Belize, 2014

On behalf of the

Government and the people of Belize, it is with great

pleasure that I congratulate you, Sir, on your election

as President of the General Assembly at its sixty-ninth

session. I would also like to take this opportunity to

register Belize’s thanks to your predecessor, our own

son of Caribbean soil, Mr. John Ashe, who performed

his duties superbly this past year and leaves the

Organization a legacy of lasting value.

Mr. President, your chosen theme for this

year’s session, “Delivering on and implementing

a transformative post-2015 development agenda”,

is ambitious, hopeful and challenging, and Belize

commends you on its selection. In the next 12 months,

we will closely monitor and contribute to its crafting

and evolution. The stated goal of the new agenda is

to promote sustained and inclusive economic growth,

safeguard the future of our planet and lead to the

achievement of sustainable development, with the

eradication of poverty and hunger at its core.

Belize views those outcomes as more than

aspirational. For us they are imperatives. Failure to

attain them will have dire consequences for our nation

and people. They call for a transformative mobilization

of our societies at the organic level. For that to happen,

we must inspire and equip every actor in our societies

with the requisite tools for tackling their responsibilities

and partaking in the dividends of sustainable economic

growth with equity and social justice.

The experiences we have had in seeking to achieve

the Millennium Development Goals, however, make

us less than sanguine that we will have more success

with the post-2015 development agenda than we have

had in meeting the Millennium Development Goals.

We are mindful that the support that some developed

Member States pledged to provide for our efforts with

the Millennium Development Goals did not materialize

in the amounts that were pledged and needed. On the

whole, small countries like my own are disadvantaged

by their lack of the resources and human, financial,

scientific and technological capacities that are

prerequisites for succeeding with such ambitious and

complex initiatives. Without cooperation and support

for addressing those needs from the developed States

Members of the United Nations and other multilateral

agencies and, crucially, through reform of the policies

of the international financial institutions, Belize’s

attainment of the post-2015 development agenda will

be severely hampered.

Looking to the future, Belize welcomes and

supports the Assembly’s adoption at its sixty-

eighth session of resolution 68/304, “Towards the

establishment of a multilateral legal framework for

sovereign debt restructuring processes”, and hopes

it will result in a robust multilateral treaty that will

increase the efficiency, stability and predictability

of the international financial system. In the wake of

the world’s financial meltdown in 2008 and the many

disasters that have occurred around the world over

the past six years, necessitating large outlays of donor

funding to assist the victims of such disasters, there

are unmistakable and troubling indications of donor

fatigue and a tendency towards isolationism and self-

centredness in our global environment, a trend that does

not augur well for financing the post-2015 development

agenda.

Belize nonetheless remains cautiously optimistic.

We are encouraged by the pilgrimage to this Hall over

the past week of world leaders from nations large and

small, friends and foes, allies and enemies. Each spoke

from this very rostrum, and each in essence voluntarily

reaffirmed the conviction of their respective countries

that collective action under these United Nations offers

our world the only true hope of dealing successfully

with the myriad problems currently afflicting

mankind, whether climate change, the dreaded Ebola

virus, religious fanaticism, or persistent poverty and

underdevelopment.

Of those maladies, Belize regards climate change as

the most pernicious. While a global consensus seems to

have finally been reached as to the causes, as well as the

cure, for this apocalyptic phenomenon, the political will

of the major emitters to take immediate, concerted and

decisive action to combat it is still absent. Indeed, just as

our international community was grievously dilatory in

taking prompt collective action to prevent the genocidal

massacre in Rwanda or the current spread of the Ebola

virus in Africa, so the major emitters are being dilatory

in confronting the challenges of climate change. It is

evident that the threats that epidemics, pandemics and

terrorism pose to our planet and humankind pale into

insignificance when compared to the existential threats

of climate change. Furthermore, it is equally evident

that it would not be hyperbole to opine that time is

not on our side. Horrendous devastation — caused by

extreme droughts, huge conflagrations in our forests,

intense rainfall, floods, hurricanes, melting snowcaps,

warming seas and sea-level rises, and an awful and

frightening increase in pestilence and diseases — is

already occurring around the world.

Among other things, my own country, Belize, is

already experiencing coral bleaching, coastal erosion

and flooding, and it is forecast that next year the entire

country will be visited by severe drought. The cost of

mitigating the damage that is already being done to my

country and of adapting to climate change is prohibitive.

It is time for the large competing emitters to put aside

their mutual suspicion and commit to capping global

warming at 1.5°C above preindustrial levels. While my

country appreciates the pledges that have already been

made to the Green Climate Fund, the amount of money

needed to address global warming is exponentially

larger. We do, however, remain optimistic that a robust

climate change agreement will be signed in Paris in

2015.

The development and security needs of nations

large and small in this era of globalization have hastened

the imperative of regional integration. Indeed, today

it is virtually impossible for any nation to function

successfully on its own in any sphere of activity. In my

own country’s case, the measure of development and

security we have enjoyed over the past 33 years, since

gaining independence, must be credited in large part to

the good relations we continue to have with our partners

in the various regional integration groupings to which

we belong and the excellent cooperation programmes

we share with our bilateral and multilateral partners,

prominent among which are the various agencies of

the United Nations. However, even as we acknowledge

with gratitude the tremendous contributions of our

partners to our nation’s security and development,

our Government is ever mindful that the primary

responsibility for it rests with our Government and

people. In that conviction, and given our limited

resources, our Government has had to prioritize its

areas of intervention. It has concentrated on providing

our nation’s basic needs — security, housing, education,

health care, employment and wealth generation.

Highest on that list of priorities is the importance

of safeguarding our country’s security and territorial

integrity. Successive Belizean Governments have

invested heavily in efforts to bring about a peaceful

resolution of the Guatemalan territorial claim over our

country. Our Government is unalterably wedded to the

peaceful resolution of this claim by adjudication at the

International Court of Justice. We have enlisted the

support of all our international friends and partners for

that decision, and the Guatemalan Government is also

committed, through the Special Agreement of 2008, to

the resolution of the claim by the International Court

of Justice.

We are convinced that wars and rumours of war

and any kind of international conflict will only bring

grief and cause pain, hardship and devastation. That is

why we keep working assiduously with our neighbours

in the region to cement friendly, peaceful, collaborative

and productive relations in order to achieve development

for our people. Belize is very pleased by the recent

designation by the Community of Latin American

and Caribbean States of our entire region as a zone of

peace. We also welcome your own call, Mr. President,

for the intensification of efforts towards the peaceful

settlement of disputes.

Domestically, Belize has enjoyed uninterrupted

peace and harmony for the past 33 years. Our

Government acts with alacrity and sensitivity to

defuse any situation that has the potential for civil

strife and disorder, and we invest substantially in our

security forces, in terms of both capacity-building

and equipment and transportation. In our quest for

wealth generation, job creation and the attainment of

sustainable development, Belize is pursuing, inter

alia, the prescriptions articulated in our Horizon

2030 national development plan. In that regard, our

Government is working in close concert with economic

development experts from the International Monetary

Fund, the World Bank, the Inter-American Development

Bank and other institutions.

Among the initiatives we are pursuing is a

comprehensive programme of infrastructure works

throughout our country, which includes the upgrading

and expanding of major highways; the paving of streets

in cities and towns; the installation of new drains in

flood-prone areas; and the construction and upgrading

of sporting stadiums and recreational community

buildings. Those programmes are being executed at a

total cost of $100 million.

Thanks to the collaboration of the Bolivarian

Republic of Venezuela and the tremendous support

we receive through the Petrocaribe initiative, our

Government has been able to invest in infrastructure

and social programmes to the benefit of all our citizens.

Our Government is cognizant of the importance of

good infrastructure to our economic development.

Belize is a major exporter of primary products. All our

agri-products are transported by road from the farms

to the factories and then to the sea ports for export.

The aquaculture products and petroleum products we

produce are also transported by road to our seaports. All

our archaeological sites and many of our tourist resorts

are also only accessible by road. It is the expectation

of our Government that, with the enhancement of our

network of streets and roads, our country will become

more attractive to both residents and foreigners, be they

tourists or investors, and that this will translate into a

rapid expansion in productivity, economic growth and

wealth generation.

With a view to ensuring that as many Belizean

workers as possible obtain employment in the

infrastructure works being carried out, the Government

has requested all contractors who successfully bid

for the works to utilize manual labour wherever it is

feasible to do so. The works are providing employment

for many Belizean youth, both male and female.

As a further initiative to stimulate economic

development, our Government inaugurated the very

first National Bank of Belize one year ago. The Bank

started out modestly. It commenced operations by

providing loans primarily to finance the acquisition of

homes for middle-class Belizeans. Though the Bank is

limited in its offerings, its establishment has resulted

in an immediate and dramatic reduction of the interest

rates being charged by commercial banks in the country

on similar loans. That is a welcome development and

a goal that our Government had tried for many years

to achieve without success. The new Bank is rapidly

building up its customer base and has now started to

accept deposits. The prospect for young employed

Belizeans to own their own homes at affordable

mortgages is now greatly increased. Very many

Belizeans are already landed property owners, thanks

to an ongoing programme by successive Governments

to make land available to them at minimal costs.

Our Government is also aggressively promoting

foreign direct investment. We have successfully

attracted investment in petroleum extraction,

agribusiness, renewable energy, tourism and business

processes outsourcing.

On our Independence Day, 21 September 1981,

Belize inherited an educational system that was

designed to educate citizens for the needs of a remote

colonial outpost in the industrial age, the primary

economic activity of which was the export of timber

and sugar. We have since been making strenuous

efforts to transform that system into one capable of

satisfying the needs of an independent nation in this,

the twenty-first century and the information age. That

is proving to be a task fraught with great difficulty. It

is also an exceedingly expensive one. Our Government

currently spends 26 per cent of our national budget on

the education sector. However, that is not nearly enough

to cover the cost of the training and education needs

of our young nation. We appreciate, however, that the

quality of our workforce will be a great determinant in

our future development, and that we must therefore do

all in our power to make our workforce the very best it

can be regardless of the cost and without heeding the

sacrifices we will undoubtedly have to make.

To that end, our Government is engaged in a

number of initiatives aimed at training and educating

our population. Among those is a comprehensive

teacher training and certification programme. We are

resolved to have only teachers trained in pedagogy

and in the various subject areas that they are expected

to teach in our classrooms. Simultaneously, we are

assiduously expanding our education coverage from the

pre-primary to the tertiary levels. Indeed, more young

people today than at any other time in the history of our

nation can afford to obtain an education and can find

space in an educational institution near their homes. We

are also placing increasing emphasis on vocational and

technical education and training and on the teaching of

science, technology, engineering and mathematics. We

are in the planning stage for a new institute of science

and technology, and we are expanding the presence of

centres for employment training across the country.

Because we possess only two young universities, we

make strenuous efforts to gain access to universities and

other advanced educational institutions abroad for those

of our students who successfully attain the matriculation

requirements for entry into those institutions. We

have been very successful in that initiative. The vast

majority of our students attend those universities on

scholarships, thanks to the generosity of our cooperation

partners. Every Belizean student, male and female,

who attains the requisite matriculation requirement

has an equal opportunity to win a scholarship. Current

data indicate that our female students are much more

successful at winning scholarships than their male

counterparts. Our initiatives in the education sector are

contributing greatly to the increase in the competence

of our workforce at every level, thereby enabling it

to produce goods and services that are competitive in

the world markets. In order to continue our efforts in

that regard, we will need the continued support of the

United Nations and its formidable network.

Belize currently spends over 13 per cent of the

national budget on the health sector. We seek to develop

and maintain a healthy and productive population. To

that end, our Government is expanding school food

programmes countrywide and programmes that allow

parents of low-income families to purchase food items

at concessionary rates. We know that regular, balanced

meals are vital to the health of our population and that

it is much less expensive to keep our population healthy

than it is to cure it when it is ill.

We continue to strengthen our primary health-care

network. We continuously upgrade facilities in our

hospital and clinics with modern diagnostic equipment.

Our flagship public hospital is now benefiting from

a significant technological upgrade. We also recently

inaugurated a brand-new neonatal wing at that hospital.

For the first time in our country’s history, a state-of-

the-art facility to cater exclusively to the health needs

of our physically challenged children has been built.

This facility is the brainchild of the wife of our Prime

Minister, who serves as a Special Envoy for Women and

Children in Belize. She spearheaded both the raising of

the finances for its construction and the supervision of

its construction.

We take this opportunity also to applaud the

efforts of our Special Envoy who, just a few days ago,

hosted one of the largest gatherings of First Ladies

and Spouses of Heads of State and Government on the

subject of the empowerment of women and girls, here at

the United Nations. That special event was a universal

call to action on the financial health of women and girls

based on the Beijing Platform for Action. We call on

all Governments and international organizations to

support that worthy cause.

Belize expanded the coverage of our health

insurance scheme in the last budget year and, through

our cooperation agreement with the Republic of Cuba,

we are significantly increasing the number of our

health-care personnel. Indeed, only some three weeks

ago we welcomed a contingent of some 35 newly

trained Belizean doctors — the largest contingent of

doctors ever to return to our country in a single year.

Our citizens are our nation’s most valuable resource.

We are resolved to invest in them, to enhance their

competences and to ameliorate the quality of life of

each and every one of them.

The victims of global strife and global tragedies

are invariably human beings. The United Nations was

founded on the determination that no other generation

would have to suffer the scourge of war, which we all

know brings nothing but death, destruction and sorrow

to humankind. Our compact is to promote and protect

fundamental human rights and the dignity and worth of

the human person — all human persons of all nations,

large and small.

The devastating Ebola virus is increasing

exponentially and frighteningly. While we are

disappointed that international health agencies did not

respond more vigorously and with greater alacrity to

the Ebola outbreak many months ago, Belize welcomes

the Secretary-General’s United Nations Mission for

Ebola Emergency Response.

Belize endorses without reservation the call for

the Republic of Taiwan to be permitted to participate

in the specialized agencies of the United Nations. In

this modern day and age, it is incomprehensible that

we should want to deny ourselves the benefit of their

expertise in dealing with global issues.

If we are to remain true to the principle of inclusion

as enshrined in our Charter and as promoted in the

post-2015 development agenda, we must continue to

advocate for the right of the Sahrawi people for self-

determination.

The indiscriminate killing, maiming and

destruction recently meted out to innocent Palestinian

civilians, especially helpless women and children,

and their possessions, were an affront to decency,

morality and humanity. We reiterate our support for

the resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict by

diplomatic means and for the coexistence of the State

of Israel and the State of Palestine in peace and security

in their respective pre-1967 international borders, as

recognized by the international community.

Belize is convinced that any discussion of a future

development agenda must include the removal of

unilateral harmful practices that stifle and stagnate

development, wherever they occur. In that respect, we

join the rest of the international community in calling

for an end to the anachronistic embargo against Cuba.

Belize recognizes that foremost among our

development priorities is to ensure the sustainability of

the environment, in keeping with our flagship status as

a haven for democracy, the promotion and protection

of human rights and environmental conservation. We

embrace the principle that economic growth should

not come at any cost. However, neither should our

people have to forgo development to protect the natural

environment. We firmly believe that it is a false

dichotomy to pit development against the environment.

That is why we fully welcome and embrace the principle

of sustainable development. Our future and the world’s

depend on the entire globe embracing the sustainable

development approach.