Minister for Economy Aiyaz Sayed-Khaiyum in Parliament [Source: Fiji Government]

More than $230million was directly injected into the economy through various movie productions in the last three years.

Minister for Economy Aiyaz Sayed-Khaiyum highlighted this in parliament today saying $43 million was pumped into the economy in 2016, $94million in 2017 and $97 million last year.

Sayed-Khaiyum says the Income Tax Film Making and Audio Visual Incentives Regulation 2016 stipulates that overseas production houses need to engage local staff.

He adds that recent production of Survivor series had employed 500 locals while a feature film currently being shot in Fiji has employed 100 locals.

“Because of the number of productions have been coming to Fiji some of the locals have actually now become a bit of an expert. So in one of the production, one local crew went to the level of assistant director. So you see if I get into the movie industry as a Fijian and if I go into four or five productions, I develop a particular knowledge base so anybody that is coming to shoot the movie says go to him because he knows the stuff. So that is actually what is happening.”

Opposition MP Mikaele Leawere had questioned about Government plans to train local participant’s story writing, dialogue, and cameramen and stage set up for movies.