1 week ago
6
The government is proposing changes to Belize’s immigration and nationality laws to create a path to permanent residence for qualifying investors and address labour shortages in several industries. Minister of Labour, Immigration and Good Governance, Kareem Musa, introduced the Immigration Amendment Bill 2026 and the Belizean Nationality Amendment Bill 2026 together at this morning’s House meeting, explaining that the two measures are related. The proposals include adding the Labour Commissioner to the Visa Vetting Committee, creating an investor residence permit, expanding eligibility for permanent residence and providing temporary employment permits under a seasonal migrant workers programme. Musa said the Labour Commissioner’s presence on the committee would help connect visa decisions with applications for work permits. He also explained that the proposed employment provisions would cover agriculture and agribusiness, construction and hospitality, sectors he said face significant labour shortages.
Kareem Musa, Minister of Immigration: “Under the Immigration Amendment Bill, Madam Speaker, seeking to allow the director to issue employment visas, temporary employment visas for three particular industries, namely the agriculture/ agrobusiness sector, construction and hospitality industries because we find that these are in fact areas or sectors that have a significant labor shortage. Of course, the consideration will always be that we find Belizeans to fill the vacant posts, but in the event there are no Belizeans we have to look outside to fill these vacancies.”
According to Musa, Belizeans would remain the first consideration for available jobs, with employers looking abroad when those vacancies cannot be filled locally. The proposed investor programme would require a minimum investment of five hundred thousand dollars in a new business in Belize. Musa said qualifying investors would be able to accumulate one year of physical presence in the country over a longer period, rather than having to remain here for almost an entire year at once. The related nationality amendment would provide for investor residence holders to qualify to apply for permanent residence, while excluding time spent under certain temporary permits from the residence calculation.
Kareem Musa, Minister of Immigration: “As you know, Belize is competing in an increasingly global market for capital, talent, innovation, and entrepreneurship. And a well-structured residency by investment program would give Belize another tool to attract qualified investors who can establish businesses, support development, create employment, and contribute meaningfully to our economy. As you know, Madam Speaker, when an investor, a foreign investor is looking to invest in a country there are several factors that they look for, several advantages or benefits. They look for the fact of whether the country is economically stable. If there’s profit to be made in that country, if it is politically stable, they look at the language and as you know Belize is a very diverse country with English as our primary language. They look of course to initiatives like our Blue Bond initiative and so Belize has a certain edge against when we look against the other countries but we do not have a permanent residence by investment program. We do have in fact a temporary residence program but all that that does, Madam Speaker, is that puts us on the playing field but really on the sidelines because we’re not really competing for the investments out there. Because in order for us to compete, we have to have programs like the rest of the region. We look at Grenada, St. Kitts, Panama. And in Panama for example their permanent residence program generated between 2020 and 2026 a quarter of a billion dollars in new investments just from their permanent residence program. And so what we are doing here today, Madam Speaker, is that we are taking our temporary residence program and now creating a pathway to permanent residence. When you look at Panama’s investment program they only require investors to stay one day out of the year to qualify to be a permanent resident. In Belize, we’re not going that far. We’re far more conservative and what we’re doing is you have to first invest $500,000 into a new business in Belize and over the course of two and a half to three and a half years you have to have been present in the country for a cumulative period of one year. So presently under our laws to become a permanent resident as you know you have to be in Belize for 351 days out of the 365. That is extremely cumbersome and as you know for investors that is highly improbable for them to meet that criteria of being here almost the entire year. So what we’re doing is we are evolving our temporary resident program to an investor program whereby you would now look at the cumulative period over the course of three and a half years to see if you have been here for one full year. So you can stay four months, one year, five months another, and six months a third year. So it doesn’t require you being physically present in the country for a full year.”
Musa said qualifying family members would also be able to apply alongside investors. Applicants would have to provide evidence of their investment, police records and supporting business information. The proposals also provide for permits to be revoked if applicants submit false information or no longer meet the conditions. Musa told the House that both bills have Cabinet’s support, saying the aim is to attract investment, create employment and protect the integrity of Belize’s immigration system.
English (US) ·