And while Public officers take a stand against diminished earnings, marine creatures such as manatees are unable to speak for themselves when it comes to the major coastal developments that are threatening the delicate balance of their way of life.
But that's where the Manatee man comes in, and today Jamal Galvez gave us his response to the environmental clearance that NEAC has given to Portico Enterprises's Limited's Port of Magical Belize.
Galvez says that the proposed Peninsula set to be built 6km south of the mouth of the Sibun River will have major impacts on fish and marine megafauna, it will also prove a major obstacle to a major manatee migration route. Here's more.
Jamal Galvez, Manatee Man
"We've stated our opinion numerous times to the developer and to the relevant authority NEAC, and the department of the environment using data to substantiate our claims, that it will impact manatees, but not just manatees, marine mega faunas, and fishes and other species that are frequent in the area, particularly this size of development. It's not a small construction It's a massive development and it includes the construction of a peninsula that will certainly disrupt water flow and the natural currents, block the passage of species such as manatees. We know that Manatees traverse along the coast."
"And we know that they use these areas along the coast, these shallow water areas. It's unknown what a manatee would do should they stumble upon this peninsula in the near future considering they've approved it. We have to really take into consideration, where and what we're doing because I thought that this pandemic would have thought us something but it seems to have taught us nothing in the sense that we lost basically everything now we are left with our environment and we're going to risk that now. I'm of the firm belief that if an ecosystem collapses an economy will die and that's not a fancy quote it's a factual statement and we need to reassess and really evaluate- the purpose of these organizations that are approving these things and ensuring that they are doing what they're there to do because the department of the environment and all these agencies are there to safeguard Belize's environment which means that the environment comes first, develop comes later and we're not against development but we want it to be done in the most sustainable manner."
Cherisse Halsall:
"So what strikes me is, in that in the first paragraph of that letter it says that the project has received environmental clearance, what are your thoughts when you read that?"
Jamal Galvez, Manatee Man
"It really troubles me to think that the work of organizations like ours that have been putting years of effort into collecting data, to try and study these species, to try and safeguard Belize's most critical ecosystems not with the support of any government funding of that sort but by writing grants proposals, having local fundraisers. So we're investing all of this into trying to protect these ecosystems but yet I feel that it didn't get the consideration that was give that was needed in regards to such a large development."
Cherisse Halsall:
"So we know that Mr. Gegg's project as well as the other two that are on the table, they are all coastal developments that will all cause problems. Talk to us about if one or two of these are approved just more cruise ship traffic coming into our waters, what does that do?"
Jamal Galvez, Manatee Man
"As it is we've been struggling to try and get a hold of manatee deaths as a result of cruise tourism. We've seen Manatee deaths increase rapidly - I'm writing a paper right now that we compare tourism visits to Belize along with manatee deaths, and we see that they go hand in hand, so the tourism goes up so the Manatee death rate goes up. As we've seen during Covid-19 tourism went down and so the Manatee deaths simply nose-dived, that shows that there's a direct correlation between the two. Currently, there's just one cruise calling from the FSTV center and if your looking at the amount of Manatees that are dying right now with just that, take into consideration some other two or maybe even three facility it means that we're literally trying to push this animal to the brink of extinction."
"We have a lot of policies and a lot of regulations but if we're not gonna follow them then there is no sense in having them."
OCEANA has also cautioned government's courting of multiple Port developers, saying, quote, "True environmental costs must be weighed against any potential benefits to safeguard Belize's economic backbone, its natural resources."
