BELIZEAN MAYAN COPAL MEDICINAL OIL NOW SOLD OVER THE COUNTER IN BELIZE

COPAL THE MAYAN INCENSE SOLD IN MARKETS IN BELIZE HAS ALSO GOT MEDICINAL PROPERTIES

Blocks of COPAL resin are sold in all markets in Belize. Two doctors, the Doctors, Mandy and Mr. Tsang have been experimenting with COPAL as a medicine. The research and work shows that Copal is confirmed as a treatment for skin conditions. It has also been used to plug tooth cavities and for treatment of muscle aches and pains.
Chemically the Copal resin is made up of isomeric tertiary and secondary cyclic terene alcohols. They are antiseptic for both internal and external use. Also have anti rheumatic properties. Both the MOPAN MAYA and KETCHI MAYA in the Toledo District use it.
The Doctor pair, husband and wife have started to package and produce Copal Medicinal Oil. Mostly used for rashes, itches, burns and scalds, insect bites, skin infections and fungus infections, and as a result for arthritus and muscle rub. Another medicinal local popular mix is; BAY RUM and MARIJUANA, rubbed on arthritus joints. Works like a charm, though illegal. There are no allergic reactions to Copal medicine. Mostly available in Spanish Lookout, or down South in Punta Gorda.

Census reveals shift in languages spoken in Belize.

THE CENSUS RESULTS AND ANNOUNCEMENTS MAKE IT OFFICIAL

ENGLISH is our official government language, but SPANISH is now the dominant language of Belize. There are many languages spoken, couple of Chinese languages, Arabic, Hindu, English, Spanish, German ( declining ), Creole ( declining ), Carib ( declining ).

We have room for inviting Japanese immigrants if they would want to come. Chinese immigrant visas have dropped from $20,000 to $2000. Japanese farmers are excellent and play a big part in the Dominican Republic.

WITH A POPULATION OF 313,000, THERE IS AN OVERWHELMING SENSE THAT WE ARE TIPPING OVER, FROM A SMALL COLONIAL RUSTIC BACKWATER, TO SOMETHING MORE ADVANCED. MESTIZOS ARE NOW THE DOMINANT POPULATION AND ONCE DOMINANT CREOLE COASTAL POPULATION HAVE DECLINED TO ONLY 20% OF OUR POPULATION AND CONTINUE TO DECLINE. In three more generations, Creole as a language is expected to almost disappear in Belize. It is believed they immigrate abroad, as they love cities and salaried jobs and seem reluctant to get into pioneering development entrepreneurial ventures. Broad Creole as a language, or dialect, is gradually converting to International English as job opportunites nowadays and in the future, require International English and Creole only speakers are at a disadvantage in the job market.

BELIZE ANNUAL AGRICULTURE SHOW, HOLDS IT´S OWN FOR 2011.

Fernando Orellana, the young farmer of the year, AWARD at the National Agriculture Fair held in Easter weekend.


Edgar Tzib, adult farmer of the year in Belize. 2011 Easter, National Agriculture Fair AWARD
*** Woman farmer of the year, Araceli Vasquez
ANNUAL NATIONAL AGRICULTURE SHOW IS OVER FOR ANOTHER YEAR, HELD DURING EASTER.

The attendence records show a rise of about 1000 people on the Saturday. Sunday ran more or less the same as the previous year, around 15,000. This is the hottest weekend of the year pretty much and at my age I stopped going, because of the heat and lack of shade and benches to rest. Too much for me, otherwise I would attend. There was no mention if there was more increase in agricultural events this year from the farmers? People were complaining last year at the decline of the National Agriculture Show.

The THREE FARMERS OF THE YEAR WERE;

Mrs. Aracelli, the WOMAN farmer of the year. Mr. Edgar TZIB the adult FARMER of the year. Mr. Fernando Orellana, the young persons choice.
From the description, the awards were placed for these people because of the general diversified nature of their farms. Insuring against any one loss season in anything, by income from other endeavors, giving a good living year round. There are a lot of farmers these days specializing in one crop seasonal ventures. The ONION people overproduced this year and lack the ability to store and protect their crop for selling over a six month period. Most of the ONION farmers face hardship, due to planting and crop loans. Agriculture Minister, Rene Montero says the government will assist in planting the next crop. You can do three crops a year in tropical Belize. You can do more if you wanted, with staggering through irrigation systems. The Ag department is attempting to get the storage technology from abroad. The NETHERLANDS was mentioned.

We are soon going to be EXPORTING RICE and the rice paddy is now up to 8 million pounds. El Salvador is rumored to be the target country, if we can eliminate the customs duties over there, in a PARTIAL SCOPE AGREEMENT. CATTLE are going to EL SALVADOR already, through middle men buyers. Not sure how it works, but expect it is contrabanded across the borders, due to costs of government rules and regulations. The price for beef thus does not rise, but at least we have export sales, even if they are under the table. Our corn crops, continue to be exported both legally and illegally across the border. Where there is a will, there is a way and making a profit is the name of the game. All good for the economy.

Citrus people are worrying about CITRUS GREENING destroying the citrus industry. Citrus Greening has been around, all over the world for decades. It should not be a problem. Citrus seems always to have some sort of problem. The Citrus Greening is just something new to Belize and we do not seem to understand the options at the government bureaucratic level yet.

The TOLEDO DISTRICT is starting to become important in different small niche export agriculture markets, as the populations expand in our Southern district. Looking for a tripling of the population in the Toledo District over the next 20 years. The big problem is going to be sorting out the lands, surveying, and issuing of titles. Our LANDS DEPARTMENT continues to be overwhelmed.

AMONG FARMERS there is a solid feeling that the nation of Belize in Agriculture is on the move! Agriculture is seen as one way to get RICH. Many are doing it too. Processed foods for export are much in the discussion mode these days and more and more products are being produced. Some difficulties meeting with international standards are being experienced, due to red tape paperwork and associated expenses eating up the profit.

Politicians of Costa Rica responsible sea turtle extinction. In Belize politicians responsible for lobster fishery extinction trend.

lobster traps under seasonal repair.
Cabinet Minister, Manuel Heredia, of Belize islands with greatest lobster fisheries has proven inadequate in tourism at the national level and of protecting the lobster, national patrimony fisheries in his electoral division.
Not so honorable, Cabinet Minister for Fisheries is more into landbased agriculture and incompetent when it comes to protecting the spiney lobster fishery. We say that, because as a Western Belize politician, he tends to the things he knows, which is agriculture, but not fisheries.
Ruling UDP party leader Dean Barrow, fails to prevent spiny lobster fishery from going toward extinction. He is a lawyer and orientated to things with courts, not into practical things to do with the private sector economy, a failure of leadership. Guess you can´t have everything?
Shame about the declining spiney lobster fishery though, due to improper and inadequate management controls. Such a simple thing to fix.

The politicians have FAILED to insist the Fisheries regulations, make it mandatory for lobster traps to have a 3 inch gap between the floor of a lobster trap and the first lathe on the sides, to allow immature lobsters that have not yet reached the age of spawning, to escape when traps are hauled out of the water. The immature lobster are sold to restaurants. West of Caye Caulker and West of the BAJO, you get only juvenile lobster. Nobody should be even fishing there. These three ( managers of the patrimony of Belize have failed to manage our spiny lobster fishery properly in a timely manner. )



_________________________________________

WHY THE TURTLES ARE GOING EXTINCT!








SEA TURTLE EXTINCTION -- NOT CAUSED BY GLOBAL WARMING


Aha, maybe we have just discovered why the sea turtle is going extinct & it is not global warming. !!!!!!!....
World shame - the coast in COSTA RICA


Please distribute widely.
The Turtle eggs are stolen to be sold.
The planet is thankful for the forwarding of this email.

NOTHING LIKE A PICTURE TO EXPLAIN AN EXTINCTION

USA PRESIDENTIAL SLATE FROM BELIZE VIEWPOINT

BEST USA PRESIDENTIAL SLATE!

Jesse Ventura for President and Donald Trump for Vice President.

or; Jesse Ventura for President and Sara Palin for Vice President and Donald Trump for Ambassador to Belize.

=============================================

Canada is the new America. All the properties and investments in the Americas are now being made by Canadians.

Canadians are also the new breed of property buyers in Belize.
_______________________________________

UDP RULING GOVERNMENT LOSE 2 POINTS FROM THEIR REPORT CARD -NOW 62%

Devastated lobster fishery of Belize killed by Manuel Heredia and Rene Montero, two Cabinet Ministers under the party leadership of PM Dean Barrow.



UDP LOSE 2 POINTS FROM THEIR REPORT CARD, FOR NEGLIGENCE! New score 62%.

Belize Lobster Industry has been killed, or decimated by BOTH the PUP and UDP governments. THEY HAVE CONSISTENTLY REFUSED TO REGULATE TRAPS TO HAVE A 3 INCH GAP REQUIREMENT AT THE BOTTOM OF THE TRAP, SO SMALL LOBSTERS CAN ESCAPE.

In theory, but not in practice, the two major political parties of Belize have ruined the Lobster Industry. Neither, when in power has legislated and enforced that the bottom lathe of the Belize lobster traps be set 3 inches above the floor of the trap. No one knows why the politicians have resisted, or been delinquent in conserving in perpetuity, the lobster industry. At least with the Spanish Mackerel industry we could claim ignorance of everyone involved in overfishing and complete killing off the Spanish Mackerel fishery, by allowing fishing during the Spanish Mackerel spawning holes. Now we know better, but it was too late. Many Spanish Mackerel spawning spots are now completely devoid of this specie of fish. But the lobster? This is ridiculous, for we have known for a very long time, across two political party terms what was necessary to do and it was not done.
=================================

(Belize Culture debating Listserve reprint.)

How To Revive The Belize Lobster Industry
April 30, 2011 By bz-admin Leave a Comment

During earlier years the Belize lobster industry was among the finest in the world.

It provided major financial support that bolstered the Belize economy. But lobster fisheries today no longer produce such financial support, and the lobster season that just closed was the worst in history.

The destruction of Belize’s once great lobster fisheries, with its enormous decline in catch and loss of revenue, has been brought about by the Government’s eight year refusal to listen to its own expert.

When the decline in revenue from the fisheries reached major proportions, the Government employed a marine biologist, who was an eminent authority on lobster fisheries, to advise the Government.

This eminent marine biologist was Maria Estela de Leon. Maria Estela provided recommendations that were the same as the laws used in the major lobster producing countries such as New Zealand, Australia, Cuba and the United States.

The first recommendation was that the lobsters be brought ashore alive.

A second recommendation was that the measurement of the lobster to determine its legal size should not be the weight of the lobster tail. It should be the measurement from between the eyes, or horns, of the lobster to the back of thebody shell. The same method that is used by major lobster producing countries.

Belize’s then and present manner of determining whether a lobster is of legal size is to rip off its tail, killing the lobster. The tails are then taken ashore to be weighed. If the tails do not weigh enough, they are rejected. The rejects are tails of undersized lobsters that were illegal to take in the first place.

It is the epitome of ignorance to ignore procedures used by successful countries and kill off the small lobsters, by ripping off their tails, to determine whether they have grown to legal size.

It would not take more than ten seconds, to do like other countries and use a small 2 ounce hand gauge to determine whether the lobster is large enough to be considered legal size.

If it were not large enough, the lobster would immediately be returned to the water where it could grow up and reproduce. It would not have to suffer death by mutilation.

Bringing in lobsters alive is a universal practice. It is done in all major lobster producing countries and doesn’t create a problem.

When I was last in New Zealand, lobster fishermen accumulated and kept their catch alive in their receivers for more than two weeks, until there was a price increase.

Though it would have cost nothing, the Government has, for approximately eight years, sat on its hands and refused to follow the experts’ advice.

If the advice had been followed, the lobster fisheries would have been rejuvenated to where it again became a major source of fishermen’s income. But because the advice was not followed, Belize’s lobster catch has declined to a point where income from lobster hunting is so paltry, the industry is almost dead.

There was one other important recommendation by the expert that was also rejected. This was a recommendation to outfit lobster traps with escapes so that baby lobsters could escape from the traps.

All that was necessary was to leave an opening running along each side of the trap, near the bottom, some 2 3/4 inches high. The opening would allow undersized lobsters to walk out of the trap.

Traps with these openings are used by the world’s major lobster producing countries. But Belize would not adopt the modified trap, even though it would have saved the lives of hundreds of thousands of baby lobsters, which have since
perished.

In any major lobster-producing country, Belize’s lobster traps would be considered illegal and would be destroyed.

Instead of returning tiny lobsters, that are trapped to the water, the prevailing procedure in Belize is to scoop them up, rip-off their tails and bring the tiny tails ashore by the thousands to sell to restaurants for lobster stew.

The practice is so prevalent, that when fishermen are questioned about why they take the baby lobsters, the common response is: “Well, if I don’t take them, someone else will”.

Thousands upon thousands of baby lobsters that were not able to escape from the traps are taken and killed each season. They are killed, before they have the chance to grow up and have babies of their own.

Now is the time to begin building new traps, or rework the old ones, so that sensible traps will be used in the coming season to protect the new generation of baby lobsters.

Even if the traps are not built or modified, lobsters can be properly measured by a small hand gauge.

Only legal size lobsters should be brought ashore alive, and there should be strict enforcement of the law to return undersized lobster to the water so that they may grow to adulthood and reproduce.

This one conservation measure would help prevent further depredation of the Belize spiny lobster.

The Government of Belize had a choice and it chose to do nothing! It is true that the previous government began this process of depredation, but the present government is squarely responsible for taking corrective measures.

Will the UDP continue to stand by and preside over the demise of the Belize lobster industry? Will it be inaction as usual, or will there be a vigorous response in favour of common sense?

Will the Old School fishing lobby prevail, or will there be young voices raised in favour of common sense? The Government has a clear duty to respond. But will it?

From a Letter To The Belize News Media by Kenneth Gale.

Mr. Gale is a retired judge from the U.S. currently residing in Belize
_________________________________

************ As a retired 74 year old lobster fisherman, founding member of the FIRST FISHING COOPERATIVE IN THE COUNTRY OF THEN COLONIAL BELIZE and since Central Cayo, Rene Montero our area representative on the CABINET with the responsibility for Agriculture and Fisheries is also my representative in the CABINET, I find this lack of leadership by RENE MONTERO mysterious. It will cost him MY VOTE if he does not fix things within this term of his office. - Ray Auxillou -
____________________________

BTL high speed internet censorship blocking causing trouble with public service.

BTL BLOCKING CENSORSHIP CREATES 2 to 6 second time lag drops in new high speed internet system.

Some telecommunications types on the Belize Rural listserve are saying and complaining that many of their favorite sites will not load, or stay loaded. The tracking and back engineering has been traced to blocking mechanisms put on by BTL, a sort of censorship to assist them blocking VOIP communications. A by product is the fact that many FAST sites, with 2 second or up to 6 second reload times, are being denied to the subscriber of the new BTL High Speed internet.