Ono-i-Lau, Lau, 18 January 2019. Most of the men in this village are fishermen and this is going to be the first time they will be selling fish as they now have solar freezers as storage units.The new one unit solar freezers handed to villagers of Doi in Ono-i-Lau, Lau will improve their livelihood and generate income for them.The purpose of the solar powered freezer is to provide proper storage for marine commodities which will further boost market availability and access.

Village headman, Mataika Pasi said the villagers who had been suffering for the past two years were excited about the positive prospects of this development."The source of income for our village is through sales of Magimagi and Copra. Now we only sell magimagi because the cyclones that have been hitting Fiji have really affected our coconut supply," Mr Pasi said.

"We are happy that the Ministry of Fisheries is giving us solar freezers because now we can store and fish. Most of the men in this village are fishermen but this is going to be the first time we will be selling fish as we now have solar freezers," Mr Pasi said.

Minister for Fisheries, Semi Koroilavesau said the solar freezers would be for villages that had little or no fresh water. "There will be a total of 40 units of solar freezers that will be distributed to the outer islands that we have identified. For 2019 - 2020 we plan to help the rural areas in anyway we can. We will provide the market for the fish and we will come and pick the fish from the village. We will continue to communicate to see when to come and to do our pick up," Mr Koroilavesau said.

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Source: Fiji Sun