As you travel up Kavanagasau Rd at Sigatoka and turn into the road where the Yalavou Development Project was, the first project farm on your right once belonged to Orisi Cawanika of Raiwaqa, Nadroga.
A farmer of only three years experience, he decided to cultivate the 120-acre idle mataqali land in Nadroga after spending most of his life working in government and other agencies in Suva.
According to a report in The Fiji Times on May 6, 1983, the 54-year-old, believed that working the land was more rewarding than office work, no matter your age.
Orisi was a robust man, with a long moustache and a strong sense of humour which, he said, developed during his five years as a regular soldier in the Royal Fiji Military Forces.
His warm smile and alert eyes were features which reflected his character.
After leaving school in 1944 Orisi had no plans for the future. In 1952 he joined the Public Works Department and became part of the workforce which built what is now called the Sigatoka Valley Rd.
Working with others opened his horizons outside the tranquillity of his quiet little village.
In 1953, he left Sigatoka to join the army in Suva.
He married his wife, Naomi, at the end of 1958 and left the army early in 1959 to join the Marine Department as an ordinary seaman.
Orisi quit again the same year and this time was persuaded to join an army friend in the survey section of the Lands Department.
He worked there for 12 years and resigned after a misunderstanding with his expatriate boss.
He then worked for the Native Lands Trust Board for two years and later rejoined the Marine Department, remaining there until 1976 when he returned to the Lands Department.
His former boss had left Fiji. The year 1979 marked a turning point in Orisi’s life.
He had a home at the Housing Authority Estate at Raiwaqa, Suva, and his son Mitieli had gained admission to Marist Brothers Primary School.
At that time, the giant Yalavou Development Project was being established near his village and this stirred in him an urge to work on the land.
With the help and guidance of the Yalavou farm advisers, Orisi’s farm gradually took shape, with the buildìng of a goat fence and a goat shed.
“I have found this new occupation stimulating, challenging and rewarding,” Orisi said.
“Despite the loss of 18 goats and several acres of cash crops during Tropical Cyclone Oscar, I am confident that a secure and comfortable standard of living is within my grasp in the near future.”
