Given its location in the centre of the knowledge economy that services the US Americas and its demographics (native makes strategic sense given that Belize is speakers of English and Spanish), and the in the same time zone as the US, is close popularity of its offshore legislation, it to should be open to Belize to become a knowledgeable people, and the cost of centre labor is far lower than would be found in of development e-commerce of an activity. The information or the US, has intelligent and the US. ICT IN BELIZEAN BUSINESSES The 2009 Scoping Exercise Report stated that promotion of the enterprise’s service or the Belize Chamber of Commerce and product or for back offices purposes. The Industry, whilst acknowledging that it has no Chamber is of the considered opinion (the hard data on the state of the information Belize Tourism Industry Association is a economy within Belize as it has yet to date to member of the Chamber) that ICT web carry out a survey on this matter, is of the presence by tourism service providers is considered and primarily limited to a static web presence. penetration of ICT for businesses purposes is The Chamber believes that there is no e- limited. In this regard the Chamber believes tourism infrastructure in Belize – a matter that use of ICT, where it has been availed of, of concern given the actions being taken in is primarily of electronic communications and this regard by competitors to Belize potential basic office applications. tourism. opinion that the use The set-up of industry and business within Belize, with the exception of a small number of large operators such as the banks, hotel operators, etc, are micro-enterprises. Given the GDP / capita and the fact that, with the exclusion of the service industry related to tourism, securing a web presence is not perceived to be a productive investment particularly given that achieving this is seen to be prohibitively expensive. Operations in the tourism industry are seen to make most use of ICT – both for the Belize ICT National Strategy 35