BELMOPAN, Belize - Former Colombian President, Ivan Duque Marquez, has praised Belize for having “almost full employment” and urged the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) country to continue generating new opportunities for its population.
Prime Minister John Briceno addressing the opening of the Belize Investment Summit 2023Addressing the opening of the two-day Belize Investment Summit, Marquez said that “one of the nicest things about Belize is that when you look at the whole Latin American and Caribbean region you have an employment rate that is something around 2.8 per cent that is almost full employment.
“That is a big achievement. But also imagine if you continue generating new opportunities and you allow the human capital through talent to be employed where the talent is and that has to do with music, the arts, with functional creation.
“What you are going to be able to do is what you are doing now with call centers where young persons are employed and they can win or earn by the hour maybe two or three times the minimum wage in an hourly basis, the same thing can happen in the orange economy but even higher.”
The former Colombian leader said that even they can earn more than what they can do in a call center if they work in a sector which they can contribute more.
“That simply creates more dynamic and I think those are the bets that countries need to make,” he told the summit that is being held under the theme “Belize: Endless Opportunities” and attended by hundreds of delegates and potential investors from throughout the region.
In his address to the summit, Prime Minister John Briceño said that he is very pleased with the interest shown in the summit with participants coming from South America, Central America, the Caribbean and from South Korea and the host country, Belize.
“There has been this buzz about Belize that things are happening in Belize and there are all these business opportunities sin Belize, so the business investment forum gives an opportunity to put investments together with locals and foreigners to see how they can get their projects going.
“It also gives the government tan opportunity to present the work we have done over the past two years and also the policies we have put in and the plans to make investments easier in Belize, bringing across that Belize is open for business,” Briceño added.
Prime Minister Briceño later acknowledged that much attention is being placed on the orange economy at this year’s investment summit.
The orange economy is also known as the creative sector and it includes music production, movie production, culture and heritage, among other opportunities.
“There are so much great opportunities and potential in the orange economy. I think the presentation that President Ivan Duque Marquez made was an eye opener for everyone to see the great opportunities that exist in the orange economy.
“What we have been unable to do is to harness that creativity especially of our young people in the arts, the music, and the raw talent that exist. We need to find a way how we can harness that and make it become into a big industry that can create opportunities and jobs and monies for these young people especially these DJ’s that are trying to hustle to make ends meet.”
Prime Minister Briceño said what the former Colombian leader is saying is that it requires the government to basically to set place the institutions, the opportunities, legislation that we can encourage them to participate and at the same time to attract foreigners to invest.
“For instance when it comes to movie making, we have everything you could imagine, from the jungle, to the food, to the culture, the water, everything you could imagine the movie industry would want.
“But they don’t know about it and we make it difficult for them to come. We have a group filming, they are filming but they have had endless challenges, labor is giving them trouble, because they are going to be here for more than thirty days, immigration is giving them trouble because they are going to be filming for more than thirty days,” he added.
Prime Minister Briceño said emphasis is also being placed on the blue, green and orange economy as well as the grey economy that includes narco money and contraband funds.
“It is illegal and we are trying to do everything we can to stomp them out. If you would look at all the legislation we are doing to make it more difficult to move their money that speaks volumes.
“Right now we are working with the US government to help us to strengthen our work in trying to keep the narcos, I think organized crime is a better word that narcos because we have no evidence, the organized crime from Mexico to come into Belize. That speaks to what we are accomplishing.
“We want to get rid of them. What bothers me the most is that this people come into Belize and create roots in Belize. It is very difficult to get them out. We have to do everything possible to get them out and I plea to every Belizean, do not get into any kind of relationship with these people,” Briceño added.
