WWF launches campaign to protect Placencia Lagoon with community mural

By Breaking Belize News Staff: The World Wildlife Fund (WWF) Mesoamerica has launched a new communications campaign aimed at building community support for the conservation and eventual protection of the Placencia Lagoon.

The campaign was launched on August 1 at Malacate Beach in Independence Village, where residents, conservation organizations and local leaders joined in painting a commemorative mural depicting the lagoon and its importance to surrounding communities. The activity coincided with Marine Protected Areas Day, which is observed globally each year on August 1 to raise awareness of the importance of marine protected areas to conservation, sustainable development and coastal communities.

Abigail Garbutt, Marine Conservation Officer with WWF Mesoamerica and coordinator of the Reef Guard project in southern Belize, said the campaign is intended not only to advocate for conservation of the lagoon, but to ensure that the people who depend on it are directly involved in determining its future.

Garbutt said consultations have already included fishers, tour guides, tour operators, developers, business owners and village councils. She stressed that WWF’s role is to listen to those views and relay them to the Government rather than impose a protected-area designation on communities.

The mural illustrates many of the connections residents identified during consultations, including a child climbing mangroves, the Hokey Pokey Water Taxi, fishing, birds and manatees. Garbutt said the images represent childhood memories, livelihoods, transportation and wildlife that residents want future generations to experience.

Placencia Lagoon is not presently a designated protected area. WWF’s Reef Guard: Sustaining Life and Livelihoods project, which runs from 2024 to 2029 and is funded by the Blue Action Fund, includes a formal objective of working toward the lagoon’s designation as a conservation area through ecological and socioeconomic studies, community consultation, a management plan and the preparation of statutory instruments for government consideration.

The wider Reef Guard initiative also seeks to improve management of four existing protected areas in the Southern Belize Reef Complex: South Water Caye Marine Reserve, Glover’s Reef Marine Reserve, Laughing Bird Caye National Park and Gladden Spit and Silk Cayes Marine Reserve.

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