Sports need $30M

The Fiji National Sports Commission (FNSC) is seeking an increased budget from the $13 million they received in the last fiscal year.

FNSC chief executive officer Peter Mazey said this was to cater for new requests including the funding of Team Fiji to the 2027 Pacific Games in Tahiti.

The establishment of a High Performance Unit (HPU) is also part of the new requests to Government.

“The Commission submission for the new fiscal year from August 2026 – July 2027 included all requests as received from national sports federations and as such was a total of $30m,” Mazey said.

“Apart from the NSO (National Sports Organisations) requests, our new requests included was for disability sports coordinator, operational funding for our new sports ambassador to Europe and France and establishment of the High Performance Unit Phase 1.

“In the current fiscal year we received $13million and are hopeful to receive an additional amount for all of the new requests as well as the two new Commissions sports development offices in Savusavu and Sigatoka.”

While the allocated budget for the next financial year would be announced in Suva next Friday, Mazey is urging NSO’s not to heavily rely on Government for funding.

“All our national sports federations need to look at ways to contribute towards their development plans locally as well as those international events they wish to attend overseas,” he said.

“Our athletes and teams need to qualify for events overseas and attend ranking tournaments only. This will better equip them for world and Olympics events.

“If we can establish the High Performance unit in Fiji, it will mean that our talented and elite athletes will obtain international training and monitoring in Fiji and will not have to travel.”

The National Budget announcement for the 2026/27 fiscal year will be on June 26.

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