$Unique_ID{COW00972} $Pretitle{290} $Title{Costa Rica Chapter 3B. Crops and Agriculture} $Subtitle{} $Author{Donald P. Whitaker} $Affiliation{HQ, Department of the Army} $Subject{costa percent production early tons hectares rica coffee province puntarenas} $Date{1983} $Log{Harvesting Sugarcane*0097204.scf Zebu Cattle*0097205.scf } Country: Costa Rica Book: Costa Rica, A Country Study Author: Donald P. Whitaker Affiliation: HQ, Department of the Army Date: 1983 Chapter 3B. Crops and Agriculture Crops Costa Rica's wide range of climates-tropical, subtropical, and temperate-permits cultivation of a variety of crops. Those produced mainly for export predominate over those grown primarily for domestic consumption. The principal so-called traditional export crops include bananas, coffee, cacao, and sugarcane (sugar). In the early 1980s the government was also promoting increased production for export of various "nontraditional" crops, including coconuts, macadamia nuts, melons, pineapples, and a number of other tropical items grown in Costa Rica. The major crops cultivated for domestic consumption were beans, maize, plantains, potatoes, rice, sorghum, and onions. Others of less significance were cassava, cotton, and tobacco (see table 4, Appendix). The banana, believed to be native to tropical Asia, was introduced into the Caribbean islands and then into Central America early in the Spanish period. It was not until after the mid-1860s, however, that the fruit became fairly widely known in the United States. By the 1870s a small but highly profitable American market had developed for bananas (mostly from Jamaica and some of the other islands). During that decade commercial production of the Gros Michel variety, which became the leading market fruit, was started in Costa Rica by American entrepreneur Minor Cooper Keith (see Minor Cooper Keith, ch. 1). Keith's first exports, made in 1880 to New Orleans, totaled 360 stems of bananas. (A century later Costa Rica was exporting over 50 million 40-pound boxes of the fruit.) Large profits resulted from this first shipment, and the plantation area was greatly expanded. Exports continued to increase, but in the late 1890s Keith's general financial difficulties and bankruptcy of the New Orleans importing firm that handled his production led to a merger of the Keith holdings and those of the Boston Fruit Company, which was then supplying bananas to the northeastern United States. The new enterprise, the United Fruit Company, subsequently maintained a virtual monopoly of Costa Rica's banana exports until the late 1950s; records for 1955 show that the company handled 99 percent of the total export that year. In 1956 the Standard Fruit Company, a subsidiary of the American Castle and Cooke group, began production in the Caribbean coastal region; its first exports were in 1959. In the 1960s a third major transnational company, the Banana Development Corporation of Costa Rica (BANDECO), a subsidiary of the Del Monte Corporation, also commenced operations. At the end of that decade, the three multinationals accounted for 95 percent of banana exports (United Fruit, 45 percent; Standard Fruit, 40 percent; and Del Monte, 10 percent). In 1979 the share of United Brands (the successor company to United Fruit after a merger in 1970 with the American conglomerate AMK Corporation) stood at 36 percent, accounted for by two subsidiaries: the Banana Company of Costa Rica (29 percent) and the Atlantic Banana Company (Compania Bananera Atlantica-COBAL) (7 percent). Standard Fruit exported another 35 percent and Del Monte 28 percent. United Fruit's original Costa Rican holdings were in the Caribbean coastal region, where soils, temperatures, the well-distributed rainfall, and the general absence of strong winds (which can easily knock down the herbaceous banana plant when it is weighted with ripe fruit) provided excellent growing conditions. In the early 1900s its plantations became infected with the fungal Panama disease, which destroys the banana's underground stem, and production declined steadily as plantations had to be abandoned. In the 1930s the company acquired large areas of land on the west coast in southern Puntarenas Province under an agreement with the government. Plantations were established around Puerto Quepos and the present-day port of Golfito, which the company constructed to handle the new trade. An extensive railroad system was also built inland from Golfito port to service the plantations (see Transportation, this ch.). Because of the region's distinct dry season (January to March), irrigation was installed. The plantations proved highly successful, but in the late 1940s Panama disease struck the Puerto Quepos area. The disease spread rapidly, and by 1956 production there had been ended. In the mid-1960s United Fruit began planting in its Pacific coast holdings a new banana variety, the Valery, which was resistant to the disease. The success of the undertaking led to a return by the company to the Caribbean coast. Standard Fruit, which operated in the Caribbean zone, introduced a related variety, the Giant Cavendish. The success of the two varieties also brought the reemergence of independent growers. The total area in bananas rose from about 20,000 hectares at the beginning of the 1970s to over 27,400 hectares in 1976; the total in 1980 stood at almost 26,100 hectares (some 19,000 hectares in the Caribbean area and over 6,500 hectares in the Pacific zone). Of the 1980 total, almost 18,800 hectares belonged to the three multinationals, and about 7,300 hectares were cultivated by independent operators. However, the latter, located almost entirely in the Caribbean region, were under contract to the large companies, which handled the exporting of their fruit. The government since 1979 has provided assistance to small producers to increase output per unit of land and to enlarge holdings. The principal goal has been to increase export earnings, and a main requirement for such assistance has been a confirmed contract to deliver the fruit produced to an established exporter, in essence the three transnationals. In the early 1980s, however, overall production and exports declined. The principal reasons for the drop included the detrimental effects of an infection by the black sigatoka disease (a leaf disease) of which a less virulent form, yellow sigatoka disease, has been kept under control by spraying, which appeared in late 1979 in the Caribbean zone. A fungus spread by wind-borne spores, the disease had also reached the plantations on the Pacific coast by 1980. As the economic recession worsened after 1981, control of the disease was seriously hampered because of a shortage of government funds to support efforts by the independent growers. In 1982 production was reduced further as the result of a 63-day strike by workers on Standard Fruit plantations. Exports were also affected that year by lower world prices caused by a large increase in the output of bananas in Ecuador, the world's leading exporter (Costa Rica is second). Domestic production costs were also cited by the multinationals as a reason for smaller shipments, in particular the export tax of US$1 per box, which was substantially higher than that of other Central American countries. The main South American exporters, moreover, paid no tax in 1983. Negotiations had begun in mid- and late 1983 between the government and the three multinationals to develop a sliding scale for the tax to relate it to the world market price, but a resolution had not been achieved by the end of November. A significant factor in the decline in exported bananas (from 53 million boxes in 1980 to 45 million in 1982) was the continued conversion of land-particularly by United Brands-from bananas to the African oil palm, a main source of edible oil. According to reports, the purpose of the shift was to reduce operating costs; considerably fewer workers were required to care for and harvest the oil palm. The oil palm tree was also resistant to the devastating winds experienced from time to time by the company's southern Puntarenas holdings; in July 1983 a hurricane in that area caused the loss of 200,000 stems of bananas. Domestic production of edible oils has regularly failed to meet demand; in 1982 edible oil worth US$25 million was imported. Increased output was expected to result in major foreign exchange savings and from about the mid-1980s to be sufficient to begin exports. Early records indicate that coffee cultivation started in Costa Rica in 1779 in the Meseta Central, where soils and climate proved ideal for the coffee tree. Exports began in the late 1820s to Panama and early in the following decade to South American ports from which transshipments were made to Europe and New York. A major impetus was given to production when a cargo of coffee was picked up at Puntarenas in 1843 and carried around Cape Horn to Liverpool, initiating direct trade contacts with the British market. Subsequently, British capital furnished most of the investment to expand the industry, and Britain became the principal buyer of Costa Rican coffee thereafter, a position that it held until World War II. The new trade and the great potential for profit in coffee growing were major factors in the spread of population outward from the urban centers of the Meseta Central in sharp contrast to the usually inward flow that characterizes developing agricultural economies. Until the beginning of the 1950s, parts of the San Jose, Alajuela, Heredia, and Cartago provinces in the Meseta Central remained almost the sole areas for coffee growing. In the 1950s new growing areas were opened in the valley of the Rio General in southern San Jose Province and in southern Puntarenas Province, where suitable conditions for cultivation had been found. In 1983 the new areas encompassed all of Coto Brus canton in the latter province and much of the Rio General valley. In the 1980-81 coffee crop year (April-March), the traditional growing region of Alajuela, Cartago, Heredia, and San Jose (plus coffee from the southern part of the latter province) accounted for over 92 percent of the coffee crop. Puntarenas Province, which had produced only a negligible quantity 30 years earlier, provided more than 6 percent of the remainder. Almost 88,750 producers were registered with the state Coffee Office (Oficina del Cafe). This office, a semiautonomous entity composed of producers, processors, exporters, and government representatives, was established in 1933 in the wake of the Great Depression to control prices and other factors affecting the domestic coffee industry. It subsequently was charged with carrying out Costa Rica's obligations under the various International Coffee Organization (ICO) agreements first entered into in 1962 by the world's coffee-producing and major consuming nations. There were about 82,500 hectares planted to coffee trees in 1980-81, compared with 75,500 hectares a decade earlier and some 68,000 hectares in 1965. Production increased from an annual average of 47,200 tons between 1961 and 1965 to 71,500 tons in the period 1965-70 and 88,700 tons between 1975 and 1980. Since 1979 the Coffee Office has emphasized an increase in productivity rather than expansion of plantation areas. This is being accomplished mainly by planting a greater number of trees in a given area and replacing old trees with improved strains; the greater use of modern technology, including proper fertilizing, use of pesticides, and the like, has also been encouraged. The Costa Rican product is included in the international category of other mild coffees. It has a high caffeine content, is of high quality, and has been used to blend and improve less desirable varieties. In the late 1970s and early 1980s about 86 to 87 percent of the registered coffee harvest was exported. About 13 to 14 percent of the harvest was retained by the Coffee Office for the domestic market. This coffee, which increased gradually in amount from 10,140 tons in 1975 to 13,830 tons in 1981, was sold in the internal market at a considerably lower price than export coffee. To prevent diversion to the export market, coffee beans for domestic use were tinted with certified coloring for identification. The cacao tree, the seeds of which provide cocoa, cocoa butter, and chocolate, is native to the humid tropical regions of the Western Hemisphere and was under regular cultivation by the Nahua Indians in the Caribbean coastal region of Costa Rica at the time of the Spanish conquest. Cacao became the country's first cash crop, and for a time in the early 1700s the beans were used as a medium of exchange. The industry began declining in the 1800s as coffee growing assumed major proportions; by the end of the century the harvesting of cacao beans had almost ceased. Growing world demand for cocoa and chocolate stimulated replanting in the mid-twentieth century in Limon Province; in 1983 the province was the principal center of Costa Rican production. Other smaller growing areas also existed in northern Alajuela and Cartago provinces and in southern Puntarenas Province. An average of about 20,000 hectares of cacao trees was believed harvested each year, but the quality of cacao beans actually processed has been affected by world prices. In the late 1960s roughly 8,000 tons of cacao products were produced annually, most of which were exported. The total declined to 6,000 to 7,000 tons during most of the 1970s but rose sharply to over 10,000 tons in 1978 and 1979 (a period of high world prices). In the latter year, however, many plantations were seriously affected by a fungal disease (monilia), and output dropped to some 5,000 tons in 1980 and 1981. Costa Rica has been the main producer of cacao in Central America, but its production constitutes only a very small fraction of the total world output (0.3 to 0.4 percent in the early 1980s). Domestic consumption needs, which by law must be satisfied before exports are made, increased sharply in the late 1970s-from under 1,000 tons in 1970 to 4,500 tons in 1978 and over 6,000 tons in 1979-stimulated by improving economic conditions. The subsequent downturn in the economy in the early 1980s was accompanied by a decline in internal consumption to about 3,000 tons in 1981. Sugarcane is grown in most parts of the country. Of the 36,000 to 38,000 hectares of cane harvested annually in the early 1980s, well over one-half was in the Meseta Central, about one-fifth in Guanacaste and northern Puntarenas provinces, and somewhat less in an area centered mainly in northern Alajuela Province. Most of the remainder was located in southern San Jose and Puntarenas provinces. During the 1970s and in the early 1980s, some 2 million to 2.3 million tons of cane were milled during the harvest period (October to March). In 1982-83 about 25 large mills were in operation, producing the whitish centrifugal sugar that is the raw sugar of international commerce, as well as refined granulated sugar; production of the latter first began domestically in 1968. The largest mill was the government-owned Tempisque Sugar Central (Central Azucarera El Tempisque-CATSA), located in Guanacaste Province. CATSA, a subsidiary of the government's Costa Rican Development Corporation (Corporacion Costarricense de Desarrollo-CODESA), was inaugurated officially in October 1975. The mill had 4,000 hectares usable for cane growing; cane was purchased from private growers in the area as well. In January 1980 an associated alcohol distillery was opened. The distillery later closed because of high production costs but reopened in 1982 to produce alcohol for gasohol. According to reports, neither the mill nor the distillery has ever produced to project specification, and CATSA in mid-1983 appeared to be in serious financial difficulty. An unknown quantity of noncentrifugal sugar is also turned out by numerous small mills. The product, a brownish crude sugar, is molded into cakes that are mostly used locally. Costa Rican sugar production had remained comparatively low until the United States embargo on Cuban sugar (subsequent to the takeover of the island by Fidel Castro) stimulated output. Imports had been necessary to meet domestic demand until 1956-57 when production had reached 32,000 tons, and imports were no longer required. By the mid-1960s exports of over 60,000 tons a year were going to the United States. In the first half of the 1970s, sugar production averaged about 174,000 tons annually but increased to over 190,000 tons thereafter as CATSA began operations. The amount constituted some 14 to 15 percent of the total output of the six Central American states but was only a small fraction (roughly 0.3 percent) of world cane sugar production. Since the early 1970s exports have ranged between 70,000 and 90,000 tons. The amount has been affected in part by world prices, local weather conditions, producer prices, and domestic demands that have grown at an estimated 3 percent annually. A large number of small and medium-sized farms, as well as a number of large plantations, cultivate sugarcane. Little detailed information was available beyond that obtained in an agricultural census taken in 1973. Of a total of almost 9,500 separate farms raising sugarcane at that time, about 54 percent (5,140 farming units) were small (under 10 hectares each), another 40 percent (3,783 units) of medium size ranged between 10 and 100 hectares, and 6 percent (557) were plantations of more than 100 hectares. The more than 8,900 farms included in the small- to medium-sized categories then occupied 43 percent of the land used for sugarcane but accounted for only 36 percent of total sugar production. Many of the larger plantations, located in Guanacaste and Puntarenas provinces, used irrigation and modern machinery. Together with the more effective and greater use of fertilizers, they obtained a markedly higher yield of sugar per hectare; in 1973 their yields averaged 75 tons compared with 54 or 55 tons produced by the smaller farms. [See Harvesting Sugarcane: Guanacaste Province. Courtesy Costa Rican Tourist Board] The principal cultivated grains are maize, rice, and sorghum, the latter of importance mainly as animal feed. Maize, a main staple, is widely grown from sea level to over 2,500 meters, hybrid seeds being available for different elevations. Rice, for which there has been a steadily growing demand as the population increased, was regularly imported until the 1970s, when self-sufficiency was attained; at that time average annual consumption was 50 kilograms. Subsequently, surpluses have been produced that are exported to other countries in the region. The main rice-growing areas are in Guanacaste and northern Puntarenas provinces, parts of southern Puntarenas, and in the plains areas of the northern tropical zone. Unlike maize, which is cultivated by smallholders, rice is grown by large-scale producers using modern methods. In 1983 wheat was not grown commercially. There has been a steady demand for wheat flour, however, for bread, biscuits, and pasta. Annual imports in the early 1980s were about 80,000 tons, almost entirely from the United States. Beans are grown on small farms all over the country and constitute one of the most important foods in the Costa Rican diet. Production of maize, beans, and sorghum does not meet the demand, and substantial quantities are also regularly imported. Other food crops include potatoes, cultivation of which is limited to areas of Cartago and Alajuela provinces because of climatic and soil requirements not found elsewhere. Plantains, related to the banana but mostly cooked before eating, require growing conditions similar to those of the banana and are cultivated in the same regions. Cassava (yuca) cultivation is scattered throughout much of the country. Some cassava products are exported to the United States. Tobacco, grown and used before the arrival of the early conquistadores and later an important colonial export crop, is widely cultivated by smallholders for their own use. About 1,000 growers produce sun-dried burley and Virginia tobaccos under contract for Costa Rica's two cigarette factories. The growing of cotton started in the 1930s, and cotton is cultivated by a few plantations in Guanacaste and upper Puntarenas provinces. Total output is small and was of only minor economic significance in 1983. Livestock Cattle raising is the most important activity in the livestock sector. Since the 1960s it has accounted annually (in constant prices) for an average of 10 to 11 percent of total agricultural production, and beef (chilled and frozen) and live animals have regularly been the third largest earner of foreign exchange. Most of the exported beef goes to the United States, whereas live animals are shipped to surrounding countries and the Caribbean states. Beef production appeared to be about 65,000 to 75,000 tons annually in the early 1980s, of which roughly one-half was exported. The number of animals exported was estimated at over 100,000 head. [See Zebu Cattle: Improved strains of zebu cattle provide meat for Costa Rica's growing beef industry. Courtesy Costa Rican Tourist Board] The first cattle were brought to Costa Rica in the 1500s. Genetic improvement was under way as early as the 1700s, and present-day Costa Rican cattle are said to compare favorably with those in the developed countries. Most beef animals are improved zebu strains; the regular dairy industry herd, however, consists mainly of breeds such as Jersey, Guernsey, and Holstein. Until the end of World War II, cattle had to be imported to satisfy domestic requirements for beef, which is overwhelmingly the favorite meat of Costa Ricans. By 1955 production had grown sufficiently to meet the local demand and to provide some exports. In 1961 the cattle population reached 1 million head and was about 1.5 million at the end of the decade. The number reached 2.5 million in the early 1980s. Consumption of beef during that period averaged about 15 to 16 kilograms a year per capita. Guanacaste and northern Puntarenas provinces and the Llanura de San Carlos region in Alajuela Province are the largest cattle-raising areas. Pastures cover between 50 and 70 percent of those areas, and in the Peninsula de Nicoya, southern Guanacaste, and northern Puntarenas they occupy more than 70 percent. Growth of the industry in Guanacaste and San Carlos has been largely attributed to the early lack of good transportation, which discouraged any wide cultivation of crops; poor communications still prevailed in 1983 in much of the San Carlos region. The Llanura de San Carlos has been a major center for fattening cattle. In 1963 the eruption of Volcan Irazu spread a heavy layer of ash over a significant part of the Meseta Central that was used for dairying. A shortage of pasture there led to the movement of herds to the San Carlos region as well as the development of a large local dairy industry; in 1983, however, the Meseta Central remained the most important dairy center. A cattle industry has developed in the southern part of Costa Rica, but there was little information on its size in 1983. The commercial pig-raising industry consists of only a few farms. Located chiefly in the Meseta Central, they have reportedly not been very profitable because of a dependence on imported feedstock. Most pigs are raised by small farmers who have one or two animals. In the early 1980s the estimated number of pigs averaged between 220,000 and 240,000. Local supplies of pork have not usually been adequate, and until the early 1980s about 30,000 to 40,000 animals were imported annually from Nicaragua. The number was drastically reduced in 1981 because of the appearance of hog cholera in that country; the situation in 1983 was unknown. Domestic consumption of pork averaged about 4.5 kilograms per person annually during the 1970s. Of the other larger domestic livestock, horses and mules were the most valuable economically. Horses, particularly important in cattle herding, numbered roughly 110,000. About 60 percent of the horses were in Guanacaste and Alajuela provinces and more than 20 percent in southern Puntarenas Province, mostly in the cattle raising plains area of that part of the country. Mules, estimated at 5,000 to 6,000, were concentrated in Guanacaste but were also numerous in Alajuela, Limon, and southern Puntarenas, where they were important in local transportation. Sheep and goats totaled little more than 1,000 or 2,000 animals. Poultry, almost entirely chickens, are raised by farm families throughout the country, to some extent by urban families, and commercially. Chickens, ducks, and geese (the latter two of little economic value in 1983) were introduced in Costa Rica by the early Spaniards. The commercial production of chicken meat began only in the mid-1950s, and although the industry has grown, it has remained relatively unimportant, constituting less than 1 percent of agricultural production. Growth of the industry is affected by the need to import feed and by competition from less expensive imports of meat from El Salvador and Nicaragua. Estimates at the beginning of the 1980s indicated that Costa Rica had 16 to 17 million chickens, about 5,000 ducks and geese, 3,000 turkeys, and 50,000 quail (quail eggs were an export item). Estimated egg production averaged between 350 million and 400 million annually. Forestry When Spanish explorers arrived in the early 1500s, the territory of present-day Costa Rica was virtually covered by virgin forests, most of which were rain forests of broadleaf evergreen species. These covered almost the entire country except the northwest (mainly present-day Guanacaste Province), where the distinct rainy and dry seasons favored the growth of deciduous trees. Mangrove forests lined much of the coasts but were not well developed except in limited locations on the Pacific; these forests have been of little economic value. A generally dense palm growth occupied a swampy zone of varying width that stretched along the Caribbean from Puerto Limon northward to the Nicaraguan border. The Indian inhabitants of the time practiced slash-and-burn agriculture, but the indigenous population was so small that its activities had little impact on the overall forest. Only as colonization of the Meseta Central proceeded in the 1800s did the gradual clearing of the land for crop and livestock raising begin noticeably to reduce the forest area. Introduction of banana culture in the late 1800s along the Caribbean resulted similarly in the clearing of extensive forested areas. In the latter case, the destruction of the banana plantations in the first decades of the twentieth century by a blight resulted in their abandonment, and much of the original cleared area was covered by secondary growth. The latter vegetation remained of little economic value in the early 1980s, however, because of the small average amount of timber per hectare. Additional clearing has taken place in the Caribbean area since the late 1960s, when the banana was reintroduced. In the Meseta Central the clearing of land became extensive as the area population grew from the late 1800s, and, by about 1940 only scattered forest stands remained. There was also substantial removal of the more valuable tree species in Guanacaste Province, and the great expansion of livestock raising in the region resulted in widespread clearing of land for pasture use. Nevertheless, in 1942 an estimated 40,000 square kilometers, or 78 percent of Costa Rica, were still covered by forest that consisted in large part of virgin growth. Construction of the Costa Rican section of the Inter-American Highway opened up new areas for agriculture and cattle, notably the valley of the Rio General. Accelerated economic development after World War II also brought greatly increased cutting as agriculture-especially cattle ranching-expanded. Estimates vary, but between 1950 and 1960 approximately 44,000 hectares were cut annually, and the amount increased to over 55,000 hectares in the period 1961-77 (a total of about 1.5 million hectares, or 15,000 square kilometers). Estimates of the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) published in 1979 indicated that some 5,000 to 10,000 hectares of trees were cut annually to meet the some 1.5-million-cubic meter commercial demands of the forest industries for timber. Overall, however, about 7 million cubic meters of timber were being cut. The remaining 5.5 million cubic meters represented trees cleared by agriculturists-at will, as both Costa Rican and foreign observers have pointed out-and then disposed of either by burning or being left to rot. The forests were in essence looked on simply as an impediment to economic progress, an obstacle to be removed without a second thought. According to government figures, in 1977 roughly 20,000 square kilometers of Costa Rica were still wooded. At the time, this was about 39 percent of the country's total area. Of the total, some 9,000 square kilometers had virgin stands of particular value for timber production. Another 8,000 square kilometers were considered valuable primarily as protection for watersheds and to prevent erosion. The remaining 3,000 square kilometers were secondary growth. The government has designated certain forest areas as protected reserves. In 1983 these totaled some 410,550 hectares, of which the greater part was located on private lands. Forests were also included in some of the national parks. The government has attempted to control cutting by requiring permits, and some success in reducing deforestation in the late 1970s and early 1980s had been reported. But illegal cutting by individuals clearing new agricultural plots remained a serious problem. In 1983 efforts were under way to establish private forest development corporations involving loggers, owners of sawmills, and transport services. One such organization was established in the timber-rich San Carlos region in northern Costa Rica in May 1983. Its aim was to introduce more scientific utilization of local forest resources and included a reforestation program. The corporation planned to establish a nursery to produce some 600,000 to 700,000 seedlings a year and by the year 2000 to reforest a total of 7,000 hectares. Government efforts at reforestation have been on a small scale and as of 1980 totaled only some 4,400 hectares. Fishing Costa Rica has over 200 kilometers of coast on the Caribbean Sea and more than 1,000 kilometers on the Pacific Ocean. In June 1948 the government established an exclusive fishing zone consisting of the waters within 200 nautical miles of its coasts. This was broadened by legislation in February 1972 to the status of Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ). Foreign vessels were required to register with the government in order to fish within the EEZ, which totaled about 600,000 square kilometers. The country's considerable fishery potential included within that area has remained largely unexploited, however. Real growth did occur in the fishing industry between 1971 and 1979, during which time the catch increased significantly from 8,200 tons to 20,800 tons. It declined thereafter to 10,900 tons in 1982, primarily because of an embargo by the United States on tuna from Costa Rica after the latter seized an American tuna boat in 1979. The embargo was lifted in 1982, and in early 1983 the United States, Costa Rica, and Panama signed the Eastern Pacific Ocean Tuna Fishing Agreement. Overall, fishing accounted for only a small part of the total value of agricultural production (roughly 2 to 2.5 percent in most years) and only a fraction of the GDP (0.8 percent in 1979, the latest figure available). Domestic fish consumption increased only slightly in the 1970s from an estimated 4.6 kilograms per capita in 1971 to 6.9 kilograms in 1977. Some part of the low consumption was attributable to consumer experience with fresh fish, which spoils easily in the tropical climate. Frozen fish had never become popular. A major factor also seemed to be the low cost of meat. Fishing was centered mostly along the Pacific coast and was commercial and artisanal. The latter was both for subsistence and for sale. Much of the fresh fish consumed in the country was supplied by artisanal fishers. Small-scale fishers used simple boats, some equipped with outboard motors, to fish estuaries, protected areas, and the like. Many of these subsistence fishers operated only part-time, supplementing their fishing activities with cultivation or other work. An unknown number were organized in cooperatives, but the latter seemed relatively ineffective. Commercial operations utilized vessels ranging from about 20 to 70 meters in length that were equipped with modern facilities, such as sonar and refrigeration. They fished primarily for shrimp, sardines, and tuna, and the greater part of their catch was exported. In 1979 the commercial fleet consisted of about 85 vessels: some 70 shrimp boats, about 10 others engaged in fishing for sardines, and five that fished for tuna; in 1979 there were also 49 tuna boats of foreign ownership reported to be registered in Costa Rica. The main facilities for commercial vessels were at Puntarenas. A new fishing port at Cuajiniquil, in far northwestern Guanacaste Province, was expected to be in operation in late 1983. Built with IDB assistance, it had a 60-meter dock for fishing and shrimping boats, ice-making and cold storage facilities, and fuel supply provisions. The main goal of the new port was expansion of exports.