Josefa Sigavolavola 
The widespread use of combustible building materials is contributing to the high number of homes being destroyed by fire across Fiji, says Puamau Sowane.
The National Fire Authority Chief Executive says residential properties account for 96 per cent of the 140 structures destroyed by fire between 2023 and 2026.
Sowane says many homes are burning down before firefighters have sufficient time to contain the blaze because they are not built with fire-rated materials.
“Around the world, they normally use fire-rated materials to construct their homes. That fire-rated material always gives one hour, two hours of fire resistance to enable our firefighters to move from their station to wherever the fire incident is.”
He explained fire-rated materials provide valuable time for occupants to escape and for firefighters to respond effectively.
Sowane added that many homes in Fiji are constructed using combustible materials that allow fires to spread rapidly.
“Unfortunately, we use materials that are combustible materials without any percentage of fire-rated material. It burns down very quickly and doesn’t give enough time for people to react. The homes that don’t have fire-rated materials burn very fast. That is the reason why we always come in very late.”
He further says that despite the NFA reducing its response time to five minutes, the speed at which these homes burn remains a major challenge in preventing total property losses.
