Caption: Newly built Production facility at TUVU for FRIENDS’s Fiji.
BY ASHTOSH SINGH
Working towards poverty alleviation in the most under- served communities of Fiji and providing eleven years of service to grow living of people from its first office on 29th August 2002 at Naviti Street, Lautoka, the hard working team has never looked back.
FRIEND announced the official opening of FRIEND’s new Production Facility funded by the European Union on the occasion of FRIEND’s 11th birth anniversary celebrations.
The opening of the production facility named “Sue Ni Vakhatokho” was held on Thursday, 2013 as part of official celebrations to commemorate FRIEND’s 11th Birth Anniversary.
Work on the production facility was initiated following severe damage to FRIEND Headquarters in Tuvu in the wake of Tropical Cyclone Evan on 17 December 2012 using contingency funds from the EU GROW project. Upon request more funds were made available from the EU for the production facility.
The main administrative office building that also housed the production space for food products supporting poverty alleviation initiatives of communities sustained severe damage while two newly built supporting structures on site, a 200 seating capacity training facility, Natatadra Bure and a card/craft workshop, Deacon House were totally destroyed.
Meanwhile, despite the damage and challenges faced by the organization in picking up pieces FRIEND has been working hard to ensure the communities continue to be served from the donor funds as per contracts.