Costa Rica Abroad: Rural Livelihoods in a Globalized World

Global and Costa Rican Operations of Kerry Group

Kerry Group is a transnational food manufacturer and distributer based in Ireland. It began as a dairy distributer but now primarily manufactures ingredients, flavors, and actives for the global food, beverage, and pharmaceutical industries. Kerry Group sells to other transnational corporations such as Unilever, Starbucks, Nestle, Kellogg, Campbells, Tyson, Heinz, Land O’Lakes, etc.. The company manufactures frozen meals, hot and cold pies, processed meats, and dairy spreads to the Irish, UK, and selected international markets. They distribute under multiple brand names: LowLow, Cheestrings, Dairygold, Charleville, Denny, Richmond, Wall’s, and Mattesons (Forbes, n.d.). Kerry group has over 23,000 employees worldwide, and more than 100 manufacturing facilities (Kerry Group, n.d.).

In 2015, Kerry Group acquired Baltimore Spice, a producer of spices, condiments and ingredients based in San José (Burke-Kennedy, 2015). Baltimore Spice has 109 employees in Costa Rica and makes $20.61 million in yearly total sales. The company operates out of the Pavas district in San José in an industrial warehouse that is 1,900 square meters (Crunchbase, n.d.).

Social, Economic, and Environmental Impacts of Manufacturing Operations in Costa Rica

Until just recently, Costa Rica’s industry consisted largely of small-scale manufacturing. In 1998, the Intel Corporation set up in San José and demonstrated the nation’s first large-scale manufacturing venture (Costa Rica Information, n.d.).

Kerry Group runs a fairly small operation in San José, but nonetheless has a very high yearly output and offers low-skilled labor jobs for Costa Ricans. It is unclear whether or not the spices are being grown or just manufactured on site. If they are grown in-country, the economic benefits for the nation will be greater, as employment is a main driver of economic growth. Manufacturing jobs offer stable incomes to people with low skills and minimal education. It is also unclear where these spices are being sold worldwide. If they are sold and shipped to Ireland, where the company is based, or the UK and America, then Costa Rica is making a lump sum of export revenue. On the other hand, the environmental impact of shipping these goods is immeasurable and may also be inflicting pressure on Costa Rican ports and roadways.

Neo-colonialism or Neo-liberalism?

Kerry Group’s prescence in Costa Rica represents a for of Neo-liberalism. Neoliberal theory holds that markets can more efficiently distribute capital, goods, and services, throughout the world than governments can. Competition within markets led Kerry Group to Latin America, where labor is cheaper and they could, theoretically, offer employment to people who would otherwise be worse off economically. Kerry Group has allowed Costa Rica to raise the output of their exports, which in turn increases the gross domestic product of the nation. As a transnational corporation, Kerry group has provided the technical and managerial knowledge to create a more efficient and profitable sector in San José. The neoliberal theory projects that the more they export, the greater the income of the corporation and the exporting nation’s economy (Lubliner, 2006).

Neoliberal economic measures have not always played out as planned within laboring countries. While neoliberalism often guises itself as increasing employment for underdeveloped nations, there is also an element of exploitation of workers. In 2021, Costa Rican social movements protested a bill that would grant Costa Rica a 1.75 billion USD loan from the International Monetary Fund. The bill was criticized for potentially being harmful to the working class and cause greater social inequality in the country. The Public Employment Law was deemed an “anti-workers regressive law,” as it sought to approve a 12-hour work day and promoted exploitation of workers, rather than the creation of new jobs (Peoples Dispatch, 2021). Neoliberal economic policies are not always beneficial for the exporting countries, and Kerry Group could potentially be another transnational corporation taking advantage of cheap and efficient labor in Costa Rica’s capitol.

References

Burke-Kennedy (2015, October 15). Kerry snaps up three US food companies for $735m, published by The Irish Times. https://www.irishtimes.com/business/agribusiness-and-food/kerry-snaps-up-three-us-food-companies-for-735m-1.2393057.

Costa Rica Information (n.d.). Manufacturing & Production Industries. http://costarica-information.com/about-costa-rica/economy/economic-sectors-industries/manufacturing#:~:text=The%20majority%20of%20these%20fatories,Jose%2C%20Costa%20Rica%27s%20capital%20city.

Crunchbase (n.d.). Baltimore Spice – Company Profile & Funding. https://www.crunchbase.com/organization/baltimore-spice.

Forbes (n.d.). Kerry Group Profile. https://www.forbes.com/companies/kerry-group/?sh=5e34acca22e3.

Lubliner, Paul B. (2006, May). EXPLORING THE IMPACT OF NEOLIBERAL ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT ON POVERTY IN COSTA RICA: WHAT WENT WRONG?. University of Oregon Thesis Paper. https://scholarsbank.uoregon.edu/xmlui/bitstream/handle/1794/2746/Lubliner_Thesis1.pdf?sequence=4&isAllowed=y.

Peoples Dispatch (2021, January 19). Costa Rican social movements and trade unions prepare to mobilize against IMF deal. https://peoplesdispatch.org/2021/01/19/costa-rican-social-movements-and-trade-unions-prepare-to-mobilize-against-imf-deal/.

Kerry Group (n.d.). Production. https://www.kerry.com/about/our-company/expertise/production.html#:~:text=Moreover%2C%20with%20more%20than%20100,mimic%20our%20customers%20production%20environments.

Ireland was England’s first colony and they lived under English rule for nearly 700 years. It is commonly said that England got very little out of Ireland, except for eternal Irish hatred. Irish culture, law and language were replaced by English culture, language, religion and education. Irish lords lost their lands and authority. England promoted policies and practices associated with Anglicization (Ohlmeyer, 2020). In the late 16th century, frustrated by continuing native Irish resistance, Protestant England implemented an aggressive plan to fully colonize Ireland and stamp out Irish Catholicism (Waller, 2021).

Commemorative statues of British figures

Buildings built in Ireland during British Rule

Many places in Ireland have names of British origin

The Material Basis

The material basis of the colony changed over time, but it was primarily built on land annexation and conquest. England’s main concern was that Ireland might become a bridgehead for a Continental invasion of England, which would likely gain support from the discontented Celtic peasantry. The close trading relationship between Spain and Southern Ireland made continental incursions seem more than likely (Stedall, 2019). As England colonized the Caribbean, Irish cattle and laborers were sent as domestic imports to the region (Kuentzel, 2023)

As the English stripped the Irish people from their farms and land, they became English tenants. Any one who challenged English military might was removed from their land, which was given to English and Scottish settlers. They dispossessed were promised were land elsewhere, but it was often half of what they had forgone and not on their ancestral lands. Britain exploited Ireland for their cheap labor, and made sure that the country was not allowed to develop in fear that their source of labor would be gone (Stedall, 2019).

The Political and Judicial Basis

Over the course of 700 years, England encouraged settlers to colonize Ireland in an effort to protect Britain from Irish aggression. From the Anglo-Norman knights in the 13th century to Henry VIII naming himself King of Ireland in the 16th century, England began its centuries-long infiltration of Ireland. The English used terrorist tactics to control the Irish people, such as destroying crops or taking hostages, this would later be referred to as “total warfare” (McDaid, 1994).

To prevent a counter-reformation in Ireland, Henry VIII sent Lutheran evangelists to Ireland. At first, the protestant faith made little progress in Ireland due to language barriers and lack of funding from the Irish population, who remained mostly Catholic. As a result, waves of settlers were sent to flood Ireland in hopes of achieving power by numbers. They stole land from Irish farmers, who were forced to become English tenants. They placed heavy duties on Irish exports sent to England, which benefited English landowners. Irish peasants’ land plots were to be sub-divided between every succeeding generation, which caused many large Irish Catholic families to live below subsistence level in squalor (Stedall, 2019). In the 17th century, the imposition of Penal laws set about disempowering Catholics, denying them the right to take leases or own land above a certain value, forbidding higher education and entry to professions, and imposing oaths of conformity to the state church, the Church of Ireland. During the 18th century strict enforcement of the Penal laws eased but by 1778 Catholics held only about 5% of the land in Ireland (Living in Ireland, n.d.).

The Irish industry was not permitted to develop alongside England in the industrial Revolution, so that English people could continue to exploit Irish labor. Even though legislation and a physical barrier attempted to keep the Irish and English separated, Irish laborers were needed on most English plantations (Waller, 2021). The Irish peasantry turned to potatoes as a form of supplement on small land plots. Potato harvests continually failed, even before the blight, which caused them to starve (Stedall, 2019).

Protestants made headway in Northern Ireland, where linen production was a secondary source of income and they did not suffer as much from annual crop production. Mass emigration to America and Canada began in the 19th century, and wealthier and less-populated protestants went first. The blight in 1845 decimated the crop and the population. The English parliament thought the problem was exacerbated, and landlords kicked out tenants who failed to pay their rents, leaving them to die on the streets (Stedall, 2019)

The Ideological Foundation

The English justified their annexation of Ireland by establishing a precedent that the Norman conquest of the 12th century secured the right to rule Ireland for the English crown. In the 16th century, Henry VIII was convinced that Ireland needed to be “pacified” in fear that they would start a counter-reformation (McDaid, 1994). As a result, the Irish clamored to using religion to motivate themselves against the English. Various uprisings like the one organized by Irish leader Brian Macphelim O’Neill were unsuccessful and motivated the English to claim more land and justify the removal of natives from English settlements (Living in Ireland, n.d.).

References

Kuentzel, W. (2023, September 6). Colonialism. Rural Livelihoods in a Global World [lecture], University of Vermont.

Living in Ireland (n.d.). A Brief History of Ireland. https://www.livinginireland.ie/culture-society/a-brief-history-of-ireland/

McDaid, C. L. (1994). Justification: How the Elizabethans Explained their Invasions of Ireland and Virginia. William & Mary Dissertation Paper. https://dx.doi.org/doi:10.21220/s2-4bnb-dq93

Ohlmeyer, J. (2020, December 29). Ireland has yet to come to terms with its imperial past. The Irish Times. https://www.irishtimes.com/opinion/ireland-has-yet-to-come-to-terms-with-its-imperial-past-1.4444146#:~:text=We%20lived%20as%20part%20of,the%20foundation%20of%20modern%20state 

Stedall, R. (March 2019). The Roots of Ireland’s Troubles, published by Pen & Sword History.

Waller, J. (2021, April 12). Northern Ireland, born of strife 100 years ago, again erupts in political violence. The Conversation. https://theconversation.com/northern-ireland-born-of-strife-100-years-ago-again-erupts-in-political-violence-158122#:~:text=In%20the%20late%2016th%20century,and%20stamp%20out%20Irish%20Catholicism.