Friends of Nature receive both money and criticism
Not all the funding to preserve the nation’s world-class natural attractions comes from abroad. Thanks to our own PACT, the world’s biggest fish will be able to call Belize home for a long time to come.
It was not the right time of the year, but still we scanned the surface of the deep blue, searching for some sign of the Whale Shark.
The sharks have been sighted in these waters for generations and their scheduled visits to southern Belize have been pinpointed between the months of March and June, especially around a full moon.
Janelle Chanona, Reporting
“The experts estimate that more than a hundred whale sharks have passed through the Gladden Split Marine Reserve, an in their wake come thousands of tourists to swim with the gentle giants. Now it’s up to local environmental groups to ensure that the attraction and the animals will be around for decades to come.”
To date, the number of whales sighted have increased every year, emphasizing the need for improved management.
Recognizing the urgency involved, the Protected Areas Conservation Trust, in one of its largest grants ever, presented Friends of Nature–an environmental group based in Placencia–a check for over two hundred thousand Belize dollars.
Friends of Nature co-manages Gladden Split, Little Water Caye, and Laughing Bird Caye with the Government of Belize. According to Executive Director Lindsay Garbutt, in addition to using the funds for data collection on fish spawning and aggregation and boundary demarcation, the money will go toward projects to make sure the communities the organisation represents see sustainable and tangible benefits from conservation practices.
Lindsay Garbutt, Executive Director, Friends of Nature
“We are building on a history. I think what we did last year through a grant from the Global Environmental Facility when we trained in excess of twenty-three youths, some of them from scratch, to become certified PADI dive masters. And some of the economic benefits that they have already seen from that has certainly sold projects of this sort… I think it shows the community that Friends of Nature really is looking out on their behalf and I think it’s something that they have recognized.”
As part of a new wave of PACT donations, more than thirty thousand dollars was also disbursed to the Belize Fishermen Cooperative Association to promote similar thinking.
Vincent Gillett, Executive Dir., Bz. Fisherman Cooperative
“For us it is important that fisherman have fish that they can fish for as long as possible, and clearly that means sustainable use of our fish resources. So the training programmes that are being organised are in fact going to provide them with the information about that sustainability programme, what it means, what it means to us as managers, what it means to them as fishers so that they can more readily appreciate what fisheries management is trying to do in terms of managing fisheries resources.”
Valdemar Andrade, Chairperson, PACT
“I think we have gotten a lot of support so far from the fisher folk, but they also need to see results and so basically we are laying the foundation for them understanding what is happening with these marine protected areas, but also how are they going to benefit. Because a lot of it boils down to actually how that money is going to be put on the table other than the fishing they had been doing, which is something that is very much in decline and we have to be careful on how we manage it so we do have to look at alternatives whether it’s deep sea fishing, fly fishing.”
But just recently, “alternative” income methods have brought heavy fire to at least one local environmental group.
In January, the laid back fishing village of Placencia rose up in anger after word got out that Friends of Nature, the same organisation blessed with the PACT grant, was in discussion with a US-based organisation to sell at least one whale shark for approximately a million dollars. Executive Director Garbutt was quick to defend his group’s position.
Lindsay Garbutt
“Obviously we could not take an issue to the community that we ourselves had not done some research on. We did a research, we waited until a formal proposal came in because evidently we would not discuss something that was not formally proposed, and then we thought about taking it to the community. Maybe in the end what is best happened, that the entire proposal has been withdrawn, but Friends of Nature takes seriously its commitment to having the community people decide on which way its resources should be used.”
Valdemar Andrade
“I have no doubt that these offers will come our way. I think we have to again, do due diligence with those and look at the pros and cons of whatever offer comes our way. We do know that there are certain communities in certain countries that are interested in certain species, but we ourselves have to know what good it will do for us, will it bring in resources that we don’t have, but also what kind of image will it create for us that we already have a conservation image out there, we have to be careful of what image it would create.”
Friends of Nature maintain that the offer would have included positive and negative consequences. But based on the havoc this first proposal created, it is doubtful the attitude towards selling the sharks will change soon.
Janelle Chanona
“If another proposal is brought forward, will you go through the same type of process again?”
Lindsay Garbutt
“It’s the only process that validates our belief that in reality we can only be an organisation, a serious organisation, a credible organisation if the community decides. I mean the areas we manage were declared because the community wanted them declared as protected areas, so that’s the only way we can go.”
