Hibiscus Highway: It's All Dressed Up

But There's No One To Go

By a Special Writer in Fiji

The “Hibiscus Highway”, well made and graded, goes out from the Savusavu trading centre and port area, 40 miles eastwards into some of the most attractive agricultural country in Vanua Levu.

THE road was opened in July. It should be a channel for strong developmental enterprise. This drive through a beautiful island should be a tourist’s “must”. The road cost at least £105,000.

A census taken in November showed that an average of 11 cars per day use the road and they mostly are Public Works vehicles engaged on maintenance. The others are trucks which bring, by road, the coastal copra which formerly travelled by sea.

Savusavu has built a deep-water wharf to accommodate big overseas shins and is providing one of th“ safest’ ports “n the South Seas.

The bis firms have built fine new stores g There is a good modem hotel There is an air-strip, and daily' air service with Suva. The Indian traders are coming in. .

With the Hibiscus Highway giving access to a huge area of good, unused land, and with the com-

pletion of the road link with the vast sugar area of Labasa, over the range, expected next year. Savu savu is throbbing with hope and enterprise, .

Could Challenge Lautoka

With its port and its roads and its f er tn e hinterland, Savusavu could challenge Lautoka for the Fiji’s second city. It should already have a growing stream of tourists.

But now it is learned that none of the countless acres opened up by the Highway have been mapped and classified as Native Land Trust Reserves, or delineated for use in any other way. No one knows when an over-all plan of land usage will be brought into operation. That is typical of Fiji’s top planning.

Meanwhile, Savusavu is living on its own fat—and 11 non-productive vehicles solemnly traverse the Hi biscus Highway each day.