Economy of Costa Rica

Although still a largely agricultural country, Costa Rica has expanded its economy to include strong technology and tourism sectors. The standard of living is relatively high and land ownership is widespread.

Important Cities

San Jose is Costa Rica’s capital and is the largest metropolitan city. Most major businesses have offices in San Jose. Important coastal cities include Puerto Limon on the Caribbean coast and Puntarenas on the Pacific coast.

Economic Sectors

Costa Rica's stable economy depends on tourism, agriculture, and electronics exports. Poverty has been substantially reduced over the past 15 years, and a strong social safety net has been put into place. At the same time, distribution of income remains unequal. Foreign investors remain attracted by the country's political stability and high education levels, and tourism continues to bring in foreign exchange.

Costa Rica was historically a subsistence agricultural society until the middle of the 19th century when coffee became the largest and most profitable export. Bananas soon followed. These two crops continue to be the most important agricultural products of Costa Rica. Other agricultural products that are important to Costa Rica’s economy are meat and sugar.

In the 1990s tourism really took off in Costa Rica as a major industry. In the mid 1990s the country revenues from tourism passed those of coffee and bananas combined. By 2000, well over one million tourists were visiting Costa Rica every year. Over one third were from the U.S. Europeans, Canadians and tourists from other Latin American nations are also commonly found in Costa Rica.

The electronics sector of Costa Rica became a major contributor in the late 1990s. One of the factors for this growth was the opening of factories by Intel, the multinational manufacturer of computer chips. In 1998, electronics was the top contributor to Costa Rica’s GDP. About three quarters of this growth was attributed to Intel. The electronics sector has slowed down in recent years due to the decrease in world demand for microchips, but continues to play a major role in Costa Rica’s economy.

Tourism continues to play an increasingly important role over agriculture in Costa Rica’s economy due to low coffee prices and an overabundance of bananas. Although global forces have hurt the agricultural sector, the country still has one of the highest GDPs per capita in Latin America.