This habitat type, remants of which are still found in Palo Verde, Santa Rosa, and Guanacaste National Parks, once stretched in a narrow belt along the Pacific from southern Mexico to Panama. Particulary hard-hit has been the tropical dry forest habitat that occupied Costa Rica’s northwest Pacific lowlands. Perhaps only 5% of land outside of protected parks and reserves is still densely-forested. As a result of past and present forest clearing, Costa Rica is among the Central American countries with the smallest percentage of its rainforests still intact. According to the World Resources Institute, Costa Rica recently ranked 4th among the world’s nations in rate of deforestation, with 3.9% of its forested area being cut each year (about 65,000 hectares, or 160,000 acres). One-third of Costa Rica’s forest cover was lost between 19, and the country still has one of the highest rates of deforestation in Central America and, in fact, in the world. Now most of it has been cleared, much of it recently. Most forest cutting and burning is not to obtain timber but to clear land for cattle pastures, crop farming, and simply as a way to claim “unused” land. The foremost cause for environmental concern is deforestation. Most environmental damage in the country is the result of generations of wasteful and polluting agriculture, practices that persist to this day. Costa Rica’s population, about 3.5 million during the late 1990s, is growing quickly (2.6% per year), and will probably double before it stabilizes most of the people are concentrated in a single region – in and around the capital, San Jose, and in the surrounding flat part of the Central Valley (the Meseta Central). Like any other country, there are problems, both socioeconomic and ecological. Here I briefly describe some of the major threats to Costa Rica’s ecosystems, as well as the country’s conservation programs and initiatives.Ĭosta Rica is a wonderful country to visit but it is not an eco-paradise. This small country simultaneously is among the nations facing severe environmental threats and the nation that is perhaps most active in conservation efforts. From the archives (first published in 1998)Ĭosta Rica holds a truly unique position among the world’s tropical nations with regard to conservation.
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