Environmental fair opens Natural Resources Week

With more than half the country separated into various protected areas, any discussion of development includes potential impact to Belize’s natural resources. That reality is just one item on the agenda of the second annual National Environmental Fair. News Five’s Alyssa Noble has more.

Alyssa Noble, Reporting
The fair is being held to highlight the importance of environmental education in the protection of Belize?s natural resources. According to Ismael Fabro, Chief Executive Officer of the Ministry of Natural Resources, that education isn?t just limited to students.

Ismael Fabro, C.E.O., Min. Natural Resources and Environment
?When we talk about environmental education we talk about education in its broader sense. Education involves both the formal and informal form of education. It?s what U.B. and all the other institutions are doing in terms of ensuring that we build capacity, build capacity within Belize to ensure the proper management of our resources.?

Manning the booth for the Protected Areas Conservation Trust was Arreini Palacio Morgan, Communications Officer for the organisation. She says that the theme of the fair fits right in with PACT?s overall objectives.

Arreini Palacio Morgan, Communications Officer, PACT
?We?re trying to educate the wider audience first of all. We are also working with communities and in terms of trying to get the communities to work with our protected areas in order to start to save our animals, protect our animals, protect our natural resources within those areas.?

And while the environmental effects of economic development have long been debated, Fabro, as well as business leaders, contend that the issues are two sides of the same coin.

Ismael Fabro
?When you talk about agriculture and fisheries, when you talk about energy, when you talk about our bio-diversity, that is what we are stressing, the importance of the linkages that exist between these elements of the environment and our social and economic well being.?

Emile Mena, President, Belize Chamber of Commerce and Industry
?I believe it?s very simple. Without the environment we don?t have business and the private sector knows that and we are aware that it is important for us to sustainably develop the environment. And that?s the key in my opinion for the future of Belize, for tourism, for aquaculture, for practically any industry or business in the country. Without a healthy environment, we can not do business.?

Ismael Fabro
?I would just like to invite everybody to be a part of the protection of our environment. For them to keep in mind that environmental protection is everybody?s business and that everybody has a role to play in the protection of our natural resources and the environment.?

Alyssa Noble, reporting for News Five.

The fair will continue at the Holy Redeemer Parish Hall until this Friday and is part of the official activities comprising Natural Resources and Environment Week.