Path of destruction
a large tract of central America's remaining rainforest is under threat from a road in the remote south of Belize. The construction of the road might lead to the clearing of the entire forest and spark a land dispute with the local Mayan Indians. Logging companies and largescale banana and citrus growers are set to invade their territory and take over their communal lands in Toledo district.
The us $60 million road project is being co-ordinated by the Inter American Development Bank in Washington. The Bank claimed that the road will improve transportation of agricultural products and access to social and health services. But the Mayans are dreading the prospect of such development. "Once the road is paved, the Belizean elites will come pouring in with big schemes for citrus production, tourism and international commerce,' said Steven Tullberg, director of the Indian Law Resource Centre in Washington.
Related Content
- Finance for climate action: scaling up investment for climate and development
- Can coastal cities turn the tide on rising flood risk?
- Building back better: achieving resilience through stronger, faster, and more inclusive post-disaster reconstruction
- Rising above the floods and working hand-in-hand
- Wetlands on path to destruction
- The 27 May 1937 catastrophic flow failure of gold tailings at Tlalpujahua, Michoacán, Mexico