Twenty-four women farmers were honoured this week at the National Women in Agriculture Symposium Gala Awards Night, in what the Minister for Women and Children, Sashi Kiran, described as a deliberate step to recast how Fiji recognises the role of women in the country’s food systems and economy.
Officiating at the event, Kiran told guests the awards were intended to acknowledge women not only as producers but as agricultural entrepreneurs, climate responders, food security champions and business leaders. “When women farmers succeed, Fiji succeeds,” she said, adding that increased rural incomes for women lead to poverty reduction and stronger communities. “Tonight we are changing the narrative,” Kiran said, underlining the symbolic as well as practical aims of the ceremony.
The minister linked the awards to national development priorities and the government’s broader strategy for women’s economic participation, citing the Women’s Economic Empowerment National Action Plan 2025–2030 (WEE NAP). The plan, Kiran said, provides a policy framework focused on four pillars—women at work, women in business, women’s financial inclusion, and women’s health and wellbeing—measures she presented as crucial to scaling the impact of individual success stories recognised at the gala.
Organisers said the awards covered multiple categories to reflect the variety of roles women play across agriculture, though specific category winners were not detailed in the event briefing. The night’s emphasis on entrepreneurship and business leadership is consistent with recent government and sector efforts to expand opportunities for women in rural economies—ranging from programmes to broaden access to finance to community-based support networks.
Those initiatives include private and development sector efforts already underway in Fiji. In recent months financial inclusion schemes and lending programmes targeted at women-led enterprises have gained momentum, with local microfinance and development organisations reporting progress in disbursing credit to women entrepreneurs. Officials at the gala framed the awards as part of that ecosystem—highlighting how recognition, training and improved access to markets and finance must work together to convert awards and accolades into sustained economic gains for women and their communities.
The awards ceremony also underscored resilience and climate adaptation as central themes for women farmers, reflecting growing attention to the role of smallholder and rural women in responding to climate pressures while maintaining household food security. By celebrating women whose work spans production, value-adding and market engagement, the event sought to elevate examples of innovation and leadership that policymakers hope to replicate more widely.
As the government moves to implement the WEE NAP and complementary measures, organisers and policymakers signalled that such public recognition will be used to build momentum. The gala offered a platform to showcase individual achievements and to press the case that supporting women in agriculture is integral to Fiji’s wider development objectives.
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