26% of Belize's land is under guard across 94 protected areas. These range
from the Cockscomb Basin Wildlife Reserve to the Hol Chan Marine Reserve. In
April of 2003 the Ministry of National Resources chartered a national protected
areas policy and system plan. 20 months later, the final report was presented
to stakeholders this morning. Both Natural Resource Minister Johnny Briceno
and Chief Forest Officer Wilber Sabido say the plan calls for Belize to strike
a balance between conservation and development.
Hon. Johnny Briceno, Minister of Natural Resources
"We are firm believers in the issue, on the principle of sustainable
development. That simply means that we have to balance conservation with nation
building, and we need to make sure that whatever we do, we do it sustainable.
Jules every study that has been done in this country is showing that the country
of Belize will depend on its natural resources for the next forty years. Now
if we accept that as a given, it is incumbent on us, it is our responsibility
to the children of our children, to make the right decisions.
(On) The whole issue about conservation for conservation sake, this plan
is showing that is not the case. When you look at the importance of our protected
areas for tourism, without our protected areas, there would be no tourism industry
in Belize."
Wilber Sabido, Chief Forest Officer
"The plan actually focuses on protected areas management and the establishment
of protected areas, and in essence what it also does is it shows that we also
have to be strategic with respect to the positioning of protected areas where
we need to look at where management is actually currently undergoing and we
have to make decisions with respect to the designation of protected areas and
possibly to a certain extent looking at realignment of protected areas so that
we focus on getting the resources that our analysis have shown need to be protected.
One of the main priorities in the plan, where we need to promote sustainable
development, we need to ensure the wise use of the resources and the plan essentially
points to that. We did extensive analysis to determine whether our protected
areas system as it is, is essentially meeting the needs of the people and one
of the things that we were able to find out is that yes it is."
The report has already been approved by Cabinet.
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