Is our present government the hardest working one we’ve ever had? The answer to that is it just might be. Has the economy improved tremendously since the present government took office in November 2020? The answer to that is a definite yes. Is this the least corrupt government we’ve had since independence? Without our oversight bodies fully functioning, all we have to go on are appearances, and based on that it could very well be so.
In his budget presentation last week, PM John Briceño spoke proudly of his government’s achievements since taking office, and from infrastructure to lands to sports to education to finance, in every sphere our leaders are putting in the work. The times definitely call for this type of energy. No government in Belize ever took office in a more trying period. Mercifully, the Covid-19 pandemic has eased up, and countrywide Belize is now open for business.
The brave new government is tackling unpopular tasks. Among other things, the government is working on difficult pension reform, and urgent improvement of the public transportation system. The new government is expanding NHI—increasing the number of people who will have subsidized access to primary health care. There is hope in the multi-pronged approach to crime, and there are cheers for more subsidies to students who come from not so well-off families, investments that move us closer to the promise of free education.
The GoB moved boldly in the past year, delivering on a long overdue minimum wage increase, restoring the salaries of its employees to what they were in 2020 and, beginning April 1, unfreezing increments that had been frozen since 2020. These moves have/will put more money in the pockets of Belizeans, money that will boost the economy, especially if it is spent on purchasing goods made at home, and on investments in businesses.
Our economy has improved much since the PUP took office. It had to. When the PUP took office, Belize was broke, in virtual lockdown because of the pandemic. The PM said that last year the value of our domestic exports rose by $46 million, our unemployment rate fell to an unprecedented low of 5%, and 7,478 new jobs were created. Our debt-to-GDP ratio has been halved, and tourism has rebounded fully. While in the agro sector there has not been much or any improvement in citrus and farmed shrimp, and the banana industry is now also struggling, farmers who produce for the local market are encouraged, though the cost of their products has been driven beyond the pockets of many because of severe inflation. The government says it’s “the magic, the marvel of Plan Belize” that’s behind our outstanding economic gains. The IMF and World Bank concur that our economy is performing, satisfactorily.
If all that isn’t sufficient dopamine for us, we also learnt that the SIB, using the new multidimensional poverty index which was developed by the Oxford Poverty and Human Development Initiative, has determined that “68,000 fewer Belizeans are poor.” There’s much to discuss about this new poverty assessment. In a nutshell, it is a comprehensive exercise that goes beyond measuring poverty in monetary terms. While physically it changes nothing directly, it does have its merits, with the prime prize probably going to the rich. There is something for them in the poor thinking they’re not as deprived as they thought they were.
The PM could be charged with gushing when he declared that “the economy is growing, expanding in 2022 by an estimated 12.4 percent, more than 10 times the average annual growth rate of 1.7 percent experienced under the UDP administration”, but he and his party have earned the right to some champagne. He might have been too exuberant when he said if we continue on our present path “with the rate of growth experienced and projected under my administration, our economy will double in size in just about ten years”, because there is a major hitch there.
The fact is that we are being buoyed by two industries: tourism, which is fragile and can’t grow much more without destroying our product, and BPOs, another fragile industry, which is under threat from the rapidly advancing AI (Artificial Intelligence). We are actually “enjoying” a little breathing space because of these two industries, and for Belize to go forward we have to look to other ways to earn.
GoB’s increased support for MSMEs will boost our economy. We need to increase manufacturing; we need to invest more in textiles, to make our own cloth and leather goods; we need to invest in researching the production/utilization of materials that will help us decrease the cost of housing and other infrastructure. The announcement by the PM that we have increased production of soybean concentrate to the point where “the importation of soybean as animal feed and cooking oil has been reduced at a savings of 25 million dollars”, gives us impetus that we can really create an economy where all of us win.
We have been told that much of the taxes owed to the country are statute-barred, out of the reach of the arms of our collection departments, but recent emphasis on collecting what is collectible will increase the size of our national pie. Restructuring the tax system could also lead to an increase for the national till. In past years the PAYE system has been tweaked, and there is talk of further adjustment, while little has been done in the past and nothing is being said presently about the rates of property taxes.
In his budget presentation, the PM said that less than 1% of national revenues come from property taxes. The tax structure didn’t drop from the sky; it was thought out, and it must be revisited. Belize’s governments, partly to spare less well-off Belizeans, have kept property taxes low, and behind that shield owners of mega-million-dollar properties in Belize have gotten away with contributing next to nil by way of taxes to national revenues. Surely our leaders can find creative ways to protect the poor while the rich owners of beachfront and other prime properties pay their just share.
The present government came into office with the promise to increase transparency and put in laws to crack down on corruption. It gets points for transforming the Public Accounts Committee, though nothing has come of that because the “watchdog” opposition party, the UDP, has been in disarray since the last general election. It went through the motions of preparing an important law to protect whistleblowers, but hasn’t enacted it. Instead, we are now involved with full constitutional reform, with a committee now in place to hear recommendations. Notably, the “third” parties have expressed little interest in the process.
This government is working hard, maybe harder than any government has before. This is a busy government, and we should be grateful for that. We need to be busy too, busy watching to make sure they are about our business, not their own, as so many governments have been before. Relative to our reality, we pay our leaders well, and we exalt them with the title, “honorable.” May they keep our economy growing, and by the way, it’s nice to know that we are not as poor as we thought we were.