The New Zealand Prime Minister has given her assurance that Fiji will continue to welcome tourists from NZ.

Despite the surge and increase in COVID-19 cases reported in New Zealand, Prime Minister Jacinda Arden says the country’s international border will remain open.

She says the country will use other COVID-safe measures to protect its population.

“And so as our borders have reopened, we’ve experienced the shifts in the impact of COVID and variants in a similar way. And so look for those countries who are currently dealing with winter illness. It’s particularly tough and it’s a situation that New Zealand is in. But we’ve already said with the protection of vaccines now our borders are open. We’ll use other mitigations isolation masks and vaccines to continue to protect our population.”

The NZ media reports that COVID cases have jumped, and more than half of them are more infectious new sub-variants.

The Fijian government announced last week that the Bula Boom is back, with tourism expected to rake in more than $1.3 billion in earnings this year.