A UVM blog Costa Rica Blog

Panasonic, headquartered in Osaka, Japan, makes a wide variety of technological products and has been since 1918. These include household appliances, televisions, phones, computers, audio equipment, cameras, and batteries of all types, including for electric vehicles. The company has a net worth of $65 billion dollars, and is a transnational corporation in its own right.

Panasonic’s Costa Rica headquarters belongs to the Panasonic Corporation of North America. The company has a facility in San Antonio de Belen, which is called Panasonic Centroamericana. Right now, they are planning on building a new warehouse and improving existing infrastructure so that they can manufacture triple-A batteries in Costa Rica and increase the throughput of Double-A battery production. The significance of this change, which the company is investing $10Million in, is that it is effectively shifting an entire production line from Asia to Costa Rica. The significance of this for Costa Ricans is that around 60 jobs will be created in the process and more income will be flowing into the country as the Costa Rica facility takes on a more important role in Panasonic’s global network. The new warehouse will add 25,800 square feet to the facility and increase the output by 200%.

Panasonic is the first company in Costa Rica to operate a factory with zero CO2 emissions, achieving this in a joint venture with the government and the state-owned electric company, which supplied 400 solar panels. This aligns with both their own vision of environmental sustainability and Costa Rica’s. Costa Rica is already powered by 98% renewable energy, and Pansonic is on course to fulfill its “Environment vision for 2050” in which it is trying to become a net-zero energy company across all its branches. Despite this, apparently the manufacturing sector in Costa Rica is contributing to the small percentage of fossil fuel usage that remains because the Panasonic factory was the first to become fully renewable in 2020. 

The presence of the Panasonic branch in Costa Rica is an artifact of neo-liberalism. Neo-liberalism is the unfettered expansion of the free market coupled with the rolling back of government regulations on that same market. Neo-liberalism is the driving force behind globalization, which has allowed for a global free-market system to arise, making trade faster and extremely profitable for transnational corporations. Panasonic has placed its satellite offices, factories, and distribution centers at strategic points across the globe. Often times TNCs will set up shop in countries with little labor or environmental protections, and/or with little tax obligation, all in the name of increasing the profit margin as much as possible, usually at the expense of the country that has gotten caught in their web. What factors determine where Panasonic expands to, I do not know. However, their choice to operate in Costa Rica is apparently at least partially motivated by the relevant location of Costa Rica to their central and North American market. That is why the triple-A battery line is moving there from Asia; it is being moved closer to the demand.

Sources

Wikipedia Contributors. (2022, January 23). Panasonic. Wikipedia; Wikimedia Foundation. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panasonic#Overseas_operations

Q Costa Rica. (2021, March 3). Panasonic will invest US$10 M to move operations from Asia to Costa Rica. Q COSTA RICA. https://qcostarica.com/panasonic-will-invest-us10-m-to-move-operations-from-asia-to-costa-rica/

Panasonic Costa Rica’s Zero-CO2 Factory Driven by Multi-sector Collaboration | Video Review | Panasonic Newsroom Global. (2020). Panasonic Newsroom Global. https://news.panasonic.com/global/stories/2020/83867.html

HVACInformed.com. (2020, November 12). Panasonic And The Country Of Costa Rica Are Reducing Their Environmental Burden To Achieve Net-Zero CO2 Emissions. Hvacinformed.com; HVACInformed.com. https://www.hvacinformed.com/news/panasonic-country-costa-rica-reducing-environmental-burden-co-1600496723-ga.1613387935.html

Panasonic Environment Vision 2050 – Environment – Sustainability – About Us – Panasonic Global. (2017). Panasonic.com. https://www.panasonic.com/global/corporate/sustainability/eco/vision.html

Spain’s colonization of Venezuela began in 1502 when it established its first settlement in the present-day city of Cumana. 

In the 16th century, the priority for Spanish settlers was to strike it rich by mining gold. Still others searched high and low for the fabled lost city of El Dorado, supposedly brimming with treasure. The first economic success story of Venezuela involved the raising of livestock, supported by the grassy plains known as llanos. The result was a feudal society of widely dispersed Spanish landowners and Native-American horse herdsmen. In the 17th century, the cash crop in Venezuela became chocolate, as demand grew in Europe, and subsequently coffee. But the real boon for Venezuela’s economy lay with its extensive oil reserves. By 1928, Venezuela had become the world’s leading exporter of oil. President Juan Vicente Gomez opened up the country’s oil reserves to foreign companies as a way to mitigate the dept acquired after World War I. There followed cycles of nationalization and privatization in response to falling oil prices and debt, which had severe impacts on the economy and wellbeing as oil represented a quarter of the country’s GDP and does to this day. 

Venezuela was ruled by the Spanish empire until 1821 when the country’s hero Simon Bolivar won independence for the country. Before that, when the colony was still connected to Spain, the ruling class was a small number of Creole elites. Creoles are people of mixed European and African or indigenous ancestry. These creoles based their claims to power based on blood linkages to Spanish royalty. The new aristocracy they created in Venezuela earned them the name of “Mantuanos” or noblemen. However, the relationship between these elites and the Spanish empire began to deteriorate in the 18th century. The creoles sustained their supremacy through brutal suppression and exploitation of the indigenous and black population, and brutal modes of governance have been hallmarks of Venezuelan statesmanship ever since – most attributed to president Juan Vicente Gomez in the early 20th century. Today the Venezuelan government is set up in the same fashion as democracies all over the world, with a popularly voted president, Congress, and a Chamber of Deputies not unlike the House; and executive, legislative and judicial branches. It wasn’t until 1969 in Venezuela when the transition between two democratically elected presidents peaceably occurred.

Venezuela has been able to sustain a national identity that imitates its Spanish colonial heritage. The country has maintained a white, European national ethos and its top positions have typically been occupied by lighter-skinned citizens, with an overwhelming amount of political and economic power held by just 10% of the population. In this way, the colonization of Venezuela followed the same pattern of colonization in Africa and Southeast Asia whereby white Europeans assumed their automatic superiority based on the color of their skin and their more industrialized background and subsequently sought to “enlighten” the colonized people while simultaneously taking the most power and privilege for themselves in the lands where the colonized people had been living.

The following are 5 examples of the ways in which the legacy of colonialism is still apparent in Venezuela today.

In many ways, Venezuela’s status as a major oil-exporting country and all the indirect economic and social unrest that this has caused in the country is a result of colonialism, and its modern manifestation, imperialism.

Spanish influence is apparent in Venezuelan architecture, especially in cities like Caracas. The style of buildings in Venezuelan cities is attributed to “a blend of modernist aspirations tempered with local traditions” (everyculture.com).

Catholicism, which 90% of the population practices, is an import from Spain that has deep roots in modern Venezuelan culture. Well-to-do Catholic schools provide an avenue for the middle and upper class to give their children a more prestigious education than the public sector is able to provide.

Not only Spanish influence, but American influence is evident in the skyscrapers of wealthy urban centers. These are not traditional building styles and are rather attempts to conform to the superficial indicators of prosperity in wealthy nations like the US. Though not pictured, urban slums often occur near and juxtapose with these shining displays of wealth in Venezuela and similar countries. The stark, visual divide between the wealthy and the poor is also an artifact of class divisions designed and perpetuated by colonizers and their descendants. It is also a status quo maintained by overt and covert manipulations by foreign powers interested in having a stake in Venezuela’s oil reserves, e.g. the US-backed coup attempt against President Chavez who was implementing social reforms to help the poor and was not playing along with US interests.

Of course, one of the main legacies of colonialism in Venezuela, and one that does not receive all that much attention, is racism. The ruling class of Venezuelans had been predominantly white until the popular election of Hugo Chavez in 1998. This was the first time that the country’s majority mestizo population saw one of their own ruling the country. He was regarded as their hero. After him, Nikolás Maduro, also mestizo, took office in 2013. But in 2019, members of the white, wealthy elite took to the streets to protest his re-election, echoing the unrest of right-wing groups resisting the diversifying of white spaces in the US and Europe. The western media outlets covered the demonstrations heavily, pointing to them as indicators that Maduro is an unpopular president in addition to the economic ruin he has brought to the country. What they did not cover is the massively more attended counter-protests in support of Maduro led by the poor, mestizo population of Caracas. Maduro’s challenger, Juán Guaidó, is supported by the white population as well as the western powers, who have refused to recognize Maduro’s re-election and, as of Trump’s acknowledgment, consider Guaido to be the president even though he did not run in any sort of election. So effectively Venezuela has two presidents, each representing not only the class but racial dichotomy and struggle of the country. This dichotomy is entrenched in Venezuelan culture but was originally established by the Spanish colonizers and their Creole descendants, and is continuing to cause problems in the form of political unrest, social inequality, and violence today.

Sources:

Wikipedia Contributors. (2021, November 2). Colonial Venezuela. Wikipedia; Wikimedia Foundation. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colonial_Venezuela#:~:text=Spain’s%20colonization%20of%20mainland%20Venezuela,in%201515%20by%20Franciscan%20friars.

‌Culture of Venezuela – history, people, traditions, women, beliefs, food, customs, family, social. (2012). Everyculture.com. https://www.everyculture.com/To-Z/Venezuela.html

‌What was Venezuela’s colonial economy like? (2015, November 6). Caracas Chronicles. https://www.caracaschronicles.com/2015/11/06/what-was-venezuelas-colonial-economy-like/

Palast, G. (2019, February 7). In Venezuela, White Supremacy Is a Key Driver of the Coup. Truthout; Truthout. https://truthout.org/articles/in-venezuela-white-supremacy-is-a-key-driver-of-the-coup/

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Over the last several decades, Costa Rica has made laudable gains in its development, many of which are attributed to a shift from an internal economy to an economy integrated with the rest of the world. Their GDP figures are significantly higher than other countries in Latin America, and the country has ranked consistently high in both economic and political stability, unlike many of its neighbors. In the wake of the 1980s debt crisis, they came back stronger with new policies fomenting export growth and diversification, along with the attraction of foreign investment. Costa Rica’s economy is now mainly centered on specialty medical equipment and agricultural products such as bananas, pineapples, and chocolate. Within Costa Rica, different regions produce greater proportions of the country’s exports. The Osa Peninsula, located in southwestern Costa Rica, is home to Corcovado National Park as well as 2.5% of the world’s biodiversity. As a result, the area is mainly known for ecotourism, but small-scale agricultural operations do take place, alongside scientific research activities. The following is an analysis of five Costa Rican products that are produced on the Osa.

Timber

The Osa Peninsula is home to one of the last remaining stands of old-growth rainforest in Central America. While the beauty and biodiversity of the Osa’s forests attract attention now, less than a century ago they were most valued for their timber, or else cleared entirely to make room for pasture. The first company to exploit Costa Rica’s forest resources was Osa Forest Products (OFP). They bought 47,513 ha of land from the widow of an engineer that had worked for the United Fruit Company, the previous owner of the land, in 1957. After decades of exploitation, scientists went to the Costa Rican government to ask that the land be preserved for research. Thus, Corcovado National Park, which claims 40% of the peninsula, was born.

Timber products that are produced on the Osa today tend to be high-end products such as wood flooring and decking for domestic and international markets, and there are a plethora of artists making unique furniture pieces from Costa Rican trees and exporting them and the raw material for woodworkers in other countries. For the latter, kiln-drying is a method being employed to add value to the wood as opposed to traditional air-drying, as it makes the wood lighter and less costly to ship. All in all, the tight regulations on timber harvesting in Costa Rica ensure that the majority of forestland is protected for the country’s more important export – ecotourism.

Ecotourism

Corcovado National Park was one of the first areas in Costa Rica to react to the rise in tourism that occurred in the 1990s, attributable to the increase in the number of educated adults from industrialized western countries seeking to escape their stifling environments. The Osa Peninsula became a pristine exotic destination, and as local people saw the opportunity that came with providing support to these travelers, the attitude toward the natural environment shifted from something to extract a subsistence living from to something to show off to foreign visitors. Of those employed on the Osa today, those who work in tourism tend to make twice as much income annually as those who do not. There is a general sentiment in Costa Rican families that at least one family member should be working in tourism for the family to make a decent living. Still, most ecotourism establishments such as ecolodges and hotels are owned by foreigners, while tour guides tend to be local. Earnings from tourism amount to over $1.7 billion annually, and it is estimated that 80% of visitors to Costa Rica come for eco-tourism-related activities.

Bananas

One of Costa Rica’s largest exports is bananas. At one time, revenue from the banana industry was greater than all tourism combined. Bananas are typically grown in the northeast region of costa rica, especially near the Sixaola River area, Santa Clara in the Alajuela Province, and in the Estrella valley. One place that bananas are grown on the Osa Peninsula is on the Osa Verde farm owned by the nonprofit Osa Conservation. On the farm, sustainable agriculture techniques are used to grow the Gros Michel variety and protect it from the fungus that nearly caused it to go extinct in the 1960s. While the work being done on this farm is admirable, it is not representative of the vast majority of banana production. 96% of all bananas produced for export are the Cavendish variety and are grown with heavy chemical inputs. The biggest importers of bananas are the US and the EU. Consumption of bananas in the U.S. alone is greater than apples and oranges combined. Some bananas that do not meet standards are sold locally at much cheaper prices. Of the ones that meet standards, they are ripened in “ripening rooms” with ethylene gas upon arrival in their destination company in order to make them as prime of a product as possible on supermarket shelves.

Vanilla

Vanilla is the most popular flavoring in the world, but incredibly labor and time-intensive to produce. Vanilla is actually a kind of orchid, and the only one to produce edible fruit out of the 25,000 kinds of orchids growing in central and South America. The vanilla orchid’s flower only blooms for 24 hours and if not pollinated in that time, the plant dies and there can be no fruit. Costa Rica is not a top producer of vanilla worldwide by any means, and vanilla growing operations on the Osa peninsula are not commercial in scale. One conservation organization, Osa Conservation, grows vanilla on its organic farm for the purpose of studying its role in the rainforest. For example, scientists still do not know what insect or animal pollinates the vanilla flower. This is a big mystery to be solved but for now, vanilla plants grown on farms commercial or otherwise must be pollinated by hand, in the same fashion invented by Edmond Albius in 1841.

Cacao

Before pineapples and bananas, Costa Rica’s main export was cacao. The history of cacao in Costa Rica is as rich as the food itself. It was a highly sacred crop among the tribes that lived in present-day Costa Rica, notably the Chorotega and the Bribri, who used it as currency up until the 1930s. A special drink would be made from the bean to denote special rituals and celebrations. Settlers adopted the cultivation of cacao, which did well until the 1970s when a fungus wiped out 80% of the cacao trees in Costa Rica. If it weren’t for the creation of a fungus-resistant kind of cacao tree, cacao likely would have disappeared from Costa Rica.

The provinces of Guanacaste, Alajuela, Talanca, Cartago, and Puntarenas all have thriving cacao plantations. On the Osa Peninsula, cacao production and ecotourism tend to go hand in hand. Visitors to the Osa can go on a number of “chocolate tours”, such as at the esteemed Finca Kobo farm, 30 minutes outside of Puerto Jimenez. As with many products grown and harvested on the Osa, chocolate is often consumed right near the site it was produced, contributing to a local, sustainable way of life. Cacao beans themselves are not really valuable or edible, and they must undergo significant processing to become the chocolate we all know and love. The beans must be roasted, then crushed, ground into a paste, conched, and tempered multiple times. The main destinations of Costa Rica’s surplus cacao beans are the Netherlands, Switzerland, Panama, the U.S., and Canada.

Sources

The successes and shortcoming of Costa Rica exports diversification policies Background paper to the UNCTAD-FAO Commodities and Development Report 2017 Commodity Markets, Economic Growth and Development. (n.d.). https://www.fao.org/3/i8308en/I8308EN.pdf

Nick St Clair. (2012). Osa Peninsula – The most biologically intense place on earth | Conservation | The Earth Times. Earthtimes.org. http://www.earthtimes.org/conservation/osa-peninsular-the-biologically-intense-place-earth/2020/

Botanika. (2019, August 20). History of the Osa Peninsula — Botánika Osa Peninsula, Curio Collection by Hilton. Botánika Osa Peninsula, Curio Collection by Hilton. https://www.botanikaresort.com/history-of-the-osa-peninsula/

Developing a sustainable wood products industry in rural Costa Rica. (2022). INITIATIVE 20X20. https://initiative20x20.org/restoration-projects/developing-sustainable-wood-products-industry-rural-costa-rica

2021 Guide to Corcovado National Park, Costa Rica. (2021, January 2). James Kaiser. https://jameskaiser.com/costa-rica-guide/parks/corcovado/#:~:text=Corcovado%20National%20Park%20takes%20up,tapirs%20%E2%80%94%20are%20common%20in%20Corcovado.

‌Costa Rica Mill. (2022). Costa Rica Mill – Exotic & unique Live edge wood slabs. Costaricamill.com. https://costaricamill.com/

Statistics on Timber Sector in Costa Rica – CentralAmericaData :: The Regional Business Portal. (2022). Centralamericadata.com. https://en.centralamericadata.com/en/article/home/Statistics_on_Timber_Sector_in_Costa_Rica

Rahim, S. (2018, July 23). Ecotourism in the Osa Peninsula: A Catalyst for Social, Economic, & Environmental Development. Medium; Medium. https://medium.com/@rahimsa/ecotourism-in-the-osa-peninsula-a-catalyst-for-social-economic-environmental-development-e29e5f3ebf4b

About Costa Rica | Embajada de Costa Rica en DC. (2021). Costarica-Embassy.org. http://www.costarica-embassy.org/index.php?q=node/19#:~:text=Costa%20Rica%20receives%20over%201.7,do%20eco%2Dtourism%20related%20activities.

Bananas: The Spotty Past and Precarious Future of the World’s Most Consumed Fruit – Osa Conservation. (2016, June 3). Osa Conservation. https://osaconservation.org/bananas-the-spotty-past-and-precarious-future-of-the-worlds-most-consumed-fruit/

Hays, J. (2019). VANILLA: ITS HISTORY, CULTIVATION AND PROCESSING | Facts and Details. Factsanddetails.com. https://factsanddetails.com/world/cat54/sub345/item1608.html

The Unexpected Values of Vanilla – Osa Conservation. (2017, June 14). Osa Conservation. https://osaconservation.org/unexpected-values-vanilla/

Parker, J. (2017, March 15). A Brief History of Costa Rica’s Chocolate. Culture Trip; The Culture Trip. https://theculturetrip.com/central-america/costa-rica/articles/a-brief-history-of-costa-ricas-chocolate/

Cocoa Beans in Costa Rica | OEC. (2019). OEC – the Observatory of Economic Complexity. https://oec.world/en/profile/bilateral-product/cocoa-beans/reporter/cri#:~:text=The%20main%20destinations%20of%20Costa,and%20Canada%20(%2430.8k).

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