 I'm Salome from the Center for Inter-K Studies at the University of Fiji. I'm a grandmother. I'm also a retired school teacher. And I've been here at the University of Fiji for the past almost 10 years now. I started here in 2009, and I'm still on the program. It's okay. It's our Fijian word for indigenous people. Hello everyone. My name is Dr. Nandini Prasad. I've been with the University of Fiji for the past four years. This is my fourth year. I started in 2016. And I'm from the second-largest island of Fiji. My mom is from Ibuwa, and my dad is from Nandong. It's actually from one side of the island to the other. And my parents were actually school teachers. So most of our childhood we spent in rural villages. And most of these, we went to some of the schools where me and my brother were the only Indian kids in a school of all indigenous Fijians. So connection-wise, we have a lot of understanding towards the indigenous community. So I think that helped a lot in terms of our bringing up. In our center, we concentrate mostly on three aspects of indigenous studies. The first one is language. Second, we touch on literature. And the third part is our culture. Those are the three main components of what we do every year with the students. We have students here in the western part, in Savani campus. And we also have students in the central division where the students also take the same units. The units are offered semester-wise. And whatever is offered here is also offered in Suwa. We have about more than 400 students in, I think, in both campuses. And our first year group is really, the numbers really increased greatly. From what I know, in 2010, we used to have less than 20. Now in Savani or Lodoka, I have 107, 107. And in Suwa, we have 56 first years. So we find that the programs that we are offering here is attracting more parents to send their children here. Because we find that it's mostly the parents who encourage their children to come and learn what they cannot teach or nurture at home. So we are very thankful that we are part of that upbringing for the indigenous people in Fiji. I'm from the department of management. And we have several programs ranging from diploma in management to degree in management postgraduate masters in the PhD. And in terms of the number of students, we have about, I would say, about in total about 250 to 300 students. And one important thing to note is after their program of BA in ethok management was introduced, and that had a big impact on our numbers too. So our numbers increased since that program was introduced. We've been concentrating on ethoke or indigenous studies and language, English. And we found that the interest of most of ethoke people today is based on business. Because of tourism, since they are landowners and they own the lovely beaches and all these, they are more interested in running business for the people or for the land. And when we started this off, I know I was one of those who started questioning the students. What do you feel if we, if the university asks you to take out ethoke studies or indigenous studies and management? How do you look at that? And they say, we will all come for management because we've had enough of English in schools. We want to take us an area that will help us in life. So, you know, I really am thankful that the program had started because it's a life learning skill for our young ethoke people. Because that's something we lack in our culture. We are not business oriented. We are more to giving and giving and participating rather than accumulating something for the future of the family or the children. So I'm very thankful that with management, when we enroll them, is it English or not? No, no, no, not English. Be it management, any kind of gear. My PhD actually was in based on sustainable marketing of the tourism industry. So that is why I think in a lot of programs, we do not have a bridge between two different disciplines. Like for example, like Madam mentioned, the ethoke way of living is far much different from how the management theories work. So I think it's a very good bridge in terms of if we have resources for the indigenous community to learn how to manage these resources. Not only for now, but how the resource could help them for a long period of time. So, and similar to that program, we have the tourism studies that we are working on that is supposed to start early next year. So here again, we'll see the issue between the environment and management. So for a management student, if somebody graduates in a degree in management and goes back to manage something in the tourism industry, see his point of view is only about efficiently using and maximizing wealth. So for example, as a manager, a student or person will not be concerned that much about the environment. So what we have done actually with our tourism studies program, we have incorporated a few courses from the biology from the science department. One of them is biodiversity and conservation. So what we think is that when a manager knows more about how his decisions might affect the environment, he will be able to make a better decision. So for example, there's a step with the U.N. Environmental Program, which states about the damage that cruise ships do. So they say that when a cruise ship anchors into a hub, it damages half the size of a football pitch and another half when it is drawn up. And for this area to regain to its original state, it takes about 50 years. Now for me as a manager, if I'm only I have a degree in management and if I have the chance of getting more cruise ships into a particular hub, I would say yes because it will bring in more revenue. But when I know things like this, for example, how cruise ships might affect the environment around the hub, I wouldn't make that decision. I'd probably think about having just a few ships that the environment could sustain the damage of. So while we are getting the revenue and the same term, we are also thinking about the environment. So I think that is how management as a department wants to fit in into most of the other in terms of ETOC studies and the indigenous studies and as well as tourism to bridge that gap. We like this idea of having the ETOC or indigenous, these present generations to take management and business studies. Because one thing that the indigenous people value and treasure is the eastern land and how we maintain and sustain the land for our own living. I'd like to mention in particular the fruit trees that we have. Today a lot of ETOC people go for apples and pears whereas so with us and those in the village, we'll go back to planting our own trees and bear lovely fruits like mangoes and so many, there's so many. And with management I find that I know that the students will be encouraged to utilize the land and plant what is near to our hearts and that is maintaining what our elders used to live on. They didn't need money to live. But today because of money, a lot of people, you know, it is brought in a lot of evils, social evils where they've neglected how we should be living, utilizing the land, the sea, the environment as one of our means of food. And I now begin to see that when we go into that we don't manage our own life where we live, but given land and the sea and the environment, a lot of people are dying early. There's so many things associated to that. We have lifestyle diseases coming up because of the food that we go for now are mostly imported. So when this management course came up I said, well, thank you Lord, thank you God. This is a gift from you, you know. Our people now open their eyes, especially the educated ones, and they will surely go back to their land, they go back to their village, to their people and talk to them in encouragement. No, we're not having this. Let's do it this way. And I find that this is a bad time. This thing has come back into the lives of indigenous people where now the parents, most parents are talked to are very happy. They say, you know, now it's worth sending our children to the university because, you know, they will turn to the land and help us bring the land back to its normal state. So that's my comment on this. There's actually a research that was done in, I believe, in Tonga, which stated about how the indigenous business owners and how the Chinese business owners follow the accounting principles and management principles. And obviously the outcome was that those who follow the management and accounting principles are more successful in terms of making more profit. And the outcome was that most of the Chinese business owners were more successful. Now, I think that is very one way of looking at, in terms of perspective, because you see, for the Chinese person, whatever money he has made, well, he's better off in that sense, but in terms of the indigenous business owner, he could be more satisfied than the Chinese business owner. Why? Because probably their values is about sharing, about empathy. And probably instead of making more money, he has helped different people in terms of giving credits or in other ways, in terms of giving donations and stuff. So I don't really think money is always the right judgment to success. In this case, the indigenous business owners could be more satisfied than the Chinese business owners. Especially with us in the center, we can sort of see and visage the loss of erosion, maybe, which is happening now, of what we hold close to our hearts, especially the behavior. We feel the loss of respect and this interrelationship between the family members. We believe in communal living. We don't believe in nuclear families. So from the indigenous perspective is that we all have only one life. And so to enjoy the life, we enjoy our relatives, share, care. And we believe, too, we are very conscious of the values of religion that the more we give, the more we'll get. And so I give to my relatives. I know my relatives when I'm sick, the house will be full. And it gives me complete satisfaction or peace of mind that people care, not care for each other. And that's our thing. What we are now looking at, the university plus the nature of education, to bring culture more strongly to the younger generation from the six-year-old right up to the university level. And I believe that that will solve that fear of loss that we may completely and totally not use there. For food, I don't think the fear of eating more exported food than our own. Because we now, maybe because of management, people are now fully aware that if I want to eat fish, I go out and catch my fish rather than taking money to the market and buy. And I find that the fear of the loss of our culture had been in our minds for the past few years. But I can say today we know, we'll manage to have everything back in the way our relatives, our forefathers had lived. Togetherness, unity, and love is the one that binds, is the, you know, the core that binds people together. If I don't, if I see him coming and I'm eating, even though it's a large piece of chicken, I'll go out, my kana, come and have something with me. And if he does come, I will give that. It's a belief that one day I will be in want and this young boy will help me. So that's a kind of culture because it's a mental, you know, kind of thinking that we have. That if I show my love and concern for you one day before I go down in the group, you know, this is a reciprocal. So that's what I say. That was the fear. And the other one is the language. Because of media, because of the TV, our younger generation, they love the show of the English. But to us, it's a sign of disrespect, you know, to be speaking in English when we have a communal gathering and people will pass comments. What is, you know, arrogant little one speaking in English when he having a function. So it's that kind of thinking that I know we have to try and manage the loss of our language. I don't think we will come to that. We'll never. Yeah, actually, I agree with that sentiment. I remember I was in class five and six. So my parents teach on one side of the river and we had to cross the swimming bridge to go to the school on the other side. And we actually had to cross a village to go to our school. And, you know, when me and my daughter used to come back, we would have about 10 to 15 houses in the villages that we would cross to come to the bridge. And, you know, at any point in time, if they're having tea, so they'd call us over to have tea. If they're having lunch, they'd call us over for lunch, you know. So in terms of the value system, I think the indigenous community is very strong, like she's mentioned about communism. And I think that's very important. And I think the role of management there is not actually to manage the values because personally for me, we respect how they operate in terms of their value system. But in terms of management, we could probably contribute in terms of resources, like how they could probably manage these resources in a better way.