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Inside Government's Deliberations On Airport Opening

And while the AG seemed relatively sure that there will not be a need to extend the State of Emergency beyond the end of the month, he was less certain about a possible date for the reopening of the airport.

There is still no planned date for when the country will start accepting visitors, which is directly connected to the rebooting of the tourism industry. Realizing that the topic would come up eventually, Peyrefitte shared some insight from the Government's deliberations as to why they are still undecided on this very important decision:

Hon. Michael Peyrefitte- Attorney General

"Everybody wants to know about the airport. Well, the situation is there is no decision yet on the airport. We thought we had come to a decision in the cabinet and upon getting some consolation with some people. But we decided afterwards to say look, what we thought would have been safe, based on pronouncements made by the World Health Organization and PAHO and other places, that we could have found a safe way to open the airport and have the airport opened by a certain time. However, we found out that some of the studies were not reliable. We cannot enter a scenario where if you make 10 tests only 6 are reliable. So, that is not a safe way to open the airport. And pretty soon we will come to a determination more or less when it will be opened but we don't want to give a date just to give a date. We want to give a date when we know for sure we will be as ready as we possibly can to open the airport. So the airport remains closed for the moment. The borders- western border, northern border, southern border- those remain closed as well. Flights are not coming in. People are not allowed to break the border to go across or to come in, except for those people who have applied to the Foreign Ministry and the Foreign Ministry has gotten approval from the Ministry of Health, the Ministry of Immigration, National Security, Civil Aviation. Those people must be belizeans or permanent residents, diplomats, students and the like. So, if you are one of those people, you apply to the Foreign Affairs Ministry, through the Covid19 website and the Foriegn Ministry takes you to a committee and we decide on who can come in based on where they are coming in from and what we have to do to protect ourselves from those people or to have those people protect themselves from us once they come into the country."

Today, pressure group COLA issued a release saying, quote, "we clearly sympathize with the plight of the tourism and other associated industries…

But that is no excuse for the hasty campaign by Tropic Air for the Government to reopen the Philip Goldson International Airport…The commentary by Tropic Air's CEO, Mr. Steven Schulte, unfortunately smacks of greed and putting making profits ahead of the safety and well-being of all Belizeans and especially his own workers.The many cannot die for the greed of a few." End quote.

And speaking of opening borders, reliable reports say that the Melchor border is now closed and under quarantine for 72 hours. This is after the head of Immigration for that Guatemalan border station died suddenly of respiratory failure and then one of his co workers tested positive for COVID-19. The immigration officers working on that shift have all been on mandatory quarantine.

And now, the border has been quarantine and, reports say, no one is allowed to go near the gate that separates the borders.

Channel 7

Today, pressure group COLA issued a release saying, quote, "we clearly sympathize with the plight of the tourism and other associated industries���
But that is no excuse for the hasty campaign by Tropic Air for the Government to reopen the Philip Goldson International Airport���The commentary by Tropic Air's CEO, Mr. Steven Schulte, unfortunately smacks of greed and putting making profits ahead of the safety and well-being of all Belizeans and especially his own workers.The many cannot die for the greed of a few." End quote.

That is a perfect example of a group taking an uninformed position and wrongfully criticizing.
If you read Mr. Schulte's remarks, he clearly states that opening the airport needs to be in conjunction with safety protocols.

BHA Asks For August Airport Re-Opening

Belize Hotel Association - Philip Goldson International Airport Re-Opening Survey

On Friday, June 12, 2020, the Belize Hotel Association (BHA) conducted an online survey where all 69 BHA hotel members and an additional 71 hotels were asked about the re-opening date of the Philip Goldson International Airport (PGIA). Please note that these 140 hotels produced 80% of the entire accommodation revenue for the country of Belize. The survey also asked about their view on having precautionary policies and procedures prior to the opening of the PGIA, to identify potential Covid-19 carriers and prevent the spread of Covid-19 in Belize.

Of the 140 hotels requested to complete the survey, 68% responded. The survey has confirmed that 98% of the respondents are of the opinion that the PGIA should be re-opened, provided that a specific set of protocols and policies can be obtained and put in place.

As previously mentioned, additional questions were asked, and results are as follows:

67% of the respondents feel that there should be rapid testing conducted upon arrival at the PGIA.

97% of respondents feel that if the rapid testing is available and there are set protocols in place, the PGIA should be opened by August 1, 2020.

79% of the respondents feel that their facilities have the necessary processes and protocols in place for the re-opening of the PGIA.

61% of the respondents feel that there should not be restrictions on travelers from certain countries to come into Belize. Of the remaining 39% that feel there should be restrictions, the following cities/countries were listed as restricted: Texas (USA), Mexico, Guatemala, and Brazil.

77% of the respondents have confirmed that if the PGIA does not open by August 1, 2020, they will be forced to terminate some of their employees. Of the 77%, 5 of those respondents indicated that they would have to terminate at least 50 employees.

In summary, majority of the respondents are of the opinion that the PGIA should re-open by August 1, 2020, provided we have rapid testing facilities and a set of protocols in place. The hotels are clearly demonstrating their willingness to take the necessary steps to support and revive the economy through tourism. The BHA trusts that the Government of Belize and the Covid-19 National Oversight Committee are diligently working on a plan to safely re-open the PGIA, taking into consideration the overall interest of the country and safety of its people.

Ted Tejada
President, Belize Hotel Association

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The Belize Tourism Industry Association of Belize (BTIA) has released the results of a survey of tourism stakeholders on the issue of re-opening the Philip Goldson International Airport (PGIA). We talked with the executives about what this means for the industry and how they are preparing for any eventualities.
John Burgos - Executive Director, BTIA
Stewart Krohn - 2nd Vice President, BTIA

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Two weeks ago we told you about the BTIA's support seeking poll for the re-opening of the PGIA. It got them nowhere in terms of a consensus and in fact, served drive a deep rift in the organization - with many big members resigning.

Tonight, we have the results of a new but similar poll, this one from the Belize Hotel Association. And over the weekend they asked their 69 members and an additional 71 hotels whether the PGIA should be re-opened provided that a specific set of protocols and policies can be obtained and put in place.

Their results were overwhelmingly positive with 97% of respondents supporting an August 1st reopening with the provisions that rapid testing be available and protocols in place. This evening BHA President Ted Tejada advocated for that re-opening but with a limited number of flights.

Ted Tejada- President, BHA
"These 140 hotels that we pulled on this survey produced 80% of the entire revenue for accomodations in the country of Belize. So, we are looking at a very important group of hotels that have 80% of the stake of the revenue that the entire country in terms of hotel revenue is produced."

Reporter
"Now sir, the reopening of the airport on August 1st is predicated on rapid tests. What will the hotels say if on August 1st those rapid tests are not available."

Ted Tejada
"You know, we have been in contact with the airport where they are doing, at this moment they are doing great things in order to get the rapid tests going. We do want the economy to open. The hotels, as you saw on the survey, 97% of them stipulated that yes. 65% that voted want the hotels or the airports to open with the condition that the rapid test is there. We don't just want to open the hotels and the economy without having that rapid test. So, we believe and we know that the government is making every effort at this moment to open it. and to be honest, when we open we are looking at 15 flights per week. You have to understand that it is not only the country of Belize that will say let's open the economy and everyone is going to be coming. The airlines have a say in this. So, American Airlines has stipulated that they will only be allowing 1 flight per day from Maiami, Delta is only going to be doing 3 flights from the US and Houston will have 5 flights from United. At one time we used to have 20 flights on a given Saturday for one Saturday. We are looking at 15 flights for the entire week. We believe that is the way to start. To start with a limited amount of flights. Start doing the testings, start operating the hotels, and start putting all the protocols in place to see that we are doing the right thing before the massive tourism that we had in the past starts again. You only want to open the international airport with limited flights because we need a couple of months for us to do the proper training and testing before we do the full fledged opening. That is why our recommendation is, just open the international airport and yes, limiting the spots, Brazil for example, where there is a high cluster of cases. So, these countries you know that most likely those cases will be imported if they are coming from there. Yes, you mentioned Texas and we were very transparent on the survey. We wanted to make sure that we mentioned what our members had put on the survey."

Additional questions were asked to respondents the results of which confirmed that 67% of them feel that rapid testing should be conducted on arrival at the PGIA, 61% feel that there should be restrictions on travelers from certain states countries, and 77% confirmed that without that August 1st reopening they'll have to lay off even more of their employees. You can see the full release on our facebook page.

Channel 7