Reddish Egret

Ambergris Caye Citizens for Sustainable Development

One of the biggest challenges facing Ambergris Caye is how to balance environmental protection with the temptations of powerful foreign developers. It’s not just a problem for Ambergris Caye, the entire of Central and South America are being preyed upon by North American developers and industry that have been blocked by laws regulating their environmentally unsound practices in their own countries and have now moved their operations to a more naïve arena where profit can be maximized because of the absence of environmental considerations and government controls.
The young and inexperienced governments like Belize are succumbing to the enticements of proposals made by these experienced foreigners.
On the up-side, the past several decades has seen citizens and environmental groups, or non-governmental organizations (NGOs), pulling together to pressure governments to pass laws to protect the environment.
In the past decade, NGOs have applied a diverse array of strategies to counter negative influences including promoting laws to protect the environment, developing lawsuits against governments and developers.
In my opinion these third party intervention groups like the Ambergris Caye Citizens for Sustainable Development are the only realistic hope of controlling the impending disaster from uncontrolled development on our isla bonita.
If you love this place like I do meeting attendance, membership fees and contributions to environmental defense funds managed by reputable groups like the ACCSD is our best way of showing it.