Pacific Islands look to first zero emissions cargo network by Giles Parkinson

There is talk around the docks of Suva that the real reason for the haphazard observation of shipping timetables may not always be because of some romantic notion of "Pacific time," but something altogether more prosaic: the high cost of diesel.

The scuttlebutt suggests that some island services are so strapped for cash they cannot afford to buy their fuel until enough passengers have paid their fares so the boat’s operators can run around the corner and put in an order.

True or not, there is no doubt that the rising price of diesel is crippling the economics of inner island ferry services and trade, and not just in Fiji. It is also crippling the entire economies of some Pacific nations. As a recent island conference concluded in Malta earlier this month, island governments are spending an average of more than 20 per cent of their GDP on fuel imports. For some smaller nations, they rely on aid to buy their fuel because the cost is greater than their GDP, and fuel for transport is often far greater a cost that fuel for stationary energy.

In Fiji, the cost is high enough to make many of the routes uneconomic and to force the government to subsidise nearly half the cost of fuel for these - a considerable bill for a nation of 300 islands and where ferry and boat links are crucial. Fiji reportedly has a fuel import bill of $1 billion a year, and the Fiji government has announced it is looking for ways to cut that by at least $100 million.