Savusavu market vendors have welcomed the government's plan to upgrade the municipal market.

Savusavu market vendors have welcomed the government’s plan to upgrade the municipal market.

Vice President of the Savusavu Market Vendors Association, Sofia Nisha, says the upgrade has been a long time coming.

Nisha says it’s been several years now that they keep hearing of the market upgrade project but nothing concentre has been done.

Speaking during the public consultation on the development of the new market, Nisha says they are looking forward to the new market concept as presented by the Savusavu Town Council.

Minister for Local Government, Premila Kumar, says the project was initiated in 2018 when the old market was demolished.

However, she told the vendors, the initial design for the market did not align with the Blue Town model for Savusavu, so they had to change the concept.

“The concept has been cleared, the engineering drawings have been done. We are at the stage of getting the building services drawings done. Once that is complete, we will be calling for tender. And after the analysis of the tender document we are going to award this project to the construction company.”

Kumar says works on the new market could start at the end of next month or early March.

The new market will be a double-story building with the ground floor having 183 vendor stalls, a new ablution block, five kiosk spaces, council office space and storage space.

The top floor will have 39 stalls for small micro-enterprise vendors, a conference and meeting room with a sitting capacity of 128, three food outlets, an open terrace and balcony and it will have an elevator with four staircases.

The Ministry of Local Government is working in partnership with UN WOMEN in delivering the market construction project.