Initiated in 1998, and funded by CIDA Americas Branch, the co-management project has been carried out in partnership with the Maya of Belize. The project has had a number of important achievements, including the establishment of a GIS/multimedia research and mapping center in the Toledo District, and the development of local research and mapping capacity. Data collection and mapping of the community of Indian Creek was carried out and will be used as a model for replication in communities throughout the District.
Over the past two years, significant political developments have taken place in Belize, both in terms of the establishment of new Maya institutions and the negotiation of a landmark agreement between the Maya and the government. The Ten Points of Agreement and its framework for implementation offer Maya an opportunity to improve their situation, and to further their goals for establishing an equitable land governance system and for sustainable resource development. The Maya view co-management as a key vehicle for implementation of the agreement, and as a final activity under the co-management project ICC hosted a roundtable in Ottawa to more clearly identify how the co-management process might be used to that end. The meeting was attended by two Maya leaders, and a number of CIDA and Foreign Affairs representatives. ICC Canada Vice-President, Violet Ford, provided the participants with an account of the Labrador Inuit experience with the land claims process, and a discussion was held on how the sharing of other Canadian indigenous experiences might benefit the Maya at this turning point in time.
In December 2000, ICC successfully completed a three-year project in partnership with the Maya and Garifuna of Belize. The project included the establishment of a training institute (BITI), which provides training and services in the areas of community economic development and capacity-building. BITI has now reached a high level of self-sufficiency and is being viewed as a possible model for other regions in the Caribbean and Latin America. We are grateful to the Danish Foreign Ministry, the International Labour Office, and the United Nations Program for their support.
From Tundra to Tropics
THE INUIT CIRCUMPOLAR CONFERENCE (ICC) AND THE BELIZE INDIGENOUS TRAINING INSTITUTE (BITI)
ABORIGINAL-TO-ABORIGINAL INTERNATIONAL COOPERATION
I) Objectives
The Belize Indigenous Training Institute (BITI) began on an aboriginal-to-aboriginal basis in 1994. It is a joint-venture between the Inuit of Canada and Greenland and the Maya and Garifuna Peoples of Belize. The initiative is intended to help develop the capacity of Indigenous communities in Belize by transferring community economic development and training services from Inuit to Indigenous communities in Belize. Once these activities have begun to increase Belizean skills and expertise there will then have been established, a firm foundation upon which Inuit may base larger, economic joint-ventures.
The Institute has already implemented numerous revenue generating projects in different regions and communities, has provided capacity-building and institutional strengthening training in project development, proposal writing, and fundraising, and has initiated various projects in the area of traditional knowledge and cultural heritage. The Institute’s programs are designed to provide local peoples with income and employment at or near their homes; to increase community organizations’ capacity to develop, fund and manage their own projects; and to preserve and protect, as well as utilize to the benefit of Indigenous peoples, their traditional knowledge and cultural heritage.
BITI is the first occasion in the history of Belizean Indigenous Peoples where they have come together under one umbrella, with one vision.
“This makes the first collaboration between Indigenous peoples on an initiative of this scope and scale, an unprecedented instance of cooperation to meet the needs of our respective peoples.”
Indigenous Leaders of Belize
Press Conference, March 21, 1995
BITI is perceived as a model, which once firmly established in Belize, can by outreach or replication be used in other countries in the Caribbean and Latin American and elsewhere. In some ways such as with exchange projects between Maya in Belize and Guatemala, and Garifuna in Belize and Honduras, this outreach is already occurring. In addition, in the case of ICC’s Canada/Russia project where ICC is working with about 30 Indigenous groups, a similar institute, fashioned after BITI is being considered.
Ii) Impact
“A disturbing feature of the growth experience in Belize over the last decade has been the unevenness across districts. In particular, critical areas of poverty have been aggravated. Belize still has much to do to establish an adequate infrastructure of social services, especially in education at the post-secondary level and in health. The challenges are all the more daunting because of far-reaching demographic changes arising from the influx of Central American immigrants and from the resurgence of old diseases ? malaria, cholera and others.”
Belize, Five Year Development Plan, 1994-1998
While Belize is considered by many to be relatively well off, its Indigenous communities lag far behind the national average incomes and are, as in many countries, the poorest of the poor. Employment and training needs are many and the desire for land continues to be difficult to fully recognize as the development demands of foreign interests continue to erode local opportunities.
Jippy Jappa basketry. Photo courtesy of Terry Rudden .
BITI in its revenue generating activities has chosen therefore to work directly with communities in both developing projects which emerge from communities themselves, and in introducing new ones which can engage families at or near their homes and which like in the case of non-timber forest products, can show new, value-added opportunities which are environmentally friendly and sustainable. To these ends, BITI serves as a marketer for community products which the Institute has helped to enhance their quality. Local basketry for example has been improved in quality and in sizing and is now marketed by BITI both across Belize as well as through ICC’s network in Greenland. BITI is also training locals to produce rustic, bush furniture. This product utilizes liana cane which was previously burned for clearing purposes.
In all BITI through its range of programs including those in the area of traditional plants and medicines with elders, is providing direct income generating opportunities as well as laying the ground for globalization of Inuit skills and expertise.
Traditional healers. Photo courtesy of Kevin Knight.
“Our training needs cannot be met in a short-term workshop from outside. We need ongoing training, training that is based on our needs, and that will change as our needs change.”BITI Community Consultation Participant
May, 1995
Iii) Sustainability
“Our communities are facing the same pressures faced by Indigenous peoples worldwide. We are a minority in Belize. We fear that our traditions, language and culture will decline as our children learn to rely on the dominant culture for education, for employment, for housing, for justice, and for government. The inevitable consequence of this trend in other countries has been the economic and cultural marginalization of Indigenous peoples: there is no reason to expect that the impact will be otherwise in Belize.”
Indigenous Leaders of Belize
May, 1995
Not only is BITI endeavouring to provide sustainable income generating opportunities for Indigenous Peoples in Belize but its programs and activities are also targeted directly at sustainable, cultural development. These concerns, both for sustainable employment and for the sustainability of a culture are at the roots of BITI and are the reason why the Institute is organized with three divisions:
1. Revenue Generating Projects;
2. Capacity Building; and
3. Traditional Knowledge and Cultural Heritage.
Sustainability of employment if considered in the context of sustainable, cultural development and Indigenous Peoples usually takes on a very different form. Ideas, for job creation must in part bubble up from the community in order for local ownership of the eventual project to occur; training in Indigenous communities must address the learning styles, language and culture of the people; and economic development is often regarded as community economic development, or in other words communal development tied also to issues such as the spiritual connection of a people to the forest.
In BITI’s case therefore, its activities are targeted not only at economic sustainability but very much linked at the same time to issues of sustainability of a culture and its heritage.
Iv) Women
Producers of Jippy Jappa Products. Photo courtesy of Terry Rudden.
BITI’s activities to date have included the direct involvement of women, men, youth and elders. Projects within BITI vary in their nature from one with 11 male elders/ healers creating a medicinal farm, to one with 80 women helping to improve and assure quality of their basketry and provide markets, to one producing bush furniture where 7 husband and wife teams work together in production work. However, in the sense of pure numbers, approximately 60% of the people trained by BITI to date have been women. While this percentage is equally true even for the core staff of BITI itself, care has also been taken in providing sufficient gender equity to ensure that within the cultural norms of the Indigenous Peoples of Belize that male and female employees work on the community projects which most aptly suit the particular gender sensitivities of the target audience. Further, because BITI works on a cross-cultural basis, its projects have also to recognize and accommodate different ethnic groups and their need for BITI staff to be of that particular culture and language.
V) Canadian Content
The aboriginal-to-aboriginal theme of this intervention is not new, but from assessment of similar inter-indigenous work elsewhere, BITI and this particular application is highly unique.
“Sustainable community-based economic development can only occur when the community itself is in full control of the process. In developing countries, that often means the first step must be the development of capacity through community-controlled training.”
Inuit Circumpolar Conference
Principles of Development
BITI has been developed through an extensive community consultation process in Belize and with the direct input and support from Inuit who know the value and understand the approach for sustainable cultural development and the importance of such an instrument as BITI. Within BITI by implementing projects such as co-management Inuit will have helped to bridge the often found gap in land and resource management plans between local communities, government and the private sector by including traditional environmental knowledge and providing it the same weight as scientific knowledge. By so doing, this project should enhance natural resource management in Belize. This should enable Indigenous Peoples to find themselves with greater control and more involvement with their lands and resources without the often found adversarial approach take over land use and development.
Vi) Rights
While Belize is not a signatory to ILO Convention 169, BITI is advancing the principles of 169 to the practical level. Through its institutional strengthening work it deals also with issues of civil society and governance. By dealing directly with traditional knowledge and cultural heritage, BITI is also addressing concerns for the respect and accommodation of cultural values, language and customs. And in many of its projects such as production of non-timber forest products and co-management, BITI is directly involved in not only environmental sustainability, but also in sustainability of traditional knowledge and culture. Finally, given that BITI in Belize is viewed as a model, it can provide the potential for much wider application in the region and beyond.
Vii) Donors
Support for BITI has been provided by the Danish Aid Agency, Danida; by the International Labor Office, ILO; from ICC Canada and Greenland, and for co-management from CIDA. Partnership agreements have been established between the ICC and BITI with the ILO and UNESCO.
Projects
1. Enhanced jippy-jappa jewellery and basketry and marketing.2. Production and marketing of exotic bush furniture.
3. Traditional healers medicinal farm for traditional use and commercialization of various products.
4. Production of Garifuna Peoples’ arts and crafts.
5. Production of traditional embroidered products.
6. Training in capacity-building (project development, proposal writing and fundraising) and institutional development.
7. Corn mill development, maintenance and administration.
8. Citrus farm management, production and marketing.
9. Office management, computer science, administration and planning.
10. Youth development.
11. Development of a silk screen business (under development).
12. A major 5 year co-management project including development of a trained and equipped, resident indigenous capacity.
13. A cultural, multi-activity center (under development).
14. A national hydroponics program (under development).
15. A research and development project on the reintroduction of traditional Maya agriculture (under development).
Co-Management
This project, conducted in partnership with the Maya of southern Belize, is in its second year of implementation. It is largely based on the experience of Inuit from Nunavik, but will also include input from other regions in Canada. To date, the project has been the subject of considerable attention by the Maya of Belize because it is central to the 10 Points of Agreement recently signed by the Government of Belize and the Maya. Aimed at addressing long-standing land-tenure issues through a district programme of co-management, the project began with a research activity that will lead to the production of maps and other tools needed for co-management programming.
Further information is available at www.geocities.com/mayacomanage/
Belize Indigenous Training Institute
The Belize Indigenous Training Institute (BITI) is a joint-venture between Inuit (Eskimo) of Canada, Greenland, Alaska and Russia, and the Maya and Garifuna peoples of Belize. Its purpose is to provide practical training in areas that will lead to income generation and employment at the community level as well as to provide capacity building training and work in the area of traditional knowledge and cultural heritage.
BITI Times – Issue No. 2 – October 1999
The eventual outcome of BITI, once skills are enhanced, is for Inuit and Indigenous Peoples of Belize to engage in larger, long-term joint-ventures.
BITI acquires support from DANIDA (Denmark), CIDA (Canada), the ILO of the U.N., UNESCO, the Greenland Government and the Inuit Circumpolar Conference.
The BITI Board
49 Main Street, Punta Gorda, Toledo, Belize, C.A.
Tel. No. 501 7 22551
Fax No. 501 7 22551
E-mail: biti@btl.net
Mr. David Magana, Chairman
San Jose Succotz, Cayo
Mr. Austin Flores, Vice-Chairman
Dangriga
Mr. Gregorio Choc, Treasurer
Punta Gorda
Mr. Pio Coc, Secretary
Punta Gorda
Mr. Victor Cal, National Coordinator
Punta Gorda
BITI is a legally incorporated Belizean NGO, established in 1998.
The BITI Times
The BITI Times is a quarterly publication. If you are interested in receiving
a free copy of this publication, please contact:
In Belize:
Mr. Victor Cal, National Coordinator
Tel. No. 501 7 22551
Fax No. 501 7 22551
E-mail: biti@btl.net
Outside Belize:
ICC (Canada)
Tel. No. (613) 563-2642
Fax No. (613) 565-3089
E-mail: tuktu@magi.com