Biggest cruise ship ever drops anchor in Belize
Cruise tourism is growing. I mean really growing. And if you don’t trust the statistics, a stroll through the Fort George area of Belize City on almost any given weekday will convince you. Today, local media houses were treated to a tour of the latest–and largest–member of the expanding fleet now calling on Belize. And while all the journalists were, as expected, blown away by the luxury, News 5’s Stewart Krohn discovered that for Belize it may not always mean smooth sailing.
Stewart Krohn, Reporting
According to agents for Royal Caribbean International, she is the largest cruise ship ever to anchor in Belizean waters. With a displacement of one hundred and thirty-seven thousand tons and a length of over a thousand feet, the Voyager of the Seas and her sister ships dwarf almost anything short of an aircraft carrier. With room for over thirty-eight hundred guests and a crew of almost twelve hundred, The Voyager of The Seas can best be thought of as a fully functional city of five thousand people…kind of like having Dangriga Town anchored a few miles off Belize City.
But as cities go, The Voyager is far closer to Disney World than Dangriga. With its numerous restaurants, swimming pools, shopping arcades, casino, and sporting activities–including an ice rink–it’s a wonder that passengers ever leave the ship. But most of them do…and according to port agent Stanley Longsworth, Belize reaps a number of benefits.
Stanley Longsworth, Port Agent, Royal Caribbean
“I think the big areas that we’re obviously doing well in is the creation of jobs. There are hundreds of people employed when a ship comes in everyday. And this covers a wide spectrum of our Belizean populous from taxi drivers to tour guides, shop vendors. There’s a lot of people involved and a lot of people do benefit from it; owners of boats, bus owners. I think that apart from that, the industry brings to Belize a lot of foreign exchange. It is said that each passenger spends roughly a hundred dollars in Belize every time a ship’s in port, so we gain foreign exchange also. Apart from that, passengers do return for longer stays in Belize, so we get publicity on the international scene. All in all, I think it’s a good deal for Belize.”
But that deal doesn’t look all that good when compared to the benefits of land based overnight tourism. In terms of taxes, government collects seven percent of every hotel dollar, not to mention airport departure taxes, sales tax, and other indirect levies. In the case of cruise passengers, the head tax totals only five U.S. dollars, four of which go to the owners of the Tourism Village and one to the Protected Areas Conservation Trust, PACT.
And that floating city of five thousand souls has much in common with other land bound municipalities: that is, how to dispose of its waste. According to captain Svein Petterson, The Voyager of the Seas except all international specifications for waste disposal. He says no garbage is thrown overboard and much is recycled. Grey water is treated before dumping, and as for all those thousands of ever flushing toilets?
Svein Petterson, Captain, Voyager of the Seas
“We have holding tanks for our sewerage and we treat our sewerage. And what we pump overboard, we pump overboard outside of twelve nautical miles. Nothing is left inside of twelve nautical miles.”
But twelve nautical miles from Belize City still leaves any waste well within Belize’s territorial waters. And with our stead easterly trade winds almost anything dumped into the Caribbean eventually finds its way to our shores, not to mention our reefs.
Which leads us to the question of who actually polices dozens of cruise ships criss-crossing the region.
Svein Petterson
“We have international rules and regulations that polices it. We have our internal SQM system that goes over and above what is required by international law, so we are ahead of the game.”
Stewart Krohn
“Okay, but when I ask you about policing…the ship is registered in the Bahamas, you visit a lot of small countries that really don’t have the capacity to do any policing, the United States doesn’t visit you in the middle of the sea to check on these things do they? So really you’re policing yourselves, so when you tell me all this we pretty much have to take your word for it?”
Svein Petterson
“I don’t know where you are leading up to, but everything that we are doing on board is documented…”
Stewart Krohn
“No, what I’m asking is, it’s documented to whom? In other words, as captain who are you answerable to?”
Svein Petterson
“We are answerable to any authority that comes aboard and check our ship. And everything that we do is documented in log books and our log books are checked periodically by also authorities like the U.S.”
Stewart Krohn
“But what authority would the United States have to worry about things that you outside of our ports?”
Svein Petterson
“Because whoever has appropriated the international rules and regulations, they also have the authority to do the controls.”
Stewart Krohn
“Even though you’re not the Unites States…
Svein Petterson
“Registered, absolutely. Belize can do the control if they like.”
Stewart Krohn
“But a small country like Belize, with all these cruise ships coming, how are we going to police the ships?”
Svein Petterson
“Well you have to police your own coast and if you have any suspicions as to if the ships are not following international rules that will be your problem to solve.”
And that’s exactly what has many Belizeans, including this one, worried. Stewart Krohn for News 5.
The Voyager of the Seas, or one of her sister ships, will dock in Belize every two weeks for at least the next year. The ship’s owner, Royal Caribbean, along with Diamonds International, has recently purchased the tourism village.
