How to Determine the Offshore Financial Center Status of a Belize Company
To Determine the Offshore Financial Center status of a comapny, the Government of Belize lists the following criteria according to which it judges foreign investment:
- Does the business in Belize create employment opportunities?
- Does the business in Belize make maximum use of indigenous raw materials?
- earns foreign exchange;
- Will it result in increased production in Belize?
- Does it introduce state-of-the-art technology to the economy of Belize
- May it enhance local management skills?
- Does it promote greater efficiency through competition?
- How much will it diversifiy the economic base of the Belizean economy?
- Does it facilitate access to foreign markets?
- Is environmentally friendly for Belize? [1]
Opportunities and incentives in Belize do encourage investment and development further inland. Furthermore, joint ventures or partnerships are promoted over full foreign ownership, which is not prohibited. Historically this makes good economics since it keeps foreign investors in tune with the country. The incentives to establish investments and developments inland make sense economically because it fosters a need for further investment in infrastructure and also encourages industry to move away from areas subject to coastal flooding and hurricanes where short term ventures and investments might not be renewed in the advent of catastrophic loss.
In early 2000, over 14,000 offshore companies were registered in Belize. This number had increased up from 3000 registrations during the 1990-97 time period.
[1] Lowtax.net, supra note 8.
Belize Tax Law Thesis 