As the first half of 2026 draws to a close, the Statistical Institute of Belize (SIB) has released key economic data highlighting two pressing challenges facing the Central American nation: widespread consumer price increases that have lifted headline national inflation, and a surprisingly weak start to the year for the country’s critical export sector.
Inflation has crept upward across every single one of Belize’s municipalities in the first five months of 2026, pushing the aggregate national inflation rate to 2%, according to the SIB’s latest consumer price tracking. Among local jurisdictions, Punta Gorda logged the highest first-quarter inflation rate nationwide, with neighboring towns San Ignacio and Benque Viejo recording the next steepest price gains, close behind Punta Gorda’s reading.
Jacqueline Sabal, manager of the SIB’s Economic Statistics Department, detailed the methodology behind the country’s consumer price index (CPI), the key metric used to calculate inflation. Sabal explained that the institute conducts monthly price surveys across retail locations nationwide, with the selection of outlets and the composition of the CPI product basket directly guided by data collected through the household budget survey (HBS). “We have to be guided by what consumers say they spend on and where they say they buy these items,” Sabal noted. She added that the published inflation rate represents a national and local average, so individual consumer experiences at specific stores may differ slightly from the aggregated figure.
Alongside rising prices, the SIB’s new trade data reveals that Belize’s export sector is facing one of its weakest opening quarters in 10 years. Total export earnings through the first quarter barely topped $140 million, a figure that falls even below export levels recorded at the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic, when global trade was largely disrupted.
SIB Director General Diana Castillo-Trejo outlined two core factors driving the early-year slowdown. First, the country’s key agricultural export industries have encountered unexpected headwinds so far in 2026, depressing total shipment volumes. Second, the timing of large bulk shipments for one of Belize’s most valuable exports – sugar – shifts slightly from year to year, and large sugar cargoes have not yet been recorded in the early 2026 data. As the country’s top physical goods export and largest source of foreign exchange, sugar’s delayed shipments have dragged down overall export totals to date.
Castillo-Trejo emphasized that the early-year data does not necessarily predict full-year performance, noting that the SIB publishes year-to-date figures to track ongoing trends rather than drawing definitive conclusions from partial annual data. SIB analysts project that export earnings will pick up steadily over the remainder of 2026 as large sugar shipments are processed and sent to international markets, pulling the full-year total closer to historical averages.