The 2nd National Millennium Development Report 2010 for Fiji, has identified that poverty is on the rise in the country with over 40 percent of the population living under $37 a week which is under the Basic Need Poverty line and that this number has doubled since 1990. However, like Kilioni Waicula one can fight their way out of poverty, with determination and courage.
Fourteen (14) years ago Kilioni injured his left arm leaving him partially disabled and being able to use only one arm. The 38 year old is married to Anaseini Kaibatiki and they have four children. They live in Kalabu, in Qaranivalu Road, a community which one can call semi urban and where people dwell with a mixture of lean to, wooden and concrete homes with arable pieces of land to plant crops and vegetables some in their backyard or few metres away from their homes. It is also where Kilioni runs his bread business.

Kilioni attended Vishnu Deo Primary School and Laucala Bay Secondary before pursuing his Diploma in Certificate in Civil Engineering in 1990.   Due to his inability to gain regular employment as a result of his partial disability he automatically qualified for allowance under the Department of Social Welfare where he started off with getting $45 a month and this has now increased to $80.
Knowing that life was going to be a struggle with his wife and kids if he were to depend on welfare money, Kilioni decided to do something more about his situation. He wanted to get his family out of poverty and was determined to make a change.

“Keirau qai tekivu vakawati ena 1995 a mai cakacaka tu na neitou Na ena vale ni culacula e Nadawa. Oti ya, mai vaka ni sega soti ni mai sau vinaka, lade sara i Lami ena FPI. A toso vakalailai kina, qai wasea o koya vei ni ratou dau caka madrai tu i liu.Ia na gauna e se cakacaka tiko kina o koya, o au dau werewere wavoki, me rawa kina so na sede me sau ni suka. Au sotava sara vakalevu na dredre ia au sa vosota me vaka ni noqu i tavi meu na qarava.” (When I got married in 1995 my wife used to work at a garment factory and then later on at FPI in Lami. I used to weed around the place in order to get some money. We faced a lot of difficulties then but I knew I had to do something as it was my responsibility as head of the household to provide for my family).

Given the knowledge that his wife acquired from her family in baking bread in a lovo pit (earth oven), Kilioni said he thought about it really well and hard one day and decided to ask his wife about the possibility of venturing into baking and selling home-made bread.

“Keirau cakava e na dua na siga vakarauwai, keirau qai raica nai lavo keirau rawata kina, mai na sau ni dua na macawa koya cakacaka kina o koya mai FPI, e rau sa veiyawaki saraga.”  (So one Saturday we decided to bake bread and found out that what we were able to do in a day was more than what she earned at FPI in a week and there was a vast difference.)

“Na caka madrai qo mai vukei keirau saraga vakalevu, ena kena mai qaravi na nodratou vuli na gone, me vaka na saumi curucuru, na voli ni yaya ni vuli vata kei na i sulu ni vuli” (This bread making business has helped me and my family a lot. Especially in terms of taking care of the needs of my children in school. It has helped me with paying for their school fees and buying things for school as well as uniforms.)

In Fiji, according to the 2nd Millennium Development Report poverty is increasing. The Basic Needs Poverty line is calculated to be 37 Fiji dollars per adult per week and today an estimated 40 percent of the population in Fiji, live below this amount. That is an increase from 25 percent in 1990 and the Government is trying to change this by supporting initiatives like the one of Kilioni and his wife.

“Well for Fiji I reckon that the definition of poverty should be specific to the Fiji context because while in other countries, poverty means hunger, in Fiji people they don’t have money, don’t get hungry, particularly when they are living in the rural areas. That is why poverty is experienced more in the peri-urban areas. People have migrated from the rural to the urban, and they have come in and they are not able to make it and they remain and that really is where poverty is,” the Minister for Women, Social Welfare and Poverty Alleviation, Dr Jiko Luveni said.
The first Millennium Development Goal aims to halve the percentage of people living in poverty from
1990 to 2015. To reach this goal the Government of Fiji needs to get the percentage down from the
current 40 percent to about 10 percent.

“I think that it is expected with increased population. Where the population increase it is more likely that more people are living in poverty. We are now also revving up the family planning programme with the Health Ministry, so that people could plan the number and spacing of their children, to the number that they can afford.
“With the agriculture, they are working with people to engage in agriculture, landowners are being encouraged to utilize their land as a resource for them. This is what the Government is encouraging to do and in providing all the assistance possible to make this happen,” the Minister said.
The Ministry through the Department of Social Welfare has helped and supported Kilioni and his wife, but the initiative to bake and sell bread came from them. In seeing that the couple ventured into supporting themselves with this bread baking business, the Department has now assisted them in the building of their canteen to which they sell items like tinned meat, tuna, fish, cooking oil, sugar, butter, biscuits, milk, bathing soap, washing soap, colgate and even kerosene.

“Yabaki sa oti laki caka tale dua na kerekere, me vaka niu sa cicivaka tiko dua na bisinisi. Kerea ke ratou rawa ni veivuke tale mai kina. Ratou cakava dua na sitoa. Na sitoa ya me i kuri ni bisinisi au sa cakava oti tu.” (Last year, I approached the Social Welfare Department to ask them if they could help me with establishing the canteen which only served in addition to my bread making business.)

In an effort to achieve MDG 1, the Ministry is now working at decentralizing their development projects, giving more assistance to family planning, giving free education for all and also trying to support initiatives by individuals like Kilioni in small and micro-enterprise development in the country which as a result is contributing to the reduction of poverty in Fiji. By undertaking different schemes the Minister believes that Fiji will be in a better position by 2015. 
“With the way that we are going now, we should be able too. But we need the partnership of everybody, the Government, the Civil society organizations, the provincial councils and right down to community level. We all need to have a change of attitude so that we work towards bettering our own livelihoods, our own standards of living, rather than being dependent on what Government can provide for them,” she added.
Kilioni’s message to the people of Fiji : “Ke ko werewere, se ko vaka sitoa, se ko volitaki yaqona, maroroya vinaka me rawa ni vukei iko mai muri kei na nomu matavuvale.” (If you are into weeding or grass cutting, or you have a shop, or you sell yaqona, make sure that you keep at it diligently so that it will help you and your family in future).

-Ends-

MDG 1 sets out by the year 2015 countries must : 1. Halve, between 1990 and 2015, the proportion of people whose income is less than one dollar a day. 2. Achieve full and productive employment and decent work for all, including women and young people 3. Halve, between 1990 and 2015, the proportion of people who suffer from hunger. Fiji is unlikely to achieve this goal. Poverty has increased from around 25 percent in 1990 to around 40 percent in 2008. Given the upward trend in poverty, it is unlikely that Fiji will meet MDG 1 by 2015.

For further information on the MDGs log onto www.undp.org.fj