Our first lecture
today was definitely a delight. His name
was Manuel and he was a jokester. He
spoke to us about how this country, Costa Rica of course, has been growing and
how opportunities are growing for young people. Costa Rica has the widest
assortment of products exported in the world; Manual says they "export
whatever we see." In order to be
successful, they had to learn how to compete with the world and how to start
doing business with other countries.
They couldn't get it done with the attitude they had at the
time, "whatever you want." To be successful, one can't think like that
when doing business with the world.
You have to be on your toes, not
laid back. Costa Ricans were trained to
use what is here already and not import.
A lot of companies went bankrupt and governments started to push to sign
free trade agreements in order to bring the company back up. In 1968, the first free trade agreement
signed in the world (CAFTA). Manuel
believes that Costa Rica has the most free trade agreements signed world wide
making the economy here wide open to the world.
From 1978 to 1982, disaster struck when the government drove Costa
Rica into economic crisis. The next government came in, a transition government, and started to
stabilize the economy bringing in foreign investment. Costa Rica saw a breaking point was when
Intel decided to come into the country.
Intel makes most of the worlds supply of computer chips. After Intel, Procter and Gamble (GBO) came
in. P&G are now running about 60% of
world wide operations from CR, including all accounting. He explained that he made his children open a
company of which he owned 1% to decrease the amount of arguments between his to
oldest children, and he told them they couldn't have inventory or accounts
receivable, for these are two ways to lose money in a company. They opened an online company that shipped
Costa Rican products to the world. Their
marketing strategies include Facebook, Google ads, yahoo ads, and a "do
not complain with the customer" policy.
The message today is that opportunities are available all over the
world, you just have to jump out of the box, and think easy and simple; simple
things are where great things happen. In
a country with a lot of restrictions, a small country like Costa Rica has
decided to open to the world. Learn how
to do business and perform world wide.
Even small companies are exporting products and bringing in money and
business to Costa Rica as well (mini pineapples, dolls, rocking chairs).
Ms. Lisa presented to us information on Costa
Rican economic history. Twenty-five
percent of biodiversity is under some manner of protection. By the time of the Spanish Conquest, Costa
Rica was a commercial meeting place of larger tribes from North and South
America. It had never been under the
political control of any of them, but the surplus of these societies
converged. There were at least 13
organized human groups in territory, with a
political and social organization.
They planted and gathered fruits and veggies along with fishing and
hunting. Political and religious
positions as well as land rights were transferred from mother to children.
The Spaniards took about 200 years to discover the country
and establish themselves in Costa Rica. Different colonies were created to
produce a variety of products. Small
farms were established. It took a long
time for Spaniards to come here and establish themselves. Surplus of these small farms were used to
trade with other small regions.
Costa Rica remained
underdeveloped and self sustained for many years.
In 1780, Spain developed a mechanism to promote
stronger production of the colonies. It allowed for capital investment and
working capital along with other things.
Independence of
Costa Rica was declared in 1821 allowing for commerce with all nations. They
started bringing entrepreneurs and capital to the country by way of coffee
production, which was second next to tobacco.
Coffee producers needed better roads and a port to better trade with
Europe, which helped the growth of the country.
They then started to produce and trade gold, and silver, along with
other metals, as well as wood, bananas, and cocoa.
In 1880, Costa Rica
started shipping to the US. WWI put the
national economy in trouble, since commercial ties with Germany were
damaged. Costa Rica recovered its income
after the war but failed to diversify its exports or invest in productivity,
leading to another defect in economy.
They always receive the shocks of international crisis. After economic depression, Costa Rica grew
back, but then came WWII.
Costa Rica is a
democratic system, but an old president proposed another presidential candidate
for the next term that would allow the previous president to work with him and
stay in power, but the most popular candidate was the other candidate. There was
cheating during the election, and the revolution started from this point on.
The higher class represented the cheating side and joined the communist party.
They became a band that wanted to stay in power. So, Costa Rica has a socialist state that is
democratic.
A revolution started
in 1948. The army existed at this point
and people took over that army and existing government in only 3 months. A new state was organized and took 18 months
to design it. It needed to answer to the
social needs of the people. The army was
then abolished and new education, medicine, and insurance and other public
services started for the people. It
sponsored by taxing exports, imports, and individual consumption.
Prices of coffee
increased during 1950s, allowing Costa Rica to increase productivity and
technology. During WWII US built a road
to protect the panama canal for trade reasons.
This is when the first economic model was developed. In terms of production, a second model of
which Costa Rica depends on the US market was also created (the common central
American market). They started trying to
produce industrial goods and sell them to the rest of Central American, not
just rely on imports from the US. They
came up with fertilizers, food products, and electrical appliances. They were involved in internal struggles that
inhibited the market, so Costa Rica would not be a good buyer for long.
The 80s brought with
it another economic crisis (due to elevated prices of oil) but it was also a
consequence of the fact that value of exports were very low and Costa Rica had
very large deficit. Costa Rica was completely
dependent on the US market at this time.
A new model for development was created. It looked for new products and
new places to send these to. Goods with
greater added value were created and they started to export to Europe again on
a larger scale, such as non-traditional agricultural goods, flowers, plants,
exotic produce, along with coffee and bananas and the like, hoping to generate
employment here.
Summary: the
economic policy of exporting higher value-added goods and services, they have
been successful in promoting growth,
Costa Rica has associated its economy to the US economy tightly. Exports have nearly tripled in real times and
reals growth of 6.6% in the 90s
Today, Costa Rica is
a popular destination for investors and tourism, and there are better paying
jobs for young people.
Costa Rica has
always had a dynamic growing economy, but the problem is that exports are
really very small compared to incomes.
Todays strategy:
higher value added products and services by investing in education and
development; making a brand of
sustainability and international peace and democratic government
Main sectors:
services and commercial services
This year it is
estimated that Costa Rica will have a 4% growth in production. Labor is very low right now. They have a currency band system for their
currency and a large public promotion of external investment, but today it is a
challenge for the country. The bands were established about 6 years ago; they
don't allow currency to go higher than 670 value per dollar or lower than
500.
Economic crisis
created monetary expansion in the US.
Funds tend to move higher where revenue is obtained.
There is a small
financial sector in Costa Rica and it's mostly public, but it's very
inefficient and not much they can do to lower the interest rates. The American dollar is huge due to the high
interest rates in the country of Costa Rica.
The country is a
little unstable from the financial stand point.
Study on Happiness
in Costa Rica
What is the key to
happiness in a country that is relatively underdeveloped and income is
relatively low. Questions asked are: how
happy are you, would you like tomorrow to be a day like today, are most other
people happier than you, in relation to a perfect life, how would you rate your
life?
Questions are more
about how you regard your life in general.
They aren't asking about the reasons, they are just asking simple
questions and comparing results.
Ms. Lisa created a
questionnaire with 33 questions. 3
variables. Theory states that the best
definition of happiness is from Seligman's work: " a result of three
variables: a set of range of positive emotion that we inherit, or derive from
our temper, the set of circumstances you face in life, and those factors under
your voluntary control."
She built a set of
questions for each of these three variables.
She used questions that had relevant indicators of happiness. Results were that
- Your set range of emotions if
you worry or resent past events; your valuation of how happy you are in
comparison to other people
- Circumstances: Educational
level: higher= can go farther and are happier; Family: very important in
Costa Rica; most of the answers has to do with families; being satisfied
with the state of the country; improving social status
- Factors under your control
having personal objectives, a positive attitude toward problems, and an
interest to climb the social ladder
Our next speaker is
Ms. Gale. She works for a foundation
that works with under privileged people in the country. She spoke to us about poverty ratification,
which is very close to her heart. She
came to Costa Rica with the peace core and has been a humanitarian since she
was very young. One of her motivational
messages is that you should speak up and
stand up for what you believe in, but do it in a way that isn't adversarial or
belligerent.
In the beginning of
her journey here, there was more poverty than there is now and people are
getting a better quality of life. She
works with volunteers from 1 hour to one year to longer than that. She says that people who were coming here to
volunteer were distraught particularly about disasters such as 9/11. Ms. Gayle is from the US but has not lived
there for over 30 years, but says that she holds her home country dear to her
heart.
Poverty:
Water is for
cleaning, washing, or flushing the toilet if you have a toilet. You do not get to use it for drinking. You are unable to shower before work. Your linens are never cleaned, therefore, you
get bed bugs. It is not the fault of the
person, it is failure of the society.
Society fails when they deny these individuals a job because of their
lack of decent clothing due to the fact that they simply cannot afford
them. Necessities such as food and rent
and such comes first. Most of these
people live with guilt and anger because they cannot support their self and
their children.
In poverty
communities, it is common for men to give up because they are not the bread
winner and can't support their families, so they run off to the woman next door
or to another country, leaving behind their children and the children's
mothers. This is why mothers and their
children are so close to one another.
Part 2:
People who come to
the La Carpio come from another country and are not able to go back to their
country to see their mothers or pets.
There is a misconception about this place that it is dangerous. Even the people from the country of Costa
Rica are afraid of this neighborhood.
Those who come in to
work with these people begin with the children because it is easy to get to
children and easy to teach them. A bond
is created with the mother by creating a bond with the children. They then find a group of women and invest in
them by giving them self-esteem workshops, therapy, teaching them to be better
mothers by showing them how to do intellectual things with their children, and
so on. If you make sure that a woman
gets x amount of money every Friday, she will make a life for herself and her
children.
Once you have all of
this, men have to change their behavior because the women will not put up with
their BS anymore.
Part 3: business
How to people in
poverty communities run a business?
Very simple. They take what they have in front of them and
do what they can with it. For example,
if you have a chair, you place it in a clinic and rent it for a dollar a day. You make enough money to buy food and maybe
enough for another chair. Every starts
out with little money and builds on it.
They never borrow money because they do not want to pay interest on
anything. They can do more with the
money they would pay on interest.
In this community,
they now have people going to high school and a population of older women who
are interacting with the guys. People
are learning more and becoming more educated.
They are starting to give titles to the land and the future is that they
will have an apartment community in La Carpio.
It will also give these people the right to vote. These people are Nicoragrans.
La Carpio: There are 34000 people and it was founded by
Costa Ricans. Nicoragrans found this
place and the word was out and not it is mainly Nicoragrans. People pass down the business they are in to
their children. They teach their
children the art of their business from a very young age.
It is expensive to
run this. They run it by accepting
donations, by charging mothers a small fee for childcare, and they also have
volunteers that go to the community and helps them out. Volunteers, if they can, help the community
by supporting the finances of La Carpio.
Lunch was delicious again today. It was a fabulous three course meal that
started with a delicious soup and bread.
We then had a buffet style second course with your choice of lettuce
topped with tomatoes, cucumbers, heart of some type of vegetable, corn,
carrots, and/or ranch or Italian dressing.
There was also rice with shrimp and other chopped veggies, pork chops,
and a thick slice of tomato topped with spinach, onions, and cheese (talk about
delicious!) For dessert, it was some
type of chocolate mousse with nuts on top that practically melted in my
mouth. My stomach is wondering what in the
world is going on. Three course meals
just don’t happen back home, especially in my house!
Our fourth speaker is a doctor who has numerous novels and
writings. By profession, he is a chemist
with multiple levels of education. He is
here today to talk about the culture of Costa Rica. Doctor speaks both French and English, but
says he is quite insecure about his English and probably feels the same way
about his French because he learned it late in life. Doctor was also the director of a
university.
There is a big difference between a big nation and a small
country such as Costa Rica. The way
people perceive their nationality is quite different from one nation to
another. Particular nations are
difficult to establish. Costa Rica has a
particular characteristic of which they are fond of. They do not have an army. Costa Rica is the first country in the world
the dissolve the army and has been without it for about a century. Costa Rica has been named as being a happy
place, “Pura Vida.” Costa Rica is
responsible for many of the changes throughout the country of Panama.
The last speaker spoke to us about the African descendants
here in Costa Rica. He showed us an
image. One of which looked like a couple
caressing each other, but if you look closely there are multiple dolphins. We are programmed by society to see things
according to what they want us to see and think the way they want us to
think. When children are asked what they
see in the same photo, they see the dolphins, for they are not yet brainwashed
by society.
He then talked about the Myans and joked that no one really
knew of them until December of last year.
He showed multiple pictures of famous icons throughout the world. These four icons are part of the 4 groups
that are a part of the Costa Rican society (Native, African, Chinese, and
European decedents). These are also the
ethnic groups found here and the heritage of which they descend from. Different
ethnic groups have different icons, but can reflect society.
The world today is a product of the different efforts around
the world.
