Belize: A Private Sector Assessment: Private Sector Development Discussion Paper #6

Two basic factors shape private sector development in Belize. First, the population is small - only 322,000 as of mid-2008. This limits the size of the domestic market and potential economies of scale. The economy was only US$1.3 billion in 2009 and diversification is limited. The economy depends strongly on trade with the world economy, both as a market for domestic produce and as a source of the wide range of products that would be costly or impossible to produce domestically. Aside from Caribbean micro-states, Belize is the fourth most open economy in Latin America and the Caribbean (Figure 1). Any strategy to promote private sector development has to recognize that growth will continue to be export-led. The purpose of this study has been to describe Belize's private sector which accounts for roughly two-thirds of the economy.