increased! by bringing a strictly limited! amount of land into cultivation;; but, after 'that, saturation point! will be reached. In any case thiss will not provide jobs for the swarmsa of children who are already swamp ing the schools.
There has been some talk about! an expansion of secondary indus tries; but whatever can conceivably^
Year’s Births per Community Pop’l’n Increase Thou.
Fijian 139,373 3,496 35.18 Indian 154,803 6,001 46.08 Europ’n 6,500 1,490* Part-Ear. 7,496 198 — Rotumans 3,990 145 48.62 Chinese 3,857 138 — * Decrease.
be done along this line could not solve the employment problem of the fairly near future.
The alternative to a controlled Indian birth-rate as ex-Governor Sir Brian Freeston pointed out in 1949, is a decline in the living standards of a large part of the population.
No great hopes are pinned to the Commission of Inquiry promised by the British Government. At the best, such a Commission can re
commend little more than stop gap measures which would soon be nullified by the birthrate of the largest section of the population.