Shipyard, Belize

17.883333333333 - 88.616666666667Koordinaten: 17 ° 53 'N, 88 ° 37 ' W

Shipyard is a municipality in the Orange Walk District in northwestern Belize (Central America). The village is predominantly inhabited by Plautdietsch Mennonites and has 2,385 inhabitants ( census 2000). According to official estimates, the population by 2005 had grown to 2,751 inhabitants.

History and Economics

Shipyard was founded by Mennonites Old Colony from Chihuahua and Durango in Mexico in April 1958. The corpus of Belize jungle was cleared away with the ax. However, the modernization in the form of a mechanization of their work activities also reached the traditional communities of Mennonites. Today, the settlers of Shipyard agricultural machinery use instead of a sickle to harvest their crops. The first colonists began with the cultivation of rice, maize and sorghum. Later, the growing of vegetables and fruits were added, such as tomatoes, melons, cucumbers and peppers. In the late 80s they were the leaders in production of broilers and livestock has also been expanded. The acceptance of machines in the life of the Mennonite community led to the establishment of sawmills that supplied the artisans of the village with wood for house construction and furniture production.