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Visitors wary of situation |
Fiji's tourism industry says it has been hit hard by the coup, with tourists heeding travel warnings and staying away from the country.
The Fiji Islands Visitors Bureau says hundreds of casual hotel employees have no work because of the high number of holiday cancellations and the shortage of bookings in the first quarter of next year.
The tourism industry directly employs 50,000 Fijians and accounts for a quarter of the country's gross domestic product (GDP).
Tourists also contribute to almost half of Fiji's foreign exchange reserves.
Already occupancy rates at major resorts have dipped to 25 per cent, compared with up approximately 75 per cent at the same time last year.
Australia's Department of Foreign Affairs has issued a strong warning advising against travel to Fiji because of the the threat of unrest associated with last week's coup.
The bureau's chief executive, Bill Gavoka, says the impact of the travel warning has been immediate.
"If you look across the country right now, the occupancies on all our inventories in terms of airline seats and hotel rooms would be around 20, 25 per cent," he said.
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