Review of Costa Rican Agricultural Exports: Banana, Coffee, & Pineapple

Abstract

Costa Rica is one of the world’s leading exporters of bananas and pineapple, as well as one of the largest producers of coffee in North America. These three exports make up the backbone of Costa Rican agriculture, which accounts for almost 5% (4.6% to be exact) of its GDP and employs 12.5% of Costa Rica’s workforce. In fact, over 10% of the world’s exported pineapples are grown in Costa Rica. Moreover, Costa Rica is a very close trading partner with many European countries and the United States especially. Given the aforementioned information, hopefully one may understand why an analysis of Costa Rican agricultural production and exports are important. Dually, there exists a relative lack of literature on Costa Rican agricultural economy when compared to other Latin American nations, and this void of published work should be filled. Not only is the industry very important for Costa Rica, but the United States and some European nations rely on Costa Rican exports of banana and pineapple. This paper seeks to contribute greater understanding within economic literature on Costa Rican agricultural exports, and demonstrate which direction Costa Rica’s exports should move in the future. This paper seeks to answer the question of what role Costa Rica currently plays in global agriculture production, and which way it should move in the near future. Analyzing Costa Rica’s production possibilities in regards to its main three agricultural crop exports may help improve efficiency, promote a more environmentally friendly agriculture industry, and even marginally increase GDP. Furthermore, this research may open the door for greater discourse on current trends of exports in the global south and the re-evaluation of the comparative advantages among developing states currently. This is to say that this paper may be the spring board with which more literature and discussion may come from in regards to agricultural exports and development in the global south. This paper finds that Costa Rica should look to slightly increasing production of Pineapple and Coffee, while slightly reducing banana production.