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By Michael J. Field

AUCKLAND, New Zealand (October 31, 1997 - Agence France Presse)--- Tuvalu is to sell passports and expects to be making around 7.3 million U.S. dollars annually within two years, the country's Prime Minister Bikenibeu Paeniu says.

His move comes after the Polynesian nation earlier this year called a halt to a controversial revenue earner -- a worldwide telephone sex line service.

That business, which utilized Tuvalu's "688" area code, was earning about 10 percent of the country's government budget but after strong moral objections from the local churches Tuvalu is ending the operation.

Tuvalu joins Kiribati, the Marshall Islands, Samoa and Tonga, which have all dabbled in the passport business.

Paeniu told the latest edition of the Canberra based Pacific Report that a Tuvalu passport would sell for 11,000 U.S. dollars per person, or 22,000 U.S. dollars per family.

He said they had talked for many years about the business...

PAGO PAGO, American Samoa (November 1, 1997 - Samoa News)---Two local investors are interested in setting up food processing plants in American Samoa.

One of the investors wants to establish a seafood processing facility, specializing in dried and smoked marine products, while the other plans development of a sausage making plant.

Research conducted by the Department of Commerce found that there is a ready and large multi-million dollar export market in the region for both products and has asked both investors, who are American Samoans, to submit business plans. The agency then will help both entrepreneurs obtain appropriate government assistance to help establish the necessary processing facilities.

"The proposed new industries are part of the government's renewed effort to provide new employment and boost small business development in American Samoa," said the Economic Development Practitioner with the Department of Commerce, Rene Clemens. "We want to help...

NUKU'ALOFA, Tonga (November 2, 1997 - PACNEWS)---The first shipment of squash pumpkin from Tonga this season , totaling 1,600 tons from three export companies, left the kingdom for Japan Wednesday aboard the MV Atlanta.

A spokesman for the Ministry of Labour, Commerce and Industries, Sione Vailanu, says the initial target of 2,000 tons for the MV Atlanta could not be fulfilled, and bad weather is partially to blame.

Meanwhile, a second vessel, the MV Evans, was scheduled to leave for Japan during the weekend with squash pumpkin shipments from four companies.

Prices paid the exporters ranged from 31 to 42 U.S. cents a kilogram.

TARAWA, Kiribati (November 2, 1997 - PACNEWS)---The people of Kiribati's remote and once phosphate-rich Banaba Island --also known as Ocean Island-- are now having to walk the very rugged and hilly island landscape to get water.

Last week, the truck used for delivering fresh water from catchments to the doorsteps of homes --Banaba's only water truck-- was set on fire.

No one has been charged in the incident, Radio Kiribati reports, but there has been an outcry from the small but scattered Banaba Island population. Water is scarce and the islanders depends only on rainwater stored in large water catchments around the island.

Formerly a supplier of phosphate to world markets, Banaba's mining operations closed in 1979 when the easily available supply ran out.