Agricultural Technical Cooperation between Belize and Guatemala

Jose Abelardo Mai

The Ministry of Agriculture recently took a trip to Guatemala in an effort to identify areas of technical cooperation between both countries to improve the agriculture industry.  Agriculture Minister Jose Abelardo Mai says that there is interest in best practices for fruit trees and have made advancements in gender inclusion in the agriculture industry.  In the first of many meetings, Guatemala sought interest in Belize’s agro-processing unit and wants training. Minister Mai says that they will collaborate in these areas.

Jose Abelardo Mai, Ministry of Agriculture

“I think that they have tremendous advances over us in fruit trees and that is one area that we can collaborate in. Secondly, another very good program they have is they have a very strong female in agriculture program where they have women and young women involved in agriculture. They have a female extension officer that deals only with that sector of society and I think it was a good program and something that we can mimic in Belize. They in turn saw our agro-processing unit as a very good initiative. They want us to train their people to add value to their products and I think we are prepared to do so. They were very impressed with our sheep program, the genetic improvement program at Central Farm and they also want to do something similar to that. So I think it was a good exchange of information, exchange of ideas and this is only the first of other meetings to come.”