This Fiji Firm Invites The

East To Keep Its Shirt On

When it comes to producing cheap shirts, it’s hard to beat the Japanese and Hongkong textile factories but a firm in Fiji is giving both a run for their money.

THE firm, a division of G. B.

Hari and Co., opened a modern, £50,000 shirt factory in Suva’s Walu Bay industrial area last year, despite the fact that it knew it

would have to compete with the East and the small local tailors pre pared to work long hours for a small return.

Yet the factory is already export ing to other South Pacific territories, and now has its eye on the dollar market in Hawaii.

And it is producing the goods without sacrificing good working conditions, as these photographs show.

The factory workroom is large and airy and well-lit, with colour schemes worked out with the aid of an industrial psychologist. There is a big and modern staff cafeteria.

Staff turnover, as a result, is negligible—and it is drawn from half-a-dozen racial groups.

The company was started 40 years ago by two brothers from India, who opened a tailoring shop m Renwick Road, Suva.

The firm they founded —G. B. Hari and Co.—still has its tailoring division in that shop, but in the last 10 years, under the direction of the founders’ sons, the firm has de veloped greatly.

The company bought (put J. M.

Bartlett Ltd., in the Garrick Build ing, in 1948, and expanded that shirt making business.