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Costa Rica is a country in Central America, bordered by Nicaragua to the north, Panama to the southeast, the Pacific Ocean to the west, and the Caribbean Sea to the east. Costa Rica, which means "Rich Coast", constitutionally abolished its army permanently in 1949. It is the only Latin American country included in the list of the world's 22 older democracies. Costa Rica has consistently been among the top Latin American countries in theHuman Development Index (HDI), ranked 69th in the world in 2011. Also was cited by the UNDP in 2010 as one of the countries that have attained much higher human development than other countries at the same income levels, and in 2011 was highlighted by UNDP for being a good performer on environmental sustainability, and better record on human development and inequality than the median of their region. It was also the only country to meet all five criteria established to measure environmental sustainability. The country is ranked fifth in the world, and first among the Americas, in terms of the 2012 Environmental Performance Index. In 2007, the Costa Rican government announced plans for Costa Rica to become the first carbon-neutral country by 2021. According to the New Economics Foundation, Costa Rica ranks first in the Happy Planet Index and is the "greenest" country in the world.
Costa Rica is located on the Central American isthmus, lying between latitudes 8° and 12°N, and longitudes 82° and 86°W. It borders the Caribbean Sea (to the east) and the Pacific Ocean (to the west), with a total of 1,290 kilometres (800 mi) of coastline, 212 km (132 mi) on the Caribbean coast and 1,016 km (631 mi) on the Pacific. Costa Rica also borders Nicaragua to the north (309 km or 192 mi of border) and Panama to the south-southeast (639 km or 397 mi of border). In total, Costa Rica comprises 51,100 square kilometres (19,700 sq mi) plus 589 square kilometres (227 sq mi) of territorial waters. The highest point in the country is Cerro Chirripó, at 3,819 metres (12,530 ft); it is the fifth highest peak in Central America. The highest volcano in the country is the Irazú Volcano (3,431 m or 11,257 ft). The largest lake in Costa Rica is Lake Arenal. Costa Rica also comprises several islands. Cocos Island (24 square kilometres / 9.3 square miles) stands out because of its distance from continental landmass, 300 mi (480 km) from Puntarenas, but Calero Island is the largest island of the country (151.6 square kilometres / 58.5 square miles). Over 25% of Costa Rica's national territory is protected by SINAC (the National System of Conservation Areas), which oversees all of the country's protected areas. Costa Rica also possesses the greatest density of species in the world.
Because Costa Rica is located between 8 and 12 degrees north of the Equator, the climate is tropical year round. However, the country has many microclimates depending on elevation, rainfall, topography, and by the geography of each particular region. Costa Rica's seasons are defined by how much rain falls during a particular period and not to the four seasons in the Northern Hemisphere. The year can be split into two periods, the dry season known to the residents as summer, and the rainy season, known locally as winter. The "summer" or dry season goes from December to April, and "winter" or rainy season goes from May to November, which almost coincides with the Atlantic hurricane season, and during this time, it rains constantly in some regions. The location receiving the most rain is the Caribbean slopes of the Central Cordillera mountains, with an annual rainfall of over 5,000 mm (196.9 in). Humidity is also higher on the Caribbean side than on the Pacific side. The mean annual temperature on the coastal lowlands is around 27 °C (81 °F), 20 °C (68 °F) in the main populated areas of the Central Cordilera, and below 10 °C (50 °F) on the summits of the highest mountains. Costa Rica Weather Averages
Good agricultural soils in Costa Rica are concentrated in the Meseta Central and in the river valleys. About one-third of the total land area is covered by forest, much of which is commercially productive. Mineral resources, including bauxite, are believed to be extensive but remain largely undeveloped. Fishing for tuna, sharks, and turtles is carried out along the coast. Waterpower is abundant and is used to generate electricity for industrial operations.
Costa Rica's forests contain rich stands of ebony, balsa, mahogany, and cedar. More than 1,000 species of orchids are found in Costa Rica. Wildlife is abundant and includes puma, jaguar, deer, monkeys, and 600 species of birds.
Costa Rica's land is protected by one of the most ambitious conservation programs in Central America. Costa Rica was one of the first, and most active, countries to participate in debt-for-nature swaps, which cancel some national debt in exchange for the protection of a specified amount of land from environmental degradation. In an effort to bolster its economy while remaining responsible to the environment, Costa Rica has also established a booming eco tourism business. This form of tourism encourages travelers to learn more about the country's natural wonders and to respect the environment in the course of their exploration. Costa Rica is party to international treaties concerning bio diversity, climate change, endangered species, hazardous wastes, marine dumping, and wetlands.
A majority of the people of Costa Rica are of European (largely Spanish) descent. Whites and mestizos (people of mixed Spanish and Native American ancestry) account for about 96 percent of the population; the small black community is largely of Jamaican origin. About 50 percent of the population is defined as rural. Spanish is the official language, but English is also spoken by many educated people and some of the ethnic Jamaicans. Roman Catholicism is the state religion, but freedom of worship is guaranteed by the constitution.
The population of Costa Rica (2011 estimate) is 4.301.712, giving the country an overall population density of 84 persons per sq km (220 per sq mi).
Costa Rica is divided into seven provinces: San José, Alajuela, Cartago, Puntarenas, Guanacaste, Heredia, and Limón. Each of the provinces has a governor appointed by the president.
The capital is San José , with an estimated population in 2000 of 309,672. Important cities are Puerto Limón (84,986), a trading center and one of the country's principal ports; Puntarenas (102,504), a major Pacific seaport; and Alajuela (222,853), a center for the production of coffee and sugar.
Costa Rica has one of the highest rates of literacy in Latin America, estimated at 96 percent. Primary and secondary education s free, and attendance is compulsory between the ages of 6 and 15. In 2000, 551,465 pupils were enrolled in 3,711 primary schools and 255,600 students attended public and private secondary schools. The prominent University of Costa Rica, in San José, was founded in 1843, and has an annual enrollment of about 29,000.
Costa Rica, with a relatively small Native American population, has been strongly influenced by the culture and traditions of Spain. Native American and African American influences have had relatively little impact. The Roman Catholic cultural pattern of Spain, with emphasis on the family and the church, has evolved into a national style of life. Festivals in honor of patron saints are a colorful part of village and town life. The guitar, accordion, and mandolin have traditionally been the most popular musical instruments, and the music reflects a Spanish heritage. Traces of the Native American culture survive in designs used in jewelry, leather goods, and clothing. The national sport is soccer.
According to the World Bank, Costa Rica's GDP per capita is US$11,122 PPP (as of 2009); however, this developing country still faces the fourth-highest inflation rate in Latin America, lack of maintenance and new investment in infrastructure, a poverty rate estimated to be 23%, a 7.8% unemployment rate (2009 est.), and a trade deficit of 5.2%. For the fiscal year 2007, the country showed a government surplus. Economic growth in 2008 diminished to a 3% increase in the face of a global recession (down from 7% and 9% growth in the prior two years). Costa Rica's inflation rate was an estimated 9.3% in 2007 and increased to 13.9% in 2008, Latin America's fourth-highest inflation rate for both years. On October 16, 2006, a new currency exchange system was introduced, allowing the value of the CRC colón to float between two bands as done previously by Chile. This policy's objective was to allow the Central Bank to be able to better tackle inflation and discourage the use of U.S. dollars. However, as of August 2009, the value of the colón against the dollar has decreased to 86% of its late-2006 value (see commonly available forex trading charts). The unit of currency is the colón, and as of October 2010, it trades around 507 to the US$, and about 705 colones to the euro. The central government offers tax exemptions for those willing to invest in the country. Several global high tech corporations have already started developing in the area and are exporting goods, including chip manufacturer Intel, pharmaceutical company GlaxoSmithKline, and consumer products company Procter & Gamble. In 2006, Intel's microprocessor facility alone was responsible for 20% of Costa Rican exports and 4.9% of the country's GDP. Trade with Southeast Asia and Russia boomed during 2004 and 2005, and the country obtained full Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation Forum (APEC) membership in 2007 after becoming an observer in 2004. The Financial Times Intelligent Unit awarded Costa Rica with the fDi’s Caribbean and Central American Country of the Future 2011/12 for its successful record in attracting FDI into the country, and being the number one destination country in the region in terms of foreign direct investment (FDI) project numbers since 2003. In recent times, pharmaceuticals, financial outsourcing, software development, and ecotourism have become the prime industries in Costa Rica's economy. High levels of education among its residents make the country an attractive investing location. Since 1999, tourism earns more foreign exchange than the combined exports of the country's three main cash crops: bananas, pineapples and coffee. Coffee production has played a key role in Costa Rica's history and economy, and by 2006, was the third cash crop export. The largest coffee growing areas are in the provinces of San José, Alajuela, Heredia, Puntarenas, and Cartago. Costa Rica is famous for its gourmet coffee beans, with Costa Rican Tarrazú among the finest arabica coffee beans in the world used for making espresso coffee, together with Jamaican Blue Mountain, Guatemalan Antigua and Ethiopian Sidamo. Costa Rica's location provides access to American markets as it has the same time zone as the central part of the United States and direct ocean access to Europe and Asia. In a countrywide referendum on October 5, 2007, the voters of Costa Rica narrowly backed a free trade agreement, with 51.6% of "Yes" votes. 
With a $2.2 billion per year tourism industry, Costa Rica is the most visited nation in the Central American region, with two million foreign visitors in 2008, which translates into a high expenditure per tourist of $1,077 per trip, one of the highest in the Caribbean Basin. In 2008, most visitors came from the United States (38.6%), neighboring Nicaragua (21.8%), Europe (11.3%) and Canada (5.2%). In 2005, tourism contributed 8.1% of the country's GNP, and represented 13.3% of direct and indirect employment. Tourism now earns more foreign exchange than bananas and coffee combined. Ecotourism draws many tourists to visit the extensive national parks and protected areas around the country. Costa Rica was a pioneer in this type of tourism, and the country is recognized as one of the few with true ecotourism. In terms of the 2011 Travel and Tourism Competitiveness Index, Costa Rica ranked 44th in the world and second among Latin American countries after Mexico. Considering its subindex natural resources, Costa Rica ranks sixth worldwide in the natural resources pillar, but 104th in terms of its cultural resources due to the country's limited number of cultural sites. Costa Rica has also developed a system of payments for environmental services. Similarly, Costa Rica has a tax on water pollution to penalize businesses and homeowners that dump sewage, agricultural chemicals, and other pollutants into waterways. In May 2007, the Costa Rican government announced its intentions to become 100 percent carbon neutral before 2030. As of 2010, Costa Rica is well on its way towards accomplishing this goal, currently producing 90 percent of its electricity through renewable sources. In 1996, the Forest Law was enacted to provide direct financial incentives to landowners for the provision of environmental services. This helped reorient the forestry sector away from commercial timber production and the resulting deforestation, and helped create awareness of the services it provides for the economy and society (i.e. carbon fixation, hydrological services such as producing fresh drinking water, biodiversity protection, and provision of scenic beauty).
Some 10.3 percent of Costa Rica's land area is under cultivation or used for plantation agriculture. Apart from banana plantations, most of the agricultural landholdings are small. Coffee, one of the most valuable crops, is cultivated mainly in the central plateaus. In 2003, 132,000 metric tons of coffee was produced. Bananas are raised in the tropical coastal regions on plantations. In the late 19th and early 20th century a United States firm, the United Fruit Company (now United Brands), opened the largest banana plantation in the world on the Pacific coast of Costa Rica and constructed the ports of Quepos and Golfito as banana-shipping points. Cacao, sugarcane, and pineapples are also raised primarily for export. Corn, rice, vegetables, tobacco, and cotton are generally cultivated throughout the country. In 2003 livestock included 1.2 million cattle, 500,000 hogs, and 115,000 horses.
Gold and silver are mined in the western part of Costa Rica. Deposits of manganese, nickel, mercury, and sulfur are largely unworked. Petroleum deposits have been found in the south, but not exploited. Salt is produced from seawater. Most of the country's industry is of small-scale enterprises such as coffee-drying plants, cheese factories, sawmills, woodworking factories, breweries, and distilleries. Costa Rica has factories that produce petroleum products, furniture, paper, textiles, chemicals, pharmaceuticals, plastics, candles, boots, and cigars and cigarettes. Costa Rica produced 6.8 billion kilowatt-hours of electricity in 2001; 82 percent of the power was generated in hydroelectric facilities.
The unit of currency is the colón, consisting of 100 centimos (505 colones equal U.S.$1, been on a stabile level since October 2006). The Banco Central, established in 1950, is the bank of issue and administers foreign reserves. In 2002 the value of imports was $6.9 billion and of exports, $5 billion. The chief exports included coffee, bananas, beef, textiles, and sugar. Principal imports were manufactured goods, machinery, transportation equipment, chemicals, crude petroleum, and foodstuffs. Chief purchasers of exports are the United States, Germany, Italy, Guatemala, El Salvador, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom, and France. Leading suppliers of imports were the United States, Japan, Mexico, and Guatemala. The entry in 1963 of Costa Rica into the Central American Common Market brought about major increases in trade in that region although its importance has since waned. In 1995 Costa Rica joined in the formation of the Association of Caribbean States (ACS). A free-trade organization, the ACS comprises the members of the Caribbean Community and Common Market (CARICOM) as well as 12 Latin nations bordering the Caribbean.
Roads total 35,881 km (22,295 mi); some 680 km (some 425 mi) of roadway forms a portion of the Inter-American Highway . San José is linked by road with the cities of the surrounding plateau region. Several domestic airlines provide service within the country. Juan Santamaría Airport, which is located near San José, is served by the Costa Rican national airline and several foreign airlines.
Costa Rica is a republic governed under a constitution of 1949.
Executive power is vested in a president and two vice presidents, each of whom is elected by direct popular vote for single four-year terms. Each candidate must receive more than 40 percent of the total vote. Voting is compulsory for all citizens over 18 years of age. The president is assisted by a cabinet of some 20 ministers.
Legislative power in Costa Rica is vested in a single-chamber Legislative Assembly, with 57 deputies, elected for four-year terms.
The leading political groups in Costa Rica are the National Liberation Party (Partido de Liberación Nacional, or PLN), a reformist organization, and the Social Christian Unity Party.
Judicial power in Costa Rica is vested in a Supreme Court, appellate courts, a court of cassation (highest appeals court), and subordinate provincial courts. Capital punishment has been banned.
The average life expectancy in Costa Rica is 77 years, the highest in the western hemisphere. A national health plan was established in the 1970s. Health services are concentrated in urban areas. A social security program has been in operation since 1942, with participation compulsory for all employees under 65 years of age.
Costa Rica has had no armed forces since 1948, when the PLN came to power and abolished the army. The only security forces are the 4,500-member Civil Guard and the 3,200-member Rural Guard.
Human habitation of Costa Rica dates from at least 5000 bc , but in comparison with the great civilizations of pre-Columbian America the Native Americans of Costa Rica were neither numerous nor highly developed. When confronted by Spanish soldiers and missionaries, they resisted violently. Those who did not succumb to the epidemics that swept over the isthmus either died fighting or fled to remote areas.
Christopher Columbus sailed along Costa Rica's Caribbean shore in 1502 and gave it its name (“rich coast”). Spanish conquest, however, came later than in most of the rest of Central America, delayed by the hostility of the natives and the absence of obvious wealth. After Juan de Cavallón led the first successful colonizers into Costa Rica in 1561, Juan Vásquez de Coronado followed from 1562 to 1565 with the establishment of Cartago and other settlements in the central valley, where most of the population is still concentrated. Within the kingdom of Guatemala (in the viceroyalty of Mexico, called New Spain) from 1570 forward, Costa Rica was principally a small dependency of Nicaragua throughout its colonial period. Such circumstances as its remoteness from Guatemala City and its lack of wealth allowed it to develop with less direct interference and regulation than the other provinces of Central America. Costa Rica's relative obscurity gave it some of its unique characteristics. The Europeans were unable to subjugate a sedentary native population, nor could they afford to import African slaves, as was done in areas of more apparent commercial agricultural or mining potential. Costa Ricans consequently turned to subsistence farming on small land grants, without the extremes of wealth and poverty that characterized so much of Latin America. Government and church officials were fewer than in the centers of authority and production. Thus, Costa Rica played only a minor role in the kingdom of Guatemala, and it developed to a large degree apart from the mainstream of Latin American history. It was first in the late 18th century, when Spanish emphasis on commercial agriculture led to the growth of tobacco as a major export, that the colony became of some importance to the Guatemalan authorities.
Tobacco exports promoted the growth of a more prosperous society, and Costa Ricans became prominent in the intellectual and political life of Central America in the early 19th century. When Spanish rule ended in 1821, the country became part of Mexico until 1823, and then part of the United Provinces of Central America, from 1824 to 1838. However, it avoided involvement in the civil wars that plagued the latter federation. Costa Rican politics reflected the liberal-conservative ideologies found elsewhere in Latin America, with the towns of Cartago , San José, Heredia, and Alajuela vying for leadership. San José gained ascendancy, but the most important development of the mid-19th century was the growth of coffee as the major export. Under the conservative dictatorship (1849-1859) of J. Rafael Mora, Costa Rica took the lead in organizing Central American resistance against William Walker , the U.S. adventurer who took over Nicaragua in 1855. After a bloodless coup ousted Mora in 1859, liberal domination followed, notably under Tomás Guardia. During his tenure (1870-1882), Costa Rica became committed to heavy foreign investment in railroads and other public improvements. The banana empire created by the U.S. businessman Minor Keith became the United Fruit Company in 1899. United developed the lowland coasts and built railroads and other communications, but it also made Costa Rica more dependent on foreign markets and capital.
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