Basic Characteristics of Small Island Economies in the South Pacific : A Case Study of Fiji

The small island economies of the South Pacific share several basic problem due to their size and isolation. Many of these problem are multiplied bacause of the small land masses, lack of basic mineral and industrial raw materials, distances from major metropolitan markets, small domestic markets, diseconomies of scale in production and so on. Taking into account the basic characteristice of the small isolated island economies of the South Pacific such as maintaining traditional communal structures and a subsistence lifestyle together with varying degrees of industrial progress, the present study therefore does not rely solely on modern economic theoretical methodology for analysis of the structure of island economies and fishries, but adopts a wider prespective using the classical tools and principles of economic and social progress. In this study, the general economics of the island societies have been analysed from the industrial development point of view, concentrating not only in areas of capitalistic and entreprenual development but also pointing out the presence of opposite relations of the backward characteristics which are existing alongside with this modernised economic system