TOURISM-COSTA RICA: Much More Than a Walk in
the Countryside
By Daniel
Zueras*
SAN JOSÉ (Tierramérica) - Some 3,000
people make their living from rural
community-based tourism in Costa Rica,
according to the association of tour
operators who connect visitors to the
delights of rural life.
Known elsewhere as agro-ecotourism, Costa
Rica has been at it for 18 years. A law
enacted Jul. 17 by President Óscar Arias
aims to make this alternative a permanent
and growing endeavour.
"We promote close interaction between the
visitor and the local community" and there
is a certain degree of natural adventure,
which small farmers and indigenous people
experience day-to-day as they provide
tourism services, Mario Ordóńez, marketing
manager for the specialised travel agency
Simbiosis Tours, told Tierramérica.
"The tourists cross the same hanging bridges
that the community members use, or ride
horseback as part of a normal workday. None
of it is specially organised or staged only
for the tourist," he explained.
The difference between community-based
tourism and ecotourism is that the latter
"delinks the cultural aspect from the
activity," Ordóńez added.
This kind of tourism is an "advanced" form
of ecotourism "because it places special
emphasis on land ownership by local
residents, giving it added value," Kyra
Cruz, president of the National Chamber of
Rural Community Tourism, told Tierramérica.
The Bribrí indigenous community, in the
Talamanca Mountains, were a pioneer in this
type of tourism.
The area is located in the eastern province
of Limón, and extends from the beaches of
the Caribbean Sea to the south-central part
of the country. The Bribrí, who number
around 10,000, live in the Upper Talamanca
valley.
In 1987, in the wake of the crisis of cocoa
crops and low prices for bananas, "we
organised to see if we could improve banana
production, and set up a telephone system
and began the tourism initiative," Guillermo
Torres, manager of the Yorkín Natural
Adventure organisation, told Tierramérica.
According to Torres, today there are 18
families that make a living from this
enterprise. They have a lodge for 25 people
and are building an eight-room inn. They
also offer a canoe trip to transport bamboo
on the Yorkín River and activities ranging
from craft-making to cocoa farming and
archery.
It has also been a boom to the Bribrí
language "because we teach words to our
visitors," said Torres. The emphasis on the
culture of each community is one of the
things that attract people to this type of
tourism.
The new law is intended to regulate a
growing activity, which is characterised by
small-scale operations. "Until now, in order
to benefit from the tourism initiatives law,
they required a minimum of 10 hotel rooms,
and 98 percent didn't reach that number,"
said Cruz.
The new legislation lowers the minimum to
three rooms for eligibility for aid, which
includes tax exemptions, facilitation of
paperwork by local governments and promotion
of "the importance of this model of
sustainable tourism," she said.
"The law is going to be very important if
the regulations are truly effective and not
too bureaucratic," Cruz added.
In the opinion of Marcy Arrieta, promoter of
this kind of innovative tourism at the
government's Tourism Institute, the
legislation "recognises the effort the
country has made over the past 18 years," as
well as the quality of the services, which
have a social and economic foundation
"highly suited to further development."
Community-based tourism "has become a model,
extending beyond our borders," Arrieta told
Tierramérica. It has been successfully
exported to other Central American
countries, as well as to Colombia, Peru and
Chile.
Gonzalo Vargas, president of the National
Chamber of Tourism, described the benefits
of rural community-based tourism this way:
"The capital that is invested is nearly all
Costa Rican, and better yet, from families
with limited resources," which reassures the
visitors that they are consuming a product
that improves the quality of life of the
local people.
Furthermore, an incredibly high percentage
of each "colón" (the national currency) that
is spent on these services remains in the
family or the community, he said.
Of the 43,000 hotel rooms in Costa Rica,
just 1,000 are found in the community-based
tourism sector, said Vargas. The average is
four or five rooms with a total of 10 to 12
beds, especially at the bed and breakfasts.
(*This story was originally published by
Latin American newspapers that are part of
the Tierramérica network. Tierramérica is a
specialised news service produced by IPS
with the backing of the United Nations
Development Programme, United Nations
Environment Programme and the World Bank.)
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