*leer en castellano abajo
Costa Rica is one of the few States that can boast of being nearly ‘Carbon Neutral’, conserving 25% and doubling its forest. But it’s still a capitalist top-down State, dominated by US capital and being rapidly bought up cheap for nearly tax free US holiday homes. Over 20% of people survive in severe poverty while millions of tourists arrive by plane and Cruise Liners, spewing uncounted CO2. You can even take a Tourist Tour of the slums to photograph the ‘happy smiling beggars’.(7 Shocking Facts About Costa Rica’s Poverty Rate).
Of course we must follow Costa Rica’s amazing ecological gains, but without forgetting it’s a small exceptional place (4.5m people) and to solve Climate and ecological breakdown the whole system of Infinite Growth must change.
Costa Rica has renewable electricity and has doubled its forests in a few decades… let’s compare with Spain
by Pepe Galindo edited with inserts by thefreeonline ”Costa Rica, is an Central American country that conserves its forests very well and that promotes renewable energy Years of uncontrolled logging razed two thirds of Costa Rica’s trees. When they stopped cutting, the forests grew.
But that was not something that simply happened, but was organized by the leaders of the country. They recognized that forests generate many benefits that do not appear in economic account.
Costa Rica began to give tax benefits to those who conserved their lands without degrading them.
They understood that protecting their “natural resources” is beneficial in the long term. The so-called Payments for Environmental Services (PES) are serving to recognize that healthy ecosystems generate benefits and that they must pay for them (carbon sequestration, water filtration, maintenance of quality aquifers and air, provision of food and medicines, etc. .).
When these environmental processes are free, people have no incentives to conserve them. Free is not valued. In rural areas, PES have also served to reduce poverty.
”Costa Rica Property Rights, Buying and Owning Property …Costa Rica granted generous incentives to foreign nationals wishing to become residents. The lure of its beautiful coasts and the warmth of the people, together
with numerous scams, has led many North Americans to buy property where there is no Capital Gains Tax …. Meanwhile 20% of the population live in extreme poverty and the number is rising. Continue reading “Costa Rica Doubles Forests/Going Carbon Neutral/ But has a million in poverty..”
The Free 