SOLOMON Islands is to feature in a global promotion which will appear in Forbes, regarded as the world’s leading business magazine in the world later this year.
Journalists Sheila O’Callaghan and Christopher French of the Magazine’s London Bureau last week interviewed Prime Minister Manasseh Sogavare in Honiara.
They also interviewed Finance Minister, Snyder Rini as well as National Planning and Aid Coordination Minister Danny Philip.
To highlight the Democratic Coalition for Change (DCC) Government’s proposed tax-free economic zones and the nation’s untapped tourism potential, Forbes also interviewed the Minister for Commerce, Industries, Labour and Immigration, William Bradford Marau and the Minister for Culture and Tourism, Bartholomew Parapolo.
It is the first time, Forbes, with an unparalled distribution network and readership, has interviewed a Solomon Islands Prime Minister.
It has, for example almost seven (7) million readers throughout the world, who collectively manage USD15 trillion in capital investments.
It is undoubtedly the powerbase of global wealth.
This audience is always looking for new opportunities in business and travel.
It publishes simultaneously in London and New York.
The glossy Magazine which publishes fortnightly has an over-riding principle that business and the free flow of capital (money), both intellectual and economic, is in the interest of the world.
Solomon Islands was included on the list of three Pacific Island countries being interviewed by Forbes. Our rich natural resources, hitherto untold, will soon be exposed to the world’s rich and famous and the top-end investors later this year.
Tonga and Vanuatu are the other two countries on Forbes’s South Pacific interview rounds this year.
Solomon Islands was chosen alongside Tonga and Vanuatu to represent the South Pacific for Small Island Developing States and to show what these vibrant and often ignored countries have much to offer the rest of the world.
It is also to show the issues the small island states deal with when it comes to climate change and the need to be addressed as much of adverse effects of climate change, which is not of their own making.
Forbes’ feature of Solomon Islands is intended to attract attention towards the current administration under Prime Minister Sogavare and plans by his Democratic Coalition for Change (DCC) Government for reform and change.
It is hoped that this effort would help show donors and investors alike that the country is on the right direction to diversify and expand its economy.
It is also hoped to demonstrate that the days of unrest are behind as the Government look to land reform and rural development to advance the lives of all Solomon Islanders.
– By ALFRED SASAKO
