Damage estimate rises to over U.S. $250 million

One week after hurricane Keith put a licking on the northern third of Belize there is both good and bad news. The good news is that disaster relief is well underway; the bad news is that economic and human losses continue to mount as inland flooding becomes more widespread. On the positive side a team from the Interamerican Development Bank arrived in the country today. The IDB delegation, headed by division four country chief Richard Archie will work closely with the government to put together an emergency financial arrangement for Belize. The team of experts, accompanied by Budget Minister Ralph Fonseca, Yvonne Hyde of Economic Development and Pat Mendoza of the Ministry of Natural Resources, will tour areas of the country affected by the hurricane. On Wednesday Archie and Fonseca will travel to Washington D.C. for a meeting with IDB President Enrique Iglesias to discuss the damage assessment.

As the IDB looks at the situation, more emergency aid continues to come in. Over a million Belize dollars has been received from an assortment of international donors including the IDB, CDB and OAS, as well as the governments of Canada, Taiwan, Italy, Norway and the USA. The official estimate of damage, originally put at U.S. $200 million, has now been revised to over 250 million as reports of damage in rural areas continue to come in.