‘We’re here to connect with the incentive operators in this market and help them to work out arrangements with ground operators, hoteliers and other suppliers in Fiji,’ says Melissa Natawake, business events manager with Tourism Fiji.

‘We’re happy to look at organising site inspections and offering other initiatives to get clients across the line for an event in Fiji.’

The organisation’s trade partnership manager says he received feedback during the DMS workshop that many corporates have returned to Fiji for holidays already and are now set to start organising their incentives and other events.

James Sowane, managing director of Tewaka, says the company sees 2023 as one of consolidation and says incentives and other group events are definitely back on the radar out of New Zealand.

‘As group numbers increase we will need to invest more in fleet – both new vehicles and upgrades. We definitely envisage that for 2024.’

Sowane says training of drivers and other team members is another priority.

‘We need to be conscious of our human resources capacity and of being able to service the market – Covid forgiveness will only be around for a short time.’

He says community ‘give-back’ programmes are becoming a fixture of more corporate events as the market recovers.

‘That is certainly coming back, it is quite a constant now. We are focusing particularly on supporting education in the community with these programmes.’