Come on Pedro, give him a little slack. There are a lot of things Belize could do if they were in the financial position of Mexico.

Whoops, I was about to comment on political issues and I cannot vote in Belize.

I was answering his uninformed questions

Sounds Idealistic to not charge these taxes and fees they pay for some services that are necessary.
Mexico has had the cheap air fare since the early 80's with no effect on Belize, We offer something entirely different and they offer the cheap air fare in desperation for tourist trade.
The tourist using the mex/air then bus to Belize are just cheap tourist taking advantage of Mexico's desperation.

Oh Elbert, don't make me have to agree with Pedro on your comments. The lower cost air fare to Mexico definatly effects Belize tourisim. I know persoally people who have gone right up the coast to Mexico instead of Belize because of price. And I think when it comes to "desperate for tourism", it better describes Belize than Mexico.

Elbert stick to your rental business

Jeez guys...Elbert you really, really, really need a wake up call and I'm suspecting that you'll get one very soon unfortunately. Kind of hard to charge 20% on zero. Calling a tourist cheap because the prices to travel via Mexico are about 30-40% cheaper is ridiculous. The fact of the matter is that the thing that has always appealed to the North American tourist is the relative ease of trip between Belize/Houston/Toronto etc. Once this is gone because price makes it inaccessible my friend, so does your business. "Cheap tourists" are what have been increasing the tourisim growth here.

And maybe these dive boat operators might figure out not paying commission would be a good way to offset higher costs. After all, if someone wants to take a dive trip, dive boat operators aren't that hard to locate and book direct with.

Now your getting nasty :-)

The fact of the matter is this, and hopefully it adds a little something to this discussion;

1) ultimately there is little we can do to off-set the immediate strain that these coming times will bring

2) times of stuggle and slow-down are a great point at which new ideas should be brought out in order to mitigate against future similar situations

3) no one is immune - ESPECIALLY if you are in the tourism business in any sort of degree

Now is the time to think of reasonable ways we can come together to make our businesses better in the future and to support each other when the tough times (oh and they will) hit.

BTW - the ironic thing about the two of you arguing is that you both are in the business of the things I love most in this world - diving and pizza!