The Asian Development Bank has approved a US$50 million soft loan to support an overhaul of Fiji’s health system as part of the regional Pacific Healthy Islands Transformation Project (PHIT), officials announced on Friday. The loan forms part of a US$181.94 million financing package earmarked for the Fiji component of PHIT and marks the first project in the Pacific to be co-financed under the Full Mutual Reliance Framework (FMRF) between the ADB and the World Bank.
“This project is groundbreaking, as it enables ADB and the World Bank to efficiently combine financing and expertise to deliver long-term regional health resilience,” Azusa Sato, ADB’s regional director for the Pacific Subregional Office, said in a statement. Sato highlighted that the funding will help modernise primary care, boost digital connectivity and strengthen Fiji’s regional referral capacity, reinforcing the country’s role as a Pacific health hub for training and specialist services.
ADB said PHIT is aligned with Fiji’s Digital Health Strategy 2023–2027 and will enable real-time digital clinical support for frontline health workers. Upgrades to health information systems are expected to improve coordinated diagnostics and patient management across facilities, paving the way for more integrated care and faster access to specialist consultation within the region.
A significant portion of the Fiji financing will support capital works and capacity-building at the Colonial War Memorial (CWM) Hospital in Suva. The project will finance the first phase of a new regional referral hospital and training facility at CWM, including a Radiotherapy Centre, modern medical equipment and expanded training capacity, the ADB said. The World Bank has previously indicated that US$70 million of PHIT funds will be directed toward investments at CWM, including rehabilitation of existing buildings in line with a Priority Infrastructure Plan developed with government and development partners.
The ADB loan is the latest development in a project that was launched jointly by the ADB and the World Bank in Manila in December, when the institutions announced a total PHIT financing package of US$239.5 million for multiple Pacific islands. At that time the World Bank, acting as lead agency, confirmed about US$181.9 million of the total would be allocated to Fiji and the remainder to other participating Pacific nations. The FMRF, established early last year, was designed to let the two multilateral development banks pool resources and technical know-how on key regional operations — PHIT is the first to be co-financed under that arrangement.
ADB’s approval of the US$50 million soft loan clears a key step toward disbursement and implementation of the Fiji component, with officials saying the combined financing will support both infrastructure and digital transformation across primary and tertiary care. The move is intended to bolster health system resilience and training capacity in Fiji, which serves as a referral centre for many smaller Pacific island states and territories.
Both institutions have emphasised coordination with the Fijian government and other development partners as PHIT moves from planning to execution, with priorities including strengthening primary health services, upgrading clinical information networks and expanding specialist and training services at CWM.
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