MANAGEMENT RECOMMENDATIONS

_______There is no doubt that the archaeological resources of the Rio Bravo Conservation Area are vast and important to archaeologists as well as to local Belizeans and foreign visitors. By Belizean law, all archaeological resources are protected by the broad and sweeping Ancient Maya Monuments and Antiquities Ordinance (Government of Belize). While government enforcement is variable due to financial resources, the Programme for Belize is obliged to set an example of compliance to all stipulations. These laws affect development activities, such as road and building construction, as well as archaeological studies. Archaeological research must be approved and permitted beforehand by the Belize Department of Archaeology. Archaeological resources are non-renewable. Once they are destroyed, there is no way to regenerate them. Avoidance of archaeological destruction should be considered the optimal management objective. In cases where destruction is unavoidable, measures to mitigate the effects of destruction need to be taken.

_______Involving an archaeologist at the outset of development planing will assist the management process. For example, plans for establishing a research station were underway at the time of our field work in the Rio Bravo Conservation Area. We noted that some large elite residential units were being cleared with the aim of establishing the station. With the philosophy of avoiding archaeological sites implemented in planning stages, areas could be targeted for construction and an initial archaeological survey could be made to identify the potential archaeological impacts. If the impacts were significant, the area could be avoided and another area selected.

_______Our primary recommendation with respect to the archaeological resources concerns the education of Programme members in Belize. Archaeological conservation efforts should be integrated into the operation so that archaeological resources rank equally with other resources on the Rio Bravo Conservation Area. Arrangement should be made for the training of Programme managers and grounds personnel in basic principles of archaeological site preservation and management. This may be accomplished through the Belize Department of Archaeology or with a professional archaeological consultant.

_______There should be formalized affiliation with a professional archaeological consultant or consultants who will coordinate archaeological management of the property in cooperation with Programme for Belize managers and the Belize Department of Archaeology. This archaeologist would contribute to the process of obtaining research grants, advise on potential impacts of any development within the property (such as road building, construction of support facilities, etc.), coordinate development of large sites for tourist visitation, and assist in the inventory of sites within the property.

_______There should be continuing concern to develop and maintain a cooperative and mutually beneficial relationship with the Belize Department of Archaeology, Association for Belizean Archaeology, Belize Center for Environmental Studies, and other archaeological and environmental organizations. Also, coordination with researchers of the Overseas Development Natural Resources Institute (United Kingdom) should be encouraged as the results of their research in the region will assist in the development and implementation of the management program (see Gray 1989; King et al. 1986, 1989). Further, effort should be made to share data of specific research efforts, for example between forestry, botany, biology, agronomy and archaeology, in order to maximize their value.

_______Open interaction among interested groups fosters an atmosphere of sharing, important to the ongoing operation of the Programme for Belize. To this end, effort should be made to prepare a pamphlet for local distribution and an article for a popular journal which would communicate the concern of the Programme for Belize with the protection of archaeological resources and the steps being taken to manage sites within the Rio Bravo Conservation Area. Archaeological activities of the Programme for Belize should be fully reported to the international archaeological community through professional publications and presentations at meetings.

_______In coordination with professional archaeologists, the Programme for Belize should establish standardized site recording procedures to be used within the Rio Bravo Conservation Area and should promote the use of these procedures in other areas, such as the privately held lands around Gallon Jug to the south, which participate in the Programme. These procedures should, minimally, collect data required by the Department of Archaeology, but also should include additional information relevant to resource management and research. As part of this recording procedure, a computerized site file system should be established, preferably in association with a computerized mapping and analysis program such as GIS (Geographic Information System; see Gray 1989; Kvanne 1989). An ARC/INFO type GIS system is currently in use by the researchers working on the land resources of Belize and is under consideration for support by USAID. The Department of Anthropology of the University of California at Riverside is in the process of setting up an ARC/INFO GIS center for Maya regional research, including Belize and the Rio Bravo Conservation Area.

_______In addition to these general matters, we recognize specific archaeological preservation and conservation priorities. The highest priorities concern the major center of La Milpa. The next level priorities concern the amplification of the settlement surveys to collect an adequate sample addressing the settlement diversity in the area. Finally, a number of supplemental recommendations are outlined.

_______The major center of La Milpa is in urgent need of attention. The current vigilance afforded by the workmen is an important first step towards protecting this site. Visits to the site should continue to be relatively frequent on a year-round basis. Plaza clearing should be maintained, but additional clearing should be monitored by archaeologists. Before any building stabilization and conservation measures can be taken, an accurate contour site map and permanent benchmark monuments need to be established with a transit. With an accurate map and permanent reference points, all subsequent work will be able to tie into the original base map and may be referenced and recorded properly.

_______It is very important to stabilize the buildings which have been damaged by the extensive looting. Before stabilization, the research potential of the trench exposures should be realized. Each trench should be documented by drawing the trench wall profile and extracting an excavated column by construction levels for chronological information. Once the trenches are documented they should be backfilled. This technique was employed for the centers of the upper Belize River area (El Pilar, Alta Vista, Yaxox and Bacab Na), and, with a minimal amount of effort, we were successful in gleaning important data on ancient Maya construction activities from the trench exposures.

_______In addition to taking measures to protect the monumental architecture at La Milpa, it is important to document and shelter carved stela and altars. It would be worthwhile to bring in a skilled epigrapher to examine the carved stela for historic and calendric hieroglyphs. This should be undertaken with extreme caution and with the consultation of the available records on Thompson's survey data (on file at the British Museum). Bearing in mind that this preliminary survey located only 7 stela and Thompson recognized 12, nine of which were clearly carved, there needs to be some effort to relocate the monuments. Minor excavation will be necessary to locate monuments that may be buried at the foot of temples by structure collapse or looter's backdirt piles. Recovery of stela through this technique was effective at Caracol (Arlen and Diane Chase, personal communication May 1987). Once located, all stela should be accurately plotted and examined by professionals to determine the presence and extent of carving.

_______Another important area in the Rio Bravo Conservation Area is the Irish Creek raised fields site, identified from the air in this survey. The area should be investigated more rigorously. The possible agricultural features within the swamp should be mapped through the use of aerial photography. This would provide a basis for surface investigations in the swamps. The low escarpment adjacent to the swamp should be checked for ancient Maya settlement and the possibility of a center. Archaeological study of this area will provide an important comparison to data from Northern Belize.

_______In addition to the prominent management issues pertaining to specific areas discussed above, there are the general management concerns that will require additional archaeological study. There should be further air reconnaissance during the dry season over eastern swamp areas to examine the extent of desiccation and to investigate the upland patches. Infra-red photography of wet and dry periods would be an asset in identifying the upland areas within the Lowlands Subregion. Upland areas would appear in foliage during both periods while the seasonal swamps would have decreased foliage in the dry season. Selected sample patches within the Lowlands Subregion deemed of sufficient size to support an ancient Maya settlement should be surveyed on the ground for evidence of architecture.

_______The western upland section should be more thoroughly investigated by selective systematic settlement survey in sample land resource zones. Such systematic archaeological survey would refine the grossly identified land resource and ancient Maya settlement relationships outlined here. Target surveys should be initiated in order to locate other centers equal to or secondary to La Milpa in order to put this center in its hierarchical context within the area. This can be accomplished by using the available land resource data (see Appendix II) to predict locations, as well as by interviewing local workers and consulting earlier archaeological reports.

_______An important potential of the Rio Bravo Conservation Area is its historical cultural resources documenting an important facet of Belizean history. Belize Estate operated a number of enterprises over the last century within the Gallon Jug Region. On our flights over the eastern Lowlands, we identified a canal connecting the interior reaches of the area with the New River Lagoon that was likely used in lumbering operations. The links between the historical documents and the remains on the ground should be investigated by a historical archaeologist.

_______Another revealing activity that could bring researchers in agronomy and archaeology together would involve the establishment of experimental agricultural sites. Such experiments should be a cooperative exercise among archaeologists, botanists, and agronomists in the study of potential productive capacity of various cultivation techniques that may have been practiced by the prehistoric Maya. These should be set up in the various land resource zones and may be integrated with plans to reduce the area of extensive (slash-and-burn) cultivation currently used by farming residents of the Rio Bravo Conservation Area. The Programme for Belize is currently involved in setting up a research station and an archaeological advisory board so that some of these ideas may soon be implemented.