Minister of Education Comments on Brain Drain Concerns in Belize

The term brain drain refers to a situation where skilled persons leave their home country to seek employment elsewhere, often for higher wages. This causes a shortage of skilled labour in that country. Brain drain has been a long-standing issue for the Caribbean and Belize has not been exempt from its effects. Minister of Education Francis Fonseca says that a major issue is Belize’s in ability to compete with developed countries in terms of salary offerings. Fonseca said that countries all over the world have had difficulty finding a solution to brain drain, but that Belize has fared off better than many of its sister CARICOM nations.

Francis Fonseca, Minister of Education: “Yeah I can tell you we discussed this issue of the brain drain issue in CARICOM, it’s affecting everybody. I mean we don’t have anywhere close to the challenge that countries like Jamaica has. I was talking to the Minister of Education from Jamaica and they’re losing I mean I think last year they lost eight hundred teachers imagine that. Eight hundred teachers. So it’s an absolutely serious issue. We’re nowhere close to that in Belize but you know any time we lose any of our quality teachers it’s obviously a problem for us so we see the same thing in the health sector with nurses of course that’s been going on for a long time. The reality is we simply cannot compete obviously with these developed countries in terms of the attractive packages that they’re offering teachers and nurses and other professionals and then the point you make about the labour pool you know that’s again you’re absolutely right. You go to many people in the private sector and they tell you we can’t find labour, we can’t find basic labour for some of these construction projects and other things. So it is a real issue and we continue to discuss and engage with the United States on that issue but the reality is that as you know they really don’t have any answers themselves for how they can deal with it. It’s a big issue for them and so you know it’s something we discussed but there isn’t any clear answer or solution to the problem.”

Brain drain is one side of a situation known as human capital flight. The country that receives the influx of skilled labor experiences what is referred to as brain gain.