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Admiral John Borland, Commandant - Belize Coast Guard
"The equipment you see here laid out is part of the enduring friendship program, the partnership that we have with the United States Government Southern Command and State Department INL under which most of the equipment you see displayed today came from. There are a variety of equipment raging from zodiac tactical boats that are mainly going to be employed by the seals for tactical operations. There are life jackets. There is 200 of them on display. They are going to be issued to the fleet. The fleet are the people who do the work on a daily basis, they go to sea every day, so they need the best equipment that we have. The foul weather gear is also going to be issued to the fleet. There are 200 sets and they are going to be use whenever the fleets on operations in foul weather. Foul weather means inclement weather or bad weather. The better you take care of a man under inclement conditions, the better he will operate."

Courtney Weatherburne
"Tell us how significant these pieces of equipment are to the fleet and of course the entire Coast Guard?"

Admiral John Borland, Commandant - Belize Coast Guard
"Extremely significant. We operate in a very fluid and unforgiving environment. The men are always at risk, always at peril especially in bad sea conditions. When the men are out there ill prepared is risk they are taking. They are risking their lives and they do this for their country. So it is imperative that we as their commanders ensure that they have the very best equipment to work out there with."

"This equipment is very hard to come by and not to mention how expensive it is. So its seriously welcome opportunity and we embrace everything that is gifted here by INL or by Southern Command here today."

George Lovell, CEO, Ministry of National Security
"The Coast Guard have been privilege to have these large Boston Whalers and fast boats and when you look at the engine that they have behind these vessels, not only the engine, the draft that these vessels have - it's certainly restrict the number of time that we would have to employ them in a way that we would like to employ them. It also limits and restrict the areas in which they can operate. These 8 zodiacs and these 200 life jackets and the foul weather gears, will certainly be able to help them to be out there in adverse weather and be able to transit all those shallow areas that are after experience in northern San Pedro, Bachalar Chico area and these mangroves area where the large Boston Whalers and fast boats cannot transit - they will now be able to operate in these areas and to be a little bit more effective."

Now aside from officer safety, this equipment will also greatly improve maritime operations. Of course this includes stopping the prevalent transitional crimes such as drug trafficking and human smuggling. CEO in the Ministry of National Security George Lovell explained how this donation will enhance efficiency.

George Lovell, CEO, Ministry of National Security
"We can never do as well as we would want to do, but we are working diligently and every moment we get we try to enhance the capacity that we have to effectively combat transnational crime. As you do know that there are trends that constantly change on us. As soon as we get to a certain level of efficiency, sometimes it switch on us and we would start all over again. So it's an ever changing, ever evolving operations that we are doing. We believe that with the resources that we have, we are as effective as we can be today. But as you note in my remarks that I gave earlier, our intent is to be a little more effective as we go beyond just the coastal areas, but into out exclusive economic zones and into our entire maritime space that we have. We are looking forward to get these large patrols crafts which hopefully will be able to give us the type of platform from which we can have more sustained and lengthy operations from which small boats like zodiacs will be able to deploy from on that mother ship concept that we intend to do."

The cost of this donation is over $500,000. The Coast Guard also received laptops and surveillance equipment which are already in use.