The Belize Sustainable Ocean Plan reveals its logo

On December 20th, 2022, Tuesday, December 20th, 2022, the Coastal Zone Management Authority and Institute (CZMAI), in partnership with The Nature Conservancy (TNC), revealed the logo for Belize’s Marine Spatial Planning process, during a live Facebook event. Previously, in September of this year, through an electronic voting poll hosted on the CZMAI’s Facebook page, the Belizean public selected the “Belize Sustainable Ocean Plan” (BSOP) as a fitting name for Belize’s Marine Spatial Plan. On Tuesday, December 13th, 2022, the public was once again invited to participate in creating a distinctive brand for this all-important planning process by selecting a unique and memorable logo that aptly reflects the purpose of the BSOP. At the close of the voting at 5pm on December 19th, 2022, the winning logo was chosen to be:
The public involvement in choosing the BSOP logo is part of the ongoing stakeholder engagement plan in keeping with principles of inclusivity, participation, and transparency. Speaking on the importance of public participation, the Chief Executive Officer of the CZMAI, Mrs. Chantalle Samuels, noted that:
“The drafting of the Belize Sustainable Ocean Plan is, by definition, a stakeholder-driven exercise, since the Plan must ultimately benefit all Belizeans while accommodating the diverse commercial, social and environmental interests in the management of Belize’s ocean space. We invited public participation in selecting a logo because we want the BSOP brand to be meaningful to all Belizeans – the ultimate beneficiaries of this plan.”
Marine Spatial Planning is a public, inclusive, and participatory process through which stakeholders will determine the optimal distribution of human activities across marine areas to achieve Belize’s ecological, economic, and social objectives. The development of the BSOP is one of Belize’s principal conservation commitments under the Blue Loan Agreement and the Conservation Funding Agreement which constitute Belize’s “Blue Bond”, signed in November 2021.
The vision for the BSOP is “A healthy, resilient, and equitably shared ocean that supports a thriving national economy and nurtures the culture and well-being of all Belizeans.” The CZMAI and TNC are committed to engaging the full spectrum of Belizean stakeholders throughout the planning process, by implementing a broad-based, multi-tiered stakeholder engagement plan. During the live logo reveal, Mrs. Nidia Chacon, Stakeholder Engagement Specialist with TNC, outlined the upcoming steps in this process, saying that, “the BSOP engagement team will be visiting the coastal communities to kick off the engagement with the community leaders, associations and organized groups representing the various sectors such as tourism, fishing, and civil society”.