Aarti Sooknandan was officially sashed as the new Miss Earth Belize 2021 on Sunday, August 8, 2021 via a virtual press conference on the Miss Earth Belize Facebook Page. Aarti is a Commercial Model for “Monster Energy” “Circle K”, Clothing line such as Cupshe Bikinis, “Astoria Active Wear” and Brand Ambassador for “Digicel Belize’ to name a few and excellent at multitasking.
“Belize, you are my home that is always in my heart, and I promise to make you proud at the Miss Earth Pageant later this year,” commented Aarti. “Thank you to my national directors Margaret R Johnson and Sarita Acosta, as well as the entire Miss Earth Belize organization for graciously allowing me to represent my beautiful homeland! Together I know we will accomplish great things during my reign.”
“Since April, I have been diligently preparing, physically, mentally and spiritually to assure I am ready for the road ahead. I have been working on my platform of empowering and enriching the lives of Belizean women and girls, as well as furthering the conservation of our invaluable natural resources. My latest endeavor is to launch my new Podcast series in support of projects I have been working on since June of 2019 – and I can’t wait to share with all of you!”
Aarti standing 5’ 9” tall (1.75m), 26 years old, born and raised in Belize City, Belize. She attended Hummingbird Elementary, an elementary schools with high academic standards, graduating as the Salutatorian of her class. Middle school was “The Belize Elementary School and high school was proud St. Catherine’s Academy but completed her high school education at Spoto High School in Riverview, Florida again graduating with Honors.
She also participated in school plays while in high school. While in Belize, she was an avid ballet dancer for approximately ten years with the “Ballet Art School” in Belize City and has performed many times in Baron Bliss Center for Performing Arts Stage. At age 8 or 9, she was so good, that when one of the guest professor of Ballet saw her skills, offered to take her
to Cuba to be train her professionally.
Her family moved to the United States when she was 14 years old. She received her Bachelors of Science degree in Advertising & Marketing from the University of South Florida (USF) and went on to elevated herself to a Master’s in Business Administration degree in Marketing graduating Magna Cum Laude from Nova Southeastern University in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida. While at the University, she was a member of the Graduate Business Student Association and their Marketing Director. While at USF she served as an RA for a year where she lived in on campus housing and oversaw, managed and counseled fellow college
students.
Aarti is an artist who paints in water and oil paints, charcoal pencils, digital art and owns her own art company called Aartistry, LLC. One of her art piece was featured in a displayed at the Salvador Dali Art Museum in St. Petersburg, FL. following a student exhibition.
“As Miss Earth Belize, I encourage you to be citizens of the world and not just citizens of your country, so that we, collectively, can do more for humanity, the environment and Mother Earth.”
In 2019, Aarti Sooknandan competed in her very first pageant, Miss Universe Belize 2019, finishing as a semifinalist and title of Miss Congeniality. This experience bolstered her interest in furthering her platform. In September 2019 she reached out to the founder of “Wingspan Seminars” to Priscilla Dames www.wingspan.org and quickly became a part of that organization and participated in the first ever women’s summit in Belize 2019 addressing pressing issues like Domestic violence. She has also served in the capacity of Keynote Speaker in women’s Issues, Guest Speaker and Co- Anchor in television interviews with Wingspan Seminars founder Priscilla Dames. In 2020 she participated again but due to pandemic it had to be virtual. She is actively participating in helping to coordinate the marketing aspect of the “Women’s Summit, scheduled to be held in Belize March 2022.
Building off her Masters in Marketing, she is currently a Media Content Strategist at ‘321 The Agency’, a nonprofit Organization in Orlando, Florida where she is the SME (subject matter Expert) for social media marketing and works with almost every department of the Agency. Her goal is to one day own a successful non-profit Advertising Agency where her primary focus will be ensuring marginalized groups have substantial, accurate representation in the media and her lifelong platform of advocating for domestic violence, care for Mother Earth by partnering with existing agencies, providing education, ideas to stakeholders and those affected on how to convert trash into treasures, mainly to her home country Belize but to anyone who cares to try.
