A Meaningful Conversation about the Sargassum Problem with the BTB (Finally)

Ok…ok…the title is maybe a little snarky. “Finally” might sound a bit harsh. But here’s why I’m using it: sargassum has been an emergency (I’m not using that word lightly), on and off but mostly ON, since at least 2015. Sargassum feels like an existential threat to our livelihoods, and too often we…hotel owners, homes, shops, restaurants, kids, adults…we feel like we’ve been fighting it alone.

This post isn’t about venting frustration (ok… maybe a little bit), but about something that is actually giving me hope: knowing that the BTB is out there actively working on this. The post is also about how important communication is.

If you live on Ambergris Caye…or anywhere along the Caribbean coast, you already know. You’ve seen it. At some times of the year, you smell it. The gas it gives off degrades metal, chews up air conditioners…other appliances and spits them out. You’ve watched our shores getting covered and then eaten away by it. The guest reviews, the apologetic responses, the Facebook threads…all of it. Sargassum has been a SERIOUS problem here for over a decade, and for most of that time, it’s felt like our government has been pretty much absent from the conversation.

Hotels and resorts have been spending thousands…tens of thousands of dollars a month on cleanup. Every property along the coast feels like it’s essentially on its own, figuring out what works, what doesn’t, where they dump it, what they can afford. It feels like there has been no central guidance, only the assignment of high-level task forces, a few meetings, but no visible national response.

There was talk last year about declaring sargassum a national state of emergency. It never happened. A Sargassum Task Force was established at the national level, co-chaired by Minister of Tourism Anthony Mahler and Minister of Blue Economy & Marine Conservation Andre Perez. I’m not sure what the results were.

The Belize Fund for a Sustainable Future distributed a grant of $250,000 BZD in October/November of last year to be split among hotels and resorts along the coast. Good. But we need bigger solutions. We want to KNOW that this is the emergency at the national level as we feel here on the ground. Solutions need to scale as much as the problem is scaling.

Is it all hands on deck at the local and national government level? Is the Dept of Environment working on establishing official dump sites for collected sargassum to prevent it from poisoning our land and lagoons? Is the Department of Finance considering Duty exemptions for sargassum solutions…for air conditioners that are destroyed by the gases? Is the Ministry of Natural Resources considering how seawalls and dredging is affecting the flow and accumulation of sargassum. Is the Health Department working on educating the population on the effects of the fumes?

This should be near or at the top of every government offices’ agenda – at our local level and at the national level.

So I was very happy to see the invite for a meeting with Efren Perez, the national president of the BTIA, at Matachica Resort, the second meeting this year. After the first one, back in January, I wrote that Ambergris Caye is at Risk.

I was especially glad to know to know that Andrew Usher, Director of Industry Development & Guest Experience at the Belize Tourism Board, would be there as well. About 15-20 hotel owners, managers, and property managers were in the room, including representatives from the Ambergris North Alliance. Efren said he wanted a meaningful conversation. After years of feeling like everyone was shouting into the void, often the social media void, this was fantastic.

After Efren, Andrew Usher spoke. And it turns out, things ARE happening. I felt like they haven’t been telling us about them. At all. But I did get to ask that question, and I’ll get to that in a bit….

Here is what Andrew and his team have been working on. And the number one takeaway for me: there is no huge magic solution. Nobody has one. What they are focused on is removal from the water, before it ever hits the beach. And honestly, that sounds right to me.

• The focus is on 5 destinations. Ambergris Caye, Caye Caulker, Hopkins, Seine Bight, and Placencia Village. Solutions might need to be customized for each location (Though it’s important to note that this problem affects the Belize Tourism industry as a whole. Belize is a brand – and if people write it off…”I heard the beach is gross”…this will affect every area of the industry from the Mountain Pine Ridge to Lamanai)
• There is some central government funding in place.
• A DESMI Tri-Turtle is on its way. Made by a Danish company (that’s been around since the mid 1800s!), this is a remotely controlled, stainless steel floating unit that draws in sargassum and water in shallow or deeper coastal water, before the seaweed hits the beach and mixes with sand. The collected material gets pumped to a floating platform for de-watering before transport and disposal. Mexico has been buying these extensively, which has created a waitlist. But good news: it shipped last week and is expected to be ready for testing here by end of May. Long-term, the BTB is exploring working with resorts for permanent installations at properties with sufficient space, with underground discharge pipes and return lines for centralized collection.
• A customized beach rake was tested in Placencia. A mini-excavator fitted with a specialized sargassum rake, modified based on trial results to skim the surface without disturbing sand, removed 300 cubic yards of sargassum in 6-7 hours.
• Barriers are showing the most promise regionally. Containment barriers block sargassum from reaching shore while allowing water and wind to pass through. Based on what’s being seen across the Caribbean, these are currently the most effective tool available.
• They’re exploring locally-manufactured collection nets. Imported options require too many modifications for local conditions, so there are conversations underway about manufacturing nets here. (I’m curious about this one)
• Andrew Usher is already in contact with Chris Miser (read about his invention here) He was scheduled to meet with the inventor of the locally-developed Sargassum Slayer right after this meeting.

There were great questions from the group. Two people asked about reef channel barriers, since that is where much of the sargassum enters, especially in the calmer summer and fall months. One member said that about a year ago, the Minister of the Blue Economy said that channel barriers would be installed in the next few months

Another raised the issue of inter-ministerial coordination. The Blue Economy ministry, the Department of Environment, Tourism, our local government, the Hol Chan Marine reserve who bought two expensive collection boats that are now MIA – these entities haven’t always been working in coordination, and that fragmentation has cost everyone time. There was acknowledgment in the room that this needs to improve. There was also a pointed concern about the unchecked construction of seawalls and barge landings, which can significantly worsen sargassum accumulation and erosion.

My question was: why are we just hearing about this now?

Andrew Usher’s answer was honest: PR isn’t his forte, and the team has been moving through iterations, tests, and trials. They didn’t want to announce things before they had something more finished to show. That’s understandable. But the HUGE problem is that in the absence of any communication, the entire tourism community on this island has been operating under the assumption that nothing was being done. Things become very adversarial. I think folks would rather know what they are testing…what they are seeing internationally… what works… what doesn’t… to be invested in the solution…to work together.

It doesn’t need to be on Facebook – where everyone is a Face-Know-It-All and/or professional criticizer…where even the poster of a cherubic kitten pic can be eviscerated. But meetings like this one? With the BTIA? Are SOOOO needed.

When something feels like an existential threat to the very core of what makes this island worth visiting, silence from the government doesn’t read as “we’re working on it….

The BTB acknowledged this directly. They know they need to do better on public communication and stakeholder engagement. They’re planning to work with marketing and PR firms on how to address sargassum directly with travelers. They’re working on maps showing sargassum presence to help visitors plan. And longer term, they’re thinking about how to bring the private sector in as real partners, not just recipients of information, but collaborators investing in proven equipment and taking responsibility for local cleanup.

I don’t know if any of this is going to work. I don’t know how widespread the solutions will be, or how fast. I don’t think there’s a magic fix coming – sargassum is a global problem with roots far beyond our shoreline, and anyone promising a complete solution is selling something. But there’s a real difference between not knowing what’s happening and knowing that serious people are working seriously on it. I’ll take the latter. It’s not everything. But I’ll take it!

Thank you Matachica, the BTIA (join them to get this type of information) and Andrew Usher and his team from the BTB for holding this meeting.

As always…let me know what you think (preferably after you read my post – I get some many comments from people who don’t…but just dive in)

And here’s an IMPORTANT voice…

A video that I saw yesterday after our meeting from a business owner in Placencia illustrates the enormity of the problem – he is saying many of the same things.