Earlier this week we reported that 15 conservation leaders signed a letter expressing their concerns regarding deforestation activities occurring within the Manatee Forest Reserve. This reserve also happens to fall within The Belize Rural Central Constituency of Dolores Balderamos Garcia, and so today we asked her whether she has taken the cries of these conservationists into consideration. While generic, her answer was well meaning.
Dolores Balderamos Garcia, Minister of Human Development
"I mean we have to take that on board in other words if there is a situation where we have deforestation and we saw what happened with the 11 inches and more of rain in the La Democracia area of course we have to be concerned. We must absolutely be concerned so I would say let us encourage the reports that come so that our country can take the necessary steps because again you know when we heard it said that we probably didn't expect that kind of erosion and difficulty that took place on the Coastal plane highway we didn't expect it in 100 years but well Hello it happened within one year. And so we have to take onboard those reports we have to work with our NGO community and at least on my part I want to signal that we will work with the reports we get and hope that the government and all our agencies can respond in an adequate way."
We note that many of the lands given within the reserve date back to the early 2000's.
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