For more than 20 years, Fiji's sugar industry benefited from European Union sugar policies that were three times the prevailing world market prices. This resulted in sending the wrong market signal to sugar planters and millers, who did not have the incentive to maximize efficiency and productivity. Thus, urgent industry restructuring was needed to reverse continued falling yields, mill recovery rates, and decreasing area devoted to production, resulting in the reduction in Fiji's sugar output. The rural economy also needed to diversify away from sugar and resolve land tenure issues The Alternative Livelihoods Development Project was envisaged to create job opportunities, especially in the sugarcane belt, with the government to handle sugar-processing issues using alternative funds.
This study validates the completion report's assessment of the project, which aimed to protect and improve the standard of living of rural people at risk because of sugar sector restructuring by increasing sustainable livelihoods, on- and off-farm. IED overall assessment: Unsuccessful