Honiara Hotels Getting

Down To Business

From a Honiara correspondent

Honiara has two hotels—one “quality” house, aimed fairly and squarely at the older tourist with money who demands comfort and the businessman, and another “where the action is”.

The second hotel, the Honiara Hotel, offers a standard of accom modation not that far removed from its competitor, the Hotel Mendana, but somehow it does not at present attract much custom. The Mendana’s 30 air-conditioned bedrooms, includ ing some quite old ones in asbestos cement buildings soon to be demo lished, run at capacity, while the Honiara—despite a new wing not long finished—attracts only small custom from visitors looking for ac commodation.

What the Honiara does have is the informal Pacific atmosphere which so many travellers look for, and this includes regular performances at least weekly by the superb Gilbert & Ellice Islands singing and dancing troupes.

One of the two groups, made up of Gilbert & Ellice emigrants to Honiara, may be as large as 60, and their

intensely rhythmic, enthusiastic and

yet professional performances are exciting and moving in the semi-out door beer garden. During the Sep tember visit by the cruise ship, Himalaya, Australians in the audience were moved at the end of a U hours performance to spontaneously rise and sing “For they are jolly good fellows” with almost as much gusto as the entertainers had shown.

This would not happen at the Mendana where there is usually no entertainment. But while the Honiara gets the fun-loving and drinking trade, it’s the Mendana which mints money from the bed trade, so much so that it is planning perhaps within this decade to grow to four times its present size on its beach front site.

The urge to do this has come from new ownership, a public company which is offering Solomon Islanders shares in the hotel enterprise for the first time, and a share in probable future investment in the Solomons.

Firstly, the company is Solomon Islands Investments Limited which has issued a prospectus inviting Solomon

Islanders especially to take up 250,C one-dollar shares. Late in Septemh the company bought half the sha in Mendana Hotels Limited fn Guadalcanal Plains Limited (an vestment company in the Solomc with rural interests, including ri coconuts, cattle and poultry) $200,000. The other half of the shai were already owned by Naviti vestments Limited, the Fiji-ba: company which is the driving s guiding force behind Solomon Islai Investments Limited.

Secondly, the expansion of Mendana is to be in four stag reaching 106 bedrooms.

Stage one is under way now. Thii three new air-conditioned bedroo overlooking Iron Bottom Sound Guadalcanal are being built, ak with the hotel’s swimming pool, at a cost of about $250,000. Fift« “new wing” bedrooms built thi years ago, and offering good tou accommodation, will together w the stage one rooms make a tc of 48, while 15 old rooms behind main block will be demolished.

Stage two which should foil! fairly quickly would see the pres; kitchens, reception area, dining ro« and offices demolished and replac with something done to the terr which is the only drinking pi within the hotel proper.

I Drinking facilities are a test for the new board of seven directors, including five Solomon Islanders, in dealing with a touchy problem. In fact, there is a “public bar”, an old asbestos-cement building on the fringe of the hotel property and barely within shouting distance of reception, and the terrace on the waterfront side. The directors have Agreed that they want to do away with the public bar, and the oc casional problem of pay night fights and brawls with visiting seamen. The problem is, how, without offending local people who would therefore be iirtually excluded from the Mendana.

The board apparently is not quib bling about wanting the Mendana to be a hotel almost exclusively for bests and their guests, although they would like to offer dining in a town not flush with restaurants for those who want it. But the hotel’s licence requires a public bar to be operated.

If the bar were to be shut, a change nver to a restaurant licence, for sxample, would mean the terrace was closed to all but diners or hotel juests.

Memories of its late owner barring Vlelanesians, including a bishop of he Anglican church on one occasion, from entering, because they were native people, are not eradicated, lespite the fact there is no trace of colour bar under the succeeding |wnership and management.

Cooks tourist boom?

I The Cook Islands tourist industry kill “have it made” when Rarotonga’s lew airport is opened towards the md of 1973. Air New Zealand will Irop in on the way to Tahiti in

December, the US has traffic rights, and France has the right to set up a service from Tahiti. It is doubtful if those three carriers will have things all their own way in virtually un touched tourist territory.

As a pipe-opener the Air NZ charter service from Nadi to Raro tonga with HS74Bs, was stepped up to two a week in December.

Tourism in a big way is not going to just happen. Planning has been under way since 1968, with both the NZ and Cook Islands taking an active part. Now there is the Cook Islands Tourist Authority, which will advise the Cook Islands Government.

The main tourist market is ex pected to lie in Australia and New Zealand. If Australian tourists want to go there in big numbers, Qantas will want to come in as a carrier.

The Cook Islands has many of the attractions of Tahiti, but costs should be lower, and for Australians and New Zealanders, there is the added advantage of the English language.

The Cooks group already has a surprisingly big volume of tourist traffic, but this will be “small beer” compared with the boom the airport is likely to bring. One wonders where the crowds will stay—hotel develop ment hasn’t got far yet.

BPs declare

source of earnings

The lead given by W. R. Carpenter Holdings Ltd in breaking down profits to show where they were earned has been followed by Burns Philp and Co Ltd. It was a refreshing move.

While it may be of little more than academic interest to many share

holders who are mainly concerned with the size of the dividend cheque, Islands administrations, already in dependent or about to gain a greater measure of self-government, will keep the information in mind.

Mr J. D, O. Burns, chairman of Burns Philp, told shareholders at the

annual meeting that the New Guinea operations contributed 33 per cent of the latest profit, Islands plantations 4.1 per cent, South Sea group 9.9 per cent and New Hebrides group 7.1 per cent. The remaining 45.9 per cent was from Australia and New Zealand.

Of the Carpenter profit of

$7,049,000, $2.7 million came frc Fiji, Tonga and Western Samoa, $1 million from Papua New Guinea a $2.8 million from Australia. Be companies, without weakening th* holdings in the Pacific Islands, £ increasing their strength in Austral This will make them less depends on the islands.

Mr C. H. V. Carpenter, chairm of W. R. Carpenter Holdings Ltd, s< in his annual report opportunities the Pacific would be available areas continued to develop in li with official policies. Carpente accepted their responsibilities as p: of the developing evolution of the countries. In Fiji - Tonga - Weste Samoa expatriate staff was about per cent, and in Papua New Guin it was 6 per cent.

Carpenters would step up tfi training programmes for local peo] to assume increased responsibility, r only within the company’s operatic; but also in the general economic a community life of their countries.

Both chairmen referred to cc tinued depressed prices for copra, t held out more hope for cocoa, w an appreciable rise in price likely.

Mr Burns said his compan policy of local participation had loi term benefits. But in the short tei it could be expected to reduce t company’s profits in areas where

applied. Increasing taxation was also having an effect on profits from the islands.

The higher taxes was a result of steady moves towards independence in the Pacific Islands and the need for those countries to be more self reliant.

I Throughout the address of each man there was an air of quiet con fidence about the Pacific, of develop ing and growing further with the in

iigenous populations.

Air Pacific asks

For Brisbane

I The Fiji Government has applied >n behalf of Air Pacific for landing ights in Brisbane. The airline hopes o begin a weekly BAC 1-11 jet service between Nadi and Brisbane via loniara in the first quarter of 1973.

If the application is approved, the mice will be the first operated by he regionally-owned airline to a point mtside the Pacific Islands.

Air Pacific envisages a rewarding low of tourists from Brisbane through he Solomons and the New Hebrides 0 Fiji and other countries in its egional network.

Meanwhile, Air Pacific has deferred mtil this year its plan to start a ervice between Tarawa in the Gilberts md Honiara in the Solomons. Air 4auru operates in the area.

Mo wastage of water

: An upgraded nine-hole golf course it the Fijian, the hotel on Yanuca sland on Viti Levu’s Coral Coast, 1 kept green, even in the middle of

the dry, hot summer, by an automatic watering system which uses water already earmarked as waste.

The Harvin Sprinkler irrigation system installed by the Christchurch (NZ) firm of Harding & Vincent Ltd covers the whole course—greens, tees, practice putting green, turf nursery and fairways—and uses treated effluent from the hotel’s sewerage system, a daily potential, with the proposed expansion of the hotel, of 100,000 gallons of water. As part of the oxidisation process of the sewage treatment plant, two reservoirs with a capacity of 1,500,000 gallons have been built by the hotel company.

The golf course irrigation pump station is housed in a chamber in one of the storage reservoirs which cost $20,000 just to line with concrete to prevent seepage.

Cunningham's take

Panduit agency

R. H. Cunningham Pty Ltd, im porters and distributors of electronic components with operations in the South Pacific Islands and Australia, have been appointed exclusive dis tributors for the complete line of wiring components manufactured by the giant Panduit Corporation of Tinley Park in the United States.

Panduit is one of the world’s largest makers of cable ties and clamps used in the electrical, electronic and tele phone industries. Cunninghams, whose headquarters are at Victoria Street, Melbourne, with branches in Sydney, Brisbane and Perth, carry considerable stocks of the components in their bond and free stores. Cata logues, which illustrate and describe

the various components, can be ob tained from Cunninghams at GPO Box 4533, Melbourne.

Business briefs

• The Directors of W. R. Car penter Holdings Limited announce the formation in Papua New Guinea of Arawa Motors Pty Ltd with 30 per cent local equity participation, Arawa Motors Pty Ltd will have an initial paid-up capital of $50,000 of which 30 per cent will be held by Mr Henry Moses of Bougainville Island

on behalf of his people. The balance of the issued capital will be held by Boroko Motors Ltd, a member com pany of the W. R. Carpenter (PNG) Ltd group. • Burns Philp (South Seas) Co Ltd reported a net profit for the year ended June 30 of $825,718, an increase of 2C.7 per cent over the previous year’s figure. A final dividend of 7i per cent per stock unit was de clared, making a total dividend of 12i per cent. • Fiji Industries Ltd, owners of the cement factory at Lami, near

Suva, made a net profit for the y ended June 30, 1972, of compared with a net profit of $139,': the previous year, shareholders w told at the annual meeting in Su The directors recommended a fi dividend of 8 per cent, making total dividend for the year of 15 cent (15c per stock unit), the sa as last year. • New Guinea Goldfields Limits timber operations at Vanimo may closed down if profit-making pot tial is not proved by the end of year. This was reported at the ann meeting in Sydney in Decern when a dividend of 2c per st< unit was declared. The timber ope tion lost $241,505 against a loss $112,582 the previous year. Pro from gold mining increased $94,908 to $151,524 and profits fr trading sections at Wau, Lae, Rab and Madang totalled $313,153, increase of $18,076. • Demka Pty Ltd, exclus marketing organisation in the So Pacific for many manufacturers c exporters, has moved “shop” fr Shell House in Sydney to the Ma National Building, 22 Central Aven Manly, Sydney. According to D. M. Kamerling, founder j governing director, the move was obtain more room to house a lar

staff recruited to cope with Demka’s growing business. There’s another advantage in the move as one of Demka’s English principals dis covered on his first visit to Australia recently. Most attractive route to the new headquarters from the city centre is via the hydrofoil. • For the first time since 1969, Emperor Gold Mines of Vatukoula in Fiji is paying a dividend—sc a share —and looking to a bright profit making 1972-73, shareholders were told at the annual meeting at which director Mr P. A. Browne handed in his resignation after a disagreement with the board over “accounting dis closures and trustee obligations”.

Chairman Mr J. L. Reid said higher gold prices had improved the com pany’s cash position. Only one sub sidiary had not operated profitably and all were budgeted to make a profit next year. • Sunhill Corporation (Australia) Ltd has contracted to buy 2,000,000 tons of nickel ore averaging 2.5 per cent nickel plus cobalt from New Caledonia. The company has bought a smelting complex at Electrona near Hobart. The contract is spread over five years. • Papua New Guinea is consider ing a package deal on rice supplies proposed by Australia’s Rice Growers’

Co-operative Mills Ltd. The co operative wants a monopoly right to the PNG market in return for setting up milling plants in PNG using local labour and offering practical en couragement to an indigenous rice growing industry.

• New Zealand’s Fletcher Timber Company has bought a 51 per cent interest in Fiji’s only gang-nail plant —Gang-Nail Fiji Ltd. Fletcher claims that nearly every hotel or house fitted with a gang-nail truss roof survived unscathed during hurricane Bebe. • New Guinea copra and cocoa growers, Plantation Holdings Ltd, has reported a 24 per cent drop in net profit from $211,423 to $161,330 for the year ended June 30. Dividend is held at 7.5 cents a 50 cent share with a final steady distribution of 3.75 cents a share. • An Australian contractor, Kil patrick Green, in a joint venture, completed nearly $3 million in electrical contracts with completion of the Bougainville copper project.

Kilpatrick Green installed the over head reticulation system at Panguna and the Arawa port area electrical works contract, both under super vision by Bechtel WKE, the project managers. • Site works have begun on the Saipan Continental, initially a 200 room resort hotel on Saipan, for Continental Airlines. The contractors, Swinerton & Walberg Co., expect to have the first stage ready for use early in 1974. A further 100 rooms are to be built later. • In association with the Mel bourne firm of Brighton Investments, Punja and Sons of Lautoka, Fiji’s main sugar town, is building a $60,000 hotel near Nadi Airport. The three-floor, 78-room cement block building with a thatched roof will be completed next July.