_{Personnel from the Ministry of Health at their booth at the Belmopan Civic Center on Tuesday}

by Orlando Pulido (Freelance Writer)

SANTA ELENA TOWN, Cayo District, Wed. May 21, 2025

The Belize Bureau of Standards (BBS) hosted a Consumer Rights Information and Metrology Day at the Belmopan Civic Center on May 20, 2025. Aside from the BBS’s booths (Consumer Protection, Legal and Industrial Metrology and Standards), additional boots were set up by invited agencies, which included the Supplies Control Unit, the Belize Agricultural Health Authority, the Belmopan City Council, the Public Utilities Commission, the Public Health Department and the Drug Inspectorate, the Department of the Environment, the Belize Tax Service, the Financial Services Commission, and the Belize Water Services Limited.

On May 20, World Metrology Day was observed, and this year it notably marked the 150th anniversary of the signing of the Meter Convention, which is what gave rise to the creation of the metric system. For Envic Castaneda, a metrology officer, it is a special day, since the majority of our neighbors conduct trade using the metric system. Castaneda maintains that metrology is the science of measurements involving not only physics, but mathematics and statistics as well, ensuring consistency and fairness in trade, science, and industry.

But for the BBS administration, Tuesday’s event, which was attended by all the standard six students from the Evergreen Primary School in Belmopan, was also all about consumer rights.

_{Samantha Banner, the Director of the Belize Bureau of Standards}

“Well, the event today is a Consumer Rights Information Day, and it is organized to inform consumers of what their rights are, as well as their responsibilities, because as consumers, we often demand certain things. We demand to be heard; we demand information. We demand redress; but we tend to neglect that with rights comes responsibilities,” said Samantha Banner, the Director of the Belize Bureau of Standards.

_{Rhonda Tillett, Consumer Protection and Liaison Officer of the Belize Bureau of Standards}

According to Rhonda Tillett, Consumer Protection and Liaison Officer of the BBS, consumers have several major rights. These are the right to basic needs, choice, information, redress, education, and the right to a healthy environment. However, she noted that the most frequent complaints that she receives at the BBS annually are, “price, number one; the sale of expired goods, number two; warranty issues, and issuance of receipts either for GST [General Sales Tax]; or no GST or no receipts issued …”

As an organization, the BBS has its own set of challenges. During times of national emergency, there have been reports of some stores raising the prices that customers must pay dramatically.

“There may be [price gouging], but we don’t have a consumer protection legislation in Belize; so that continues to be a challenge, because without the legislation … you cannot regulate something without legislation,” Banner told Amandala.