Returned Worker Success | Tailevu, Fiji

Spending four years away from his family in Australia while working on the Pacific Australia Labour Mobility (PALM) scheme wasn’t easy for Peni, but it was a sacrifice that changed everything. Before leaving Fiji, Peni, his wife and their five children were living in a small house and often had to move during cyclone season. Sitting together each afternoon for prayer, he made a promise. “I told them the first thing I wanted to do was build a house so no one would have to move again.” Working long days in a meat processing facility in New South Wales, Peni stayed focused on that goal and achieved it within a year. “When the building materials arrived, I spent half the day crying. If I had stayed in Fiji, I would never have achieved that,” he says. Today, his family is living in a safe home in his village Nakoroivau in the province of Tailevu, and with further savings he has bought a boat and started a fishing and diving business, creating a more stable income. “Before, I struggled to provide for my family. Now, with the help of God and a little sacrifice, life is easier.”