My Misgivings

The Traffic. I was a pretty rapid driver in the States, and the prospect of no speed limits and no speed cops sounded good to me before I got here.  BOY, WAS I WRONG!!.  Imagine a nation of teenagers, out in Daddy's car for the first time.  You can't drive even reasonably fast on the highways here, because you will probably meet someone trying to pass on a blind curve.  And as you drive at reasonable speeds down the highway, cars are constantly overtaking you, passing YOU on a blind curve.  Since the Free Zone opened three years ago, the number of gasoline trucks driving the Northern Highway has gone up a thousand percent, and of course, the odds that one of these fireball passers will meet one of those trucks is escalating every day.  Just yesterday, I saw a passer meeting a gasoline truck head-on.  Guess what the passer did?  Turned on his headlights!!  Well, he did that, as he forced his way over into the right lane so he wouldn't head-on the gasoline truck.  A simple fact: automobile accidents account for 40% of the deaths in Belize.  (The only thing more deadly in our little country is AIDS.)

There is a 55 mile speed limit in Belize.  It is not enforced.  The Transport Department is planning to get their first radar gun in 2003.  Of course, they don't need a radar gun to arrest someone for driving down a congested city street at 65 mpg, but they don't do it.  It just isn't part of their job description.  They write a lot of parking tickets. 

Resolution.  The current or future government could establish a traffic safety program with:

1. School traffic safety education

2. Driver education, with published traffic regulations and traffic exams

3. Enforcement of the existing traffic laws, including speed, inspection and general driving behavior. 

Update: (Feb 2002)  Since I wrote this, my friend David Greenhalgh has come down and done some research on traffic safety.  Read his report here.

Update: (Jan 2004)  The Transport department has a new set of statutes which issue tickets for speeding, running stop signs and other serious violations.  They mean to write tickets!!  (We'll see.)

BTL.  Belize Telecommunications, Ltd. has an exclusive right to provide telecommunications in and out of Belize until December 23, 2002.  That includes Internet access as well as voice/data communications in and out of the country.  In 1999, a blue ribbon commission studied the services sector in Belize -- which is surely the biggest single hope for a healthy economy here -- and concluded that BTL was the biggest single obstacle to service and technological growth.  To quote the report, "High cost of telecommunications technology and BTL's unwillingness to allow others into the market...  is singularly the most serious threat to the growth of this sub-sector."  You might like to read this report.  It used to be on the GOB website, but they removed it.  However, you can still find it here.

How Bad Is it?  Well, first of all, it's expensive!  $20US for the first 8 hours, and $2 for each hour after that.  I spend well over $100 a month for nominal service.  (I hang up whenever I can.)  The latest feature: Unlimited service will only cost you $500 US a month!!!   What do you get for your money?.  Not much bandwidth.  The highest actual rate anyone has reported is about 31K.  During peak hours, you simply can't log on.  Not much service.  The techs in BC make changes to the protocols and don't bother to tell anyone. And then when you call the help desk for help, they don't help because their real agenda is to hold down the number of people who can get online!! (surprise!!)  Bandwidth is best in the middle of the night, but then some nights, the unattended server goes down, and there is no service until they come in at 8AM.  Last Easter, the server went down on Good Friday, and nobody bothered to bring it back up until Tuesday morning.  (Easter Monday, after all, is a holiday.) Just this past May 28, Commonwealth Day (a Monday) the mail server and name server were both down for most of the day. Just another day of wonderful BTL service. UPDATE: (Apr 02)  Rates are officially changed, and you can see the details here.  The net for me...my BTL will went down -- from $150US to $100 -- for service I could get from AT&T for $15.  This Easter, the server didn't go down -- the connection to the net just got so bad that no one could use it.  (Connecting to MSN took ten (10, countem 10) minutes.)

The Real Problem.  Aside from the monopoly, which of course, makes BTL unresponsive to complaints, they just don't have much bandwidth to hand out.  We're tied to the internet via satellite hookup which gives us some pretty limited maximum speeds.  Until the maritime fibre cable comes in from Miami (due, perhaps in 2002) or a reputed fibre link comes into Chetumal, we will all be talking to the Internet through a pretty small funnel.   UPDATE: (Apr 02) The backbone has arrived in Chetumal!  Watch the site for developments. 

Resolution:  Of course, deregulate; open the market to competition.  This has brought the US market down to 7 cents a minute for long distance, and $7 a month for unlimited service.  (This is for AT&T, the most obscenely profitable utility in the history of the world!!!)   BTL has to understand that if they cut rates, the usage will go up, and the net profits will go up correspondingly, as they have every where else in the world. 

Update:  More on the BTL situation and the history of AT&T here.

Anti-Gringo Bias.  The current government pays a lot of lip service to Tourism as the future of Belize and I believe it is right on.  Of course, the tourists are Gringos, and there are some people who think that all Gringos are rich and deserve to be gouged whenever possible.  Actually, we don't mind paying when we get something like our money's worth, but we don't like being regarded as an easy target for every midnight tax that someone dreams up.  My page on A Predatory Tax describes the new exit tax but here are some other "gotchas"

1.  As long as you stay here, you have to pay a hefty tourist fee every month. (That is described here.)  Since you've paid to be a tourist, you should get tourist privileges. For instance, the Free Zone offers duty free shopping to foreign nationals.  (Read about that here.)  I've checked with The Powers That Be, and sure enough, a tourist should be able to shop there.  However, the petty officios at the entrance to the zone may not let you in!  Hint:  Be persistent. The Law and TPTB are on your side.

2. There used to be a graduated set of work permits for nationals (described here.)  Now, if you're a Gringo, you pay $750 to do anything.  What the heck, you're a rich gringo, right?

Resolution:  Enforce the existing regulations uniformly, rather than passing one person and 'dinging' the next.  Get revenues from the following well-organized programs::

A. A program which taxes every person who passes the border -- a minimum fee.  Everybody benefits from an orderly, well-policed border.  Let's charge everyone. 

B. Set up government currency exchange.  Everybody has to change money when they go to Mexico -- why shouldn't the Government pick up the profit?   UPDATE:  (Jan 2002) Since I wrote this a year ago, the GOB is doing exactly what I suggested, except --- except -- except the profit goes to Belize Bank, rather than to the Country.  (August 2002)  The GOB legalized cambios, and we have one in Corozal, but the border hasn't changed a bit. 

C. Charge everybody who buys outside of Belize proper (including those who buy in the Free Zone.)  Record the amount everyone spends in the Free Zone, and charge them duty on it.  (This would be easy to do with a computer system, and would add millions to the BZE coffers.)  Expect receipts from people who spend money in Mexico. If they don't have receipts, you can use the product bar code (SKU) to estimate a price. (If you're interested in the computer aspects of this, ask me about it!!)   

Downside:  Here's something I wrote about the bugs  right after I got to Belize.  It's still true, and just another consideration. (And I didn't even know about sand-flies!)

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