Board of Directors

Hari Punja, OBE, OF, is the Chairman of FMF and of its promoter group, Hari Punja & Sons Ltd. Recognized as an extremely successful and influential business and community leader in the South Pacific region, including Australia, New Zealand and the Pacific islands, Mr Punja has served on many Government Boards, including the Senate of Fiji, the Fiji Sugar Corporation and Air Pacific. He has also served as a Mayor of Lautoka City. He was awarded the Order of the British Empire (OBE) in 1977 and the Order of Fiji (OF) in 1998.

Prof Brij Lal of the Australian National University named Mr. Hari Punja one of the 10 most successful Indian businessmen in the world living outside India, in “The Encyclopedia of the Indian Diaspora, 2006”.

He was voted the 6th most influential person in the Pacific Region in an independent poll carried out by the Hawaiian based “Pacific Magazine”.

He also received recognition by the Fiji National Millennium Committee for his contribution in “Shaping the Nation of Fiji during the 20th Century.”

His hard work and an unflinching commitment to excel in every endeavour has seen the Hari Punja Group of Companies grow from strength to strength, successfully adding new business lines while contributing significantly to the Fiji economy.

Mr Punja, resides in Suva with his wife Tara and they have three sons and two daughters who are also an integral part of the business today.

Mr. Rohit Punja is an energetic and long time member of our board. Born in Lautoka, he moved to Suva in 1985 to take up a position as Training Miller at FMF. He was also educated in Tasmania and India, during which he spent six months in Sri Lanka doing work training in Tea Tasting and Tea Grading. He is a very keen boat enthusiast, having picked up the passion with his first boat as a boy. An achievement that gives Rohit much pride was winning the Prestigious Suva - Levuka Launch Race. When he is not boating, Rohit plays golf and participates in amateur golf championships around the globe or takes rides on his motorbike with his wife. He is currently the General Manager and Director for Hari Punja and Sons Ltd. He is married to Patricia with whom he has two daughters, Tia and Deepa Punja, both at University in New Zealand.

Mr Gary Callaghan has been a non-executive Director of the Company since January 1992.

Mr. Callaghan has vast experience and an impressive track record in the corporate sector, including his work with the Insurance broking firm Marsh, where he held senior positions in their New Zealand and Pacific Island businesses and as former Executive Director of the Dominion Group which owns and operates very successful companies in the Insurance and Financial Services sector.

He is a Fellow of the Australian Insurance Institute and Associate in Risk Management and Loss Control of the Insurance Institute of America.

Gary is also a Director of a number of other companies including Rice Company of Fiji Ltd, Atlantic and Pacific Packaging Ltd, Data Bureau Limited, Insoft International Limited and OCIS Limited.

Mr Pramesh Sharma is a non-executive Director of the Company. He was appointed to the Board in February 2010.

He is also General Manager-Investments with BSP Life. Pramesh has rich experience in the corporate sector, having worked previously with organizations such as the Merchant Bank of Fiji and Westpac Banking Corporation in very senior roles.

Mr Sharma is also a Director of The Rice Company of Fiji Ltd and Atlantic and Pacific Packaging Company Ltd.

Ram Bajekal is our Managing Director, leading a team of enthusiastic "FMFers" determined to make the company "the most admired in the region".

Ram is a Chartered Accountant from India and a Fulbright Fellow in Management Studies from the Tepper School of Business, Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, USA. He has spent most of his working life in India with diverse organizations such as PricewaterhouseCoopers, Hindusthan Photo Films, Unilever Group and the Murugappa Group; in Fiji he has worked previously with the Carpenters Group. After 25 years of what he calls corporate sector 'rat race', Ram took a three-year sabbatical to work in rural India with Traidcraft Exchange, a UK based NGO imparting business skills to low-income communities engaged in micro-enterprise. A large part of his work involved capacity building among farmer groups to help them get a fair deal in the value chain. He says he thoroughly enjoyed the stint for its positive impact on people - "and the fact that I didn’t have to wear a business suit !". He says it was only his fondness for Fiji and the life-work balance it provides that allowed him to return to the corporate world.

His goal is to progressively make hierarchy irrelevant at FMF, insisting it is people that are important, not their official positions. The greatest challenge of his job he says, is taking decisions that may adversely affect some people but are necessary for the greater good.

Job stress seldom troubles him because he gives it "only as much seriousness as it deserves in the wheel of life”. It also helps that he plays sports (hockey, cricket, golf & badminton), listens to traditional jazz and Indian classical music and reads non-fiction books.

He speaks eight languages – and now knows most, nay, all Fijian swear words.

He hopes to succeed in his dream of building an institution where every single individual feels a sense of worth, a sense of belonging and a sense of achievement.