30 Million Dollars: World Bank/Belize Loan

When I was a young gal, back in my college days at my liberal, urban university, I took a class called something like Globalization 101. This was taught by a fiery, short, cute nerdy graduate student who passionately explained, described and at times demonized the World Bank, IMF, giant corporations and other key players and influences in the phenomenon of Globalization. This phenomenon is not an entirely evil thing and certainly provides benefits to many populations and societies, but it seems that the little guys get screwed. From wikipedia, I found this simple definition, as well as a long entry including critiques, explanations, negative and positive impacts, scholarly input, history, etc...

Globalization (or globalisation) describes an ongoing process by which regional economies, societies, and cultures have become integrated through a globe-spanning network of communication and trade. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Globalization)

In this Globalization class of mine we spoke at length about the World Bank (WB) and the International Monitary Fund (IMF) and attempted to understand the processes that occur when these players start doling out money to impoverished nations. While sitting in that academic world, surrounded by similarly aged college students with our notebooks, laptops, cell phones and textbooks, the big ideas to me sounded too gargantuan to grasp; too complex and removed and unknown to contextualize. I gained some understanding of the WB and IMF but they just seemed like things, entities. Things I cannot control nor entirely understand or relate to. I might feel they're presence or grasp vaguely their effects or roles in society but always I stop short of really getting it... I get this similar feeling when thinking about monolithic entities, events or concepts such as mega-corporations, God and war.

Well, here I am in Belize. I've been here six months now and I'm starting to make connections, build relationships, start projects and get involved and invited to things such as World Bank meetings (this time as a rep of the House of Culture, where I volunteer). Belize is currently in the process of acquiring a $15mil US or $30mil BZ loan from the World Bank. Initially when I heard about this, I thought it was a grant. That may have been my idealistic, optimistic mind filling in the blank, or replacing bad words with good words. Grant is a much better word than a Loan, clearly. I know this, I went to college, I applied for financial aid. But in college, I was working with thousands of dollars, and not that many thousands. This is a much bigger deal.(And yet, its all so so small in the global financial world.)

The first meeting I went to was a workshop meeting that lasted about five hours and the objective was to review the Social Assessment Framework of this Municipal Development Project. Big words. In attendance were big people from institutions like the Ministry of Financial Development, The World Bank, the Social Investment Fund and of course Roger's counterpart, Mr. Nick Ruiz, the mayor of Benque Viejo. (I want to make a quick note about Roger's role in this also. He is working with the mayor on this project to draft up the things that Benque will do with the money they receive. He is in no way responsible for the application of this loan, while falls on the shoulders of the Government of Belize. His role is to assist the town council of Benque in its project creation and development as a town.) At this meeting, the loan was vaguely spoken of, instead talk consisted of what would be done with the money. They are hoping to have a three year project, with money dispursed by this June and projects starting late this year.
A few weeks later, I'm invited to a next meeting. This time it is a National World Bank Workshop to discuss things like how the money will be granted, how hiring will occur when the projects actually start, more on the social assessment and impacts of the loan, environmental safeguards and the forthcoming environmental impact assessment (EIA) for large projects, land acquisition and involuntary resettlement issues. In attendance are Mayors from each district, town council members, community members, NGOs, Tourism Board members, Bank Managers and several World Bank officials.

Now here are some points I gathered from the meeting:
-- Its been almost 10 years since the WB has invested in Belize. Without getting into history or politics, it sounds like this is due largely to past political corruption and misuse of funds. A CEO for the Financial Sector in Belize got up to emphasize the necessity of transparency and strict regulations of this loan, euphemistically referred to as an "injection of funds". To protect the proper speed and direction of this "injection", SIF (Social Investment Fund) will strictly regulate the fund distribution. I don't know a whole lot about SIF but that they are put in place to do this sort of thing.
-- At this meeting, each municipality (district) was present with an appropriate number of representatives. The biggest concerns seemed to be, 1) Where's the money; when and how much does my town/city/district get? & 2) We must hire locally. My people need jobs. Mayors want to make sure that jobs are created for the local people where the projects will take place and that they are not outsourced "X" amount of times to contractors who will skim funds, and/or who will hire cheaper labor from Mexico or Guatemala.
-- The majority of projects are geared towards infrustructure such as building and improving roads, providing adequate drainage, traffic management, & social infrustructure - markets, parks, bridges, shelters etc.. While the identified projects are definitely needed, I'm not sure how this loan can be taken out 'sustainably' or how Belize plans to pay it back.
-- Land Acquisition issues are tricky! There is an official proposed Grievance Redress Mechanism in place that will become contractual law once Belize signs the dotted line with WB for the loan. For land acquisition compensation of land or money must be made "within a reasonable time" to the owner/affected persons. Squatter's rights were another interesting topic of conversation. Apparently in Belize laws, squatter's (people who take up residence on land without purchasing, getting permission, etc, usually 'backabush') have rights to own the land after they've lived on it for 12 years. After this amount of time the official owner of the land (if there is one) cannot object or remove the squatter legally.

As we discussed these issues, the WB had its input while the mayors and other GOB (Gov't of BZ) officials had theirs. It was becoming clear to me as we discussed and trouble shooted these various scenarios that Belize laws and WB 'laws' or mandates will have to be navigated and clarified. How will things look as this 'project' develops and the key players dance between contracts, rules, regs and laws. In thinking through this, I began to see WB as nearly equal to a government power. Big. Powerful. Kind of scary. And yet the WB reps I met were kind, well spoken and had pretty smiles. One WB woman spoke with me about the role that NGOs could take in this project and how they could benefit from the money. For true. I'm sure they can. Another WB man with his dark skin, expensive suit and sparkly smile was so smooth and captivating as he shook my hand, gave me his card and talked with me about the project in no definite terms. I couldn't help but wonder how these people felt at the end of the day when they went home; if they consider the countries they work with on any smaller terms, as individual people or simply numbers and projects. And how much money do they make? They're very well dressed...

This was a full days workshop complete with lunch and snacks and lots of coffee. Some of it was terribly interesting; some pieces included monotone powerpoint presentations - dull and 'shoot me in the head' boring. At these times my mind would wander. I heard once during my short time so far in Belize (and I can't remember from whom) that for every dollar earned in Belize, about $.95 of that is owed back to someone else in loans. I don't know the numbers but I wonder what the current debt of the Government of Belize is and what the numbers will look like once this loan goes through. This loan, this injection of funds, this municipal project, makes me worried and nervous for the fate of Belize. I am beginning to fall in love with this country. I don't think I could ever call it home but I am fond of the people here and I don't want to witness their financial futures being screwed over (again) by bigger forces, mega-entities that seem impossible to control. Belize is a developing country that has many needed improvements to make. I don't doubt that this money, if properly used and administered, will better the districts and help the country to progress developmentally. But I worry, still, about "proper" ... in the way that one might worry about war, or corporations and goverment and the loss of clarity between the two. Yet, I'm just an observer, a visitor here to only look and listen. I must admit though, its strange to have such an opportunity to be in these big meetings, talk about this project and to learn about and attempt to understand the financial situation of Belize. Yet, ask me about my own country's financial situation and I have a pitiful lack of knowledge. I know its bad. Real, real bad. We're spending money we don't have and perhaps not very wisely, which seems to be the current state for much of the world. I'm not a financial expert, but this just doesn't seem good.