Last month a Samoa Bureau of Statistics report revealed that there were over 40,000 arrivals in the first quarter of 2023 which marks a 21.4 per cent increase.

The visitors including those who were in transit made up the largest component of all arrivals with 33.1 per cent (14,445) recorded for males and 33.0 per cent (14,396) for females. And New Zealand was the leading country, in terms of visitor arrival by country of usual residence, accounting for 46.1 per cent (13,886) of total visitors.

All in all – the data from the bureau confirms that Samoa’s visitor numbers are getting back to pre-COVID-19 levels – which augurs well for the country’s main foreign exchange earner in tourism.

With the tourism sector slowly getting back on its feet, everyone should be doing their bit to assist the industry, which at its peak prior to the 2019 measles epidemic and the COVID-19 pandemic pumped over SAT$300 million into the local economy.

Therefore, an article (Funding for villages’ beautification scrapped) in yesterday’s edition of the Samoa Observer on the scrapping of funding for village-focus beautification programs is a cause for concern. 

According to the article, the Government has scrapped funding support for the national village beautification activities and community-based committees and instead prioritised its SAT$1 million district grant programs. The change in financial assistance is reflected in the 2023/2024 Budget of the Ministry of Women Community and Social Development which was passed recently. According to the budget estimates for this new financial year, the annual allocation of SAT$150,000 for the National Beautification Activities and Awards has been dropped altogether in a major blow to efforts at the village level to get families to beautify their homes and communities.

The Samoa Tourism Authority’s “Keep Samoa Clean” campaign, which was centred around a national beautification competition campaign and run in partnership with the private sector and villages and communities, worked a treat in terms of getting our villages looking beautiful and spick and span. 

This blurb from the STA website on the significance of this campaign, we think, best described the benefits of having such annual funding from the Government:

“Villages across the country over the past few months have been busy with their dedicated clean-up programmes which have involved sprucing up front-yard and road-side gardens, putting up decorations, managing waste and maintaining water sanitation, as they vie to capture the attention of the National Beautification Committee and ultimately national honours.”

So why would a Government pull the plug on a national program that is already having a positive effect on the community in terms of how our villages and communities stay beautiful to continue to impress our overseas visitors and tourists? 

And why would the Government cut the funding altogether when the actual budgetary allocation from the last financial year is just SAT$150,000 which in monetary terms is just a drop in the ocean and wouldn’t directly impact the whole budget?

With Samoa’s visitor numbers on the way up and getting back to pre-COVID-19 pandemic levels, you can be assured that maintaining the national beautification competition would have been the icing on the cake promoting “beautiful Samoa”, especially for a tourism sector that was on life support but is now on the mend.

While we understand the rationale behind the move by the Government to prioritise its popular SAT$1 million district grants program, which gives more financial autonomy powers to the constituencies and their Members of Parliament, there is no guarantee that all districts will earmark funding for their own constituencies’ beautification competitions.

In fact, based on our own coverage of multiple SAT$1 million district grants program launchings over the past 12 months, there has been a big shift to purchasing agriculture tools for farmers. But what guarantee is there that those farming tools actually get to be used for their intended purposes, amid reports of villagers turning up at the hardware outlets in Apia with that equipment, hoping to return them for cash?

As Samoans, we take pride in our villages and the communities we live in, but you can be assured our aiga (families) will work twice as hard and double their efforts to keep their backyards and gardens manicured as an incentive through the national beautification competition.

The national beautification competition complimented the efforts of the STA and the wider tourism industry to enable our visitors and foreign tourists to have a memorable Samoan experience that will keep them coming back. To pull the plug on funding of this national initiative, at this stage of the tourism industry’s rebuild following three years of mayhem, is akin to trampling on the communities’ efforts to contribute to nation-building.