14.1% GDP growth expected next year depending on visitor arrivals- RBF Governor

Governor of the Reseve Bank of Fiji Ariff Ali says GDP growth is expected to be about 14.1 percent on an assumption that visitor arrivals for next year will be 50 percent of the visitor arrivals in 2019.

There were around 900,000 visitor arrivals in 2019.

While speaking at the Fiji Commerce and Employers Federation Symposium, Ali said as at today visitor arrivals are down by 84 percent.

Ali says so far this year all the indicators are negative, sectoral performances are all weak, consumption is down and private sector growth is significantly low.

He says inflation is now -3.5 percent and one of the major contributors of this is the price of kava while the other factor is oil prices.

Ali says foreign reserves currently stand at $2.1 billion and it is expected to be $2.2 billion as government will be drawing down almost $100 million early next month.

He also says that there is no question of devaluation because they have more than enough reserves to purchase almost 8 months of imports.