March 2017 | Business View Caribbean

86 87 Belize Estate Company Limited Transportation-centric W hen Belize was a still colony of Great Britain, the Belize Estate & Produce Co., Ltd., founded in 1875, was one of the largest property owners in the country with rights to almost a third of its available land. “It was a British-based company that had interests in logging,” explains David Vasquez, Managing Director of Belize Estate Co., Ltd. (BEC), the present-day incarnation of the legacy firm. “At the time, Belize was known for mahogany and for logwood, which was used for the creation of regal purple dye. Those were primarily Belize’s first exports and the Belize Estate & Produce Compa- ny was at the forefront of that.” In those years, in the height of the logging season, the company employed some 1,000 workers and operated its own sawmill. Years later, it made a shift into the harvesting of chicle, used as a base for chewing gum, when the export of wood diminished, but over time, the chicle trade, likewise, declined. “The company closed all businesses here in Belize and was defunct for a while,” Vasquez says, “until its interests were bought up by the patriarch and founder of my company, Barry Bowen, in 1983.” Sir Barry Manfield Bowen was a Belizean bottling magnate, politician, and entrepreneur. His business interests included Bowen & Bowen, Ltd., which bottles Coca-Cola products in Belize; the Belize Brewing Company, which brews Belikin Beer; and Crystal Mineral Water, the country’s main bottled AT A GLANCE Belize Estate Company Limited WHAT: A transportation-centric company that deals in automobiles, agricultural equipment, and ship- ping services WHERE: Belize City, Belize WEBSITE: www.belizeestate shipping.com Estate Company Belize LIMITED