Fijian Competition and Consumer Commission Chief Executive Joel Abraham says that the government will fully subsidize the bus fares for students with blue cards while students with yellow cards will pay the current fare, with the government subsidizing the additional increase.

This comes as the FCCC has concluded its comprehensive bus fare review that was ongoing for the past 12 months and recommended that students fare be the same as adult fares.

Abraham says their recommendation is to only increase student fares and adult fares will remain the same.

“And one of the key outcomes of our review is the implementation of a fair and equitable fair pay seat allocation. This new fare structure will result in the alignment of adult and student fares. For instance, the current fare for stage one in Viti Levu is $1.02 for adults and $0.51 for students, reflecting 50% of adult fare for students.”

Abraham says the comprehensive review was conducted with the active participation of the bus operators where they had to make adjustments to the pricing mechanisms.

Fijian Competition and Consumer Commission Chief Executive Joel Abraham

Abraham says historically, student fares have been subsidized by adult fares through a system of cross-subsidization and student fares were generally lower.

“This also was a result of seat allocation because you could carry more student passengers as opposed to adult passengers in the buses. Effective for first of September 2024, the new fare structure will hit and this will be a pay seat allocation, so where there’s three seats on one side and two seats on one side in buses.”

Abraham further states that buses will not be allowed to overload, so it addresses a major safety concern.

“When we did the calculation, we saw that the fare increase was basically quite substantial. Now, this would have disadvantaged a lot of Fijian families and advantaged a lot of parents and students because it is those in the poor and vulnerable communities that may have had issues affording the new fare structure.”

He says as a result they held a series of meetings with the government to mitigate the financial impact on both parents and students.

Abraham also clarifies that long haul bus operators and those operating in Taveuni represent different markets, and a review of these operators will be conducted in due course.

Meanwhile, Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Professor Biman Prasad has confirmed that the total additional estimated cost for transportation subsidy for students is around $23m for the financial year 2024-25.

The Fiji Bus Operators Association has welcomed the Government’s decision to fully subsidise bus fares for students.

President Richard Lal says for more than 50 years, bus operators have subsidised 50% of student bus fares, something that no other privatised service industry has been expected to do.

Lal says bus operators recognise that any government must work to balance national priorities and aspirations within financial and resource constraints, so this measure is commendable.

The FCCC will commence the next bus fare review process in September 2024.