APO Secretary-General Dr. Santhi Kanoktanaporn (R) and Minster of Employment, Productivity and Industrial Relations Parveen Kumar at the ceremony.

The Asian Productivity Organization (APO) handed over the National Productivity Master Plan to the Ministry of Employment, Productivity and Industrial Relations of Fiji on 13 June 2019. APO Secretary-General Dr. Santhi Kanoktanaporn and Minister of Employment, Productivity and Industrial Relations Parveen Kumar attended the hand-over ceremony as chief guests.

Minister Kumar commented that the National Productivity Master Plan developed in cooperation with the APO under the Specific National Program (SNP) was timely since it would be integrated with and implemented under Fiji’s newly approved budget. The focus of the SNP is tailoring broad-based efforts to meet the current and future needs of individual APO members.

In his remarks, Secretary-General Dr. Santhi stated that the agility-productivity–innovation nexus should form the core of Fiji’s national sustainable productivity initiatives. He emphasized that productivity itself was never enough in a world of constant change and uncertainty, and that the Government of Fiji needed to become resilient to achieve sustainability while meeting its development goals.