Humane Society International applauds Miami-based Carnival Corporation – the world’s largest cruise company – for improving farm animal welfare by working to eliminate controversial pig gestation crates from its pork supply chain. The tiny cages are used to virtually immobilize breeding pigs. “Carnival Corporation & plc supports the pork industry’s movement away from gestation crates and will w...

Last month The Costa Rica Star published an article about La Ruta de los Conquistadores, and how you have to be tough as nails to finish it. JACO, Costa Rica - When the notion of racing a mountain bike across Costa Rica was conjured up 20 years ago it was about more than riding a bike; it was about the adventure to be had between the Pacific Ocean and Caribbean Sea. Adventure and then some i...

The Costa Rican Chamber of Construction has requested explanations about recent public works contracts through other States or international organizations. A statement from the Costa Rican Chamber of Construction (CCC) reads: CCC REQUESTS TRANSPARENCY IN GOVERNMENT PROCUREMENT OF INFRASTRUCTURE PROJECTS AND PUBLIC WORKS In a memorandum to President Laura Chinchilla, the Costa Rican Cham...

The National Institute of Housing and Urban Development has announced the creation of a trust to finance housing for middle-income families. According to an article in Nacion.com, the new CEO of the National Institute of Housing and Urban Development (INVU in Spanish), Alvaro Gonzalez, said three lots are available in the province of San José, where the plan is to build high rise condominiums...

Public employees' job performance is evaluated each year and the workers treated with a bonus for excellence, but Labor Minister Sandra Piszk doesn't think the system has ever worked properly. A rough draft of a reform bill was presented to lawmakers this month and has already resulted in a teachers' strike last week. Piszk believes it is because employees have come to regard annual bonuses as ...

Costa Ricans must wait about a month for an expected drop in gasoline and diesel prices while the public services rate watchdog agency ARESEP holds public hearings mandated by the Supreme Court's Constitutional Chamber (Sala IV) in 2008. This situation disturbs President Laura Chinchilla who would otherwise have the price at the pump drop immediately. Since the government-owned refinery, RECOPE...

For all of you who have lived in and around Costa Rica for awhile now, you have undoubtedly experienced water skiing, jet skies, surfing, and other water sports. While, make sure you are sitting when you read the rest of this, imagine flying under water with a totally new water sport experience called, SUBWING. SUBWING is a product invented by 20 year old Simon Sivertsen during a sail t...

The current situation of organized crime in Central America is the central topic of a meeting carried out by the general district attorneys of the area, said the Judicial Power of Costa Rica here Monday. According to the General District Attorney of Costa Rica, Jorge Chavarría, the program of the Net against Organized Crime is giving positive results in the area, although the high indexes of de...

Thailand coach Victor Hermans is worried about his men's fragile defence ahead of the first match of their Futsal World Cup campaign against Costa Rica on Thursday. The Dutch coach said yesterday that Brazil and Spain, the only two nations who have won the world title, are again favourites to be crowned champions. He said Paraguay, Italy and Russia could reach the top in the seventh World Cu...

Recently The Costa Rica Star was emailed a photograph of a man hand fishing in Costa Rica. We shared this photograph on our Facebook page, and it received a good amount of comments and sharing. What we did not know is that this photograph was not the property of the person who emailed it to us, it was in fact the property of Adam Allegro (pictured above), who was recently in Costa Rica catchin...

One of the structures that suffered damage from the 7.6 magnitude earthquake was the colonial church of Nicoya, which was built in 1544. Plans for its restoration are now underway, according to Adrian Vindas, director of the Conservation Center of the Patrimonial Church. Vindas explained that the major damages are to the vault and the façade, the walls of which split apart and cracked in place...

The President of Costa Rica Laura Chinchilla criticized state-owned commercial banks for being directly responsible for the high interest rates plaguing the economy. Nacion.com reports that "President Laura Chinchilla recently said that Costa Rican public banks "are over stepping their hand" with interest rates in colones which are hitting Costa Rican’s wallets." Chinchilla said "it is the p...

Investigators are trying to determine whether a body found last week in a vacant lot in San Jose is that of a Mexican journalist who disappeared in June, the press reported. Pascual Tarin Avila's relatives in Mexico have been contacted by the Judicial Investigations Agency to see whether or not the body found last Tuesday is his, the La Nacion newspaper said. The 53-year-old Tarin, who worke...

Evanescence will perform live in Costa Rica for the first time. The amazing voice of Amy Lee accompanied by the sound of the Evanescence band will rock Estadio Ricardo Saprissa in Tibás. Evanescence is an American rock band founded back in 1995 in Little Rock, Arkansas. The group consisted singer/pianist Amy Lee and guitarist Ben Moody. After many single releases, Evanescence released t...

The situation was so unique that the normally unflappable president of the Supreme Court, Luis Paulino Mora, appeared uncertain of how to go about treating it and called a meeting of top Judges this week. Judge Priscilla Quiros had submitted a letter to Mora last week in which she accused a fellow Judge, Oscar Gonzalez, of sexual and workplace harassment. The closed door meeting Monday decid...

Every time the south Altantic breeds a hurricane, narrow Costa Rica suffers because the low pressure sucks in wet air from the Pacific to dump torrential rains on the Pacific coast. So the story went this week with Hurricane Sandy, which hit Haiti and Jamaica hard with high winds and rainfall. But it also brought flooding that isolated 200 families in Costa Rica. Roads were damaged, especial...

Finca Luna Nueva will be hosting its second “Slow Food in the Rainforest” luncheon in celebration of Terra Madre Day on December 9, 2012. It will be a fun and exciting day at our eco-lodge in the rainforest. The event will start between 9:30 a.m. and 10 a.m. with an introductory gathering in Casa Luna where we will serve fresh juice, coffee or tea, and galletas, after which the group will spli...

With a new public works minister taking office and announcements of new highway investments last week, Costa Rica’s infrastructure plans seem to be full speed ahead. Due to a 13 percent reduction in capital expenditures and a 2.4 percent cut for the public works ministry next year, the Costa Rican government has looked abroad for credit and investments to beef up the country’s infrastructure. “The...

FRIDAY - OCTOBER 26, 2012 A pair of three-goal performances from Claudio Goodridge and Fernando Mena led Panama to a 7-5 victory over host Thailand in the first of two futsal friendlies in Bangkok on Friday. Miguel Lasso had the other goal for the Canaleros, who earned their second consecutive victory against an Asian opponent after topping Malaysia earlier this week. Panama continues pre...

Chile’s Energy Undersecretary, Sergio del Campo, announced that the government will begin studying the potential for building nuclear power plants again. The government had been analyzing this option but stopped after the 2011 Fukushima disaster in Japan. Del Campo underscored that the administration does not intend to start a full nuclear program, but rather wants to generate information in case ...

Washington, D.C., 26 October 2012 (PAHO/WHO) – A mobile application that enables health professionals to make evidence-based decisions on students’ health, while on-the-go, was launched by the Pan American Health Organization/World Health Organization this week, during the Ninth Regional Congress on Health Sciences Information (CRICS9). The new eGSHS mobile application provides access to data f...

Donald Trump, the U.S. billionaire real-estate developer, is seeking to put his name on hotels in Argentina and Brazil as he expands his brand in Latin America. Uruguay, Costa Rica and Mexico are also possibilities for hotel development as trade growth for the region equals China, said Eric Trump, executive vice president of development and acquisitions at Trump Organization Inc. The Trump O...

(BRUSSELS – 26/10/2012) A new report released by EuropeanVoice this week examines the policies and practises tasked with correcting the world’s climate change challenges. International Climate negotiations The next major meeting of international climate negotiators will start on 26 November in Doha and run until 7 December. One of the big issues will be outlining the rules of the second Kyot...

NEW YORK, Oct. 26, 2012 - KPS Capital Partners, LP ("KPS") announced today that it signed a definitive agreement to sell its portfolio company, North American Breweries Holdings, LLC ("NAB" or the "Company"), to Cerveceria Costa Rica, S.A. ("CCR"), a subsidiary of Florida Ice and Farm Company, S.A., for $388 million in cash. NAB is one of the largest independently owned beer companies in the ...

In Costa Rica, the new tax law increases the penalties for mistakes and omissions in income tax statements. Effective from September 28, the Law for Strengthening Tax Management and Law for Enforcing Standards of Fiscal Transparency in some cases doubles fines to be paid for misreporting. Errors without malice will be subject to a penalty of 50% of the unpaid amount, when it used to be 25%...

Almost unnoticed in the turmoil surrounding numerous scandals, the Chinchilla Administration's vow to make the country an easier place to do business seems to have borne some fruit. The nation jumped 12 places in the Doing Business ranking by the World Bank. Vice President Luis Liberman, among others in both the Oscar Arias and Chinchilla administrations, have been working on the problem. Pr...

A Chinese official Thursday expressed here China's willingness and determination to work with the international community to promote sustainable development. Speaking at the opening of the 6th "Environment for Development" (EfD)annual meeting, China's diplomat in Costa Rica Zhai Yue highlighted his country's commitment for the world's sustainable development, and also stressed the right to a fa...

While on a visit to San José, Armenian Foreign Minister Edward Nalbandian had a meeting with the President of the Legislative Assembly of Costa Rica, Victor Emilio Granados Calvo. Greeting the Armenian Foreign Minister, the Chairman of Costa Rica’s Parliament attached importance to Edward Nalbandian’s visit, which, according to him, marks a new start in the bilateral relations and will undoubte...

The Chinese government donated $1.3 million in medical equipment to Costa Rica’s security ministry, the Central American country’s government said in a statement. China, which established diplomatic ties with Costa Rica in 2007, donated medical equipment including ultrasounds, X-rays and defibrillators, according to today’s statement. Since diplomatic relations were established between the c...

PAHO/WHO Technical Advisory Group on Vaccine-preventable Diseases makes recommendation in view of the challenge to guarantee a steady supply of priority vaccines and maintain achievements to date. Washington, DC, October 25, 2012 (PAHO/WHO)—The Technical Advisory Group (TAG) of the Pan American Health Organization/World Health Organization (PAHO/WHO) on Vaccine-preventable Diseases has recommen...

AMA Pro road racer Skip Salenius will be re-entering the race scene this coming weekend after taking the 2012 race season off. ‘Furia de Motores’ Costa Rica is scheduled for the 27th and 28th of October, 2012 at the Autódromo La Guácima and will feature car shows, drifting rallies, car tuning and of course motorcycle racing. Salenius was approached by local rider Roger Diaz to come down and ...

The registration deadline approaches to join industry colleagues and the National Automatic Merchandising Association (NAMA) board of directors at the first-ever coffee origin tour in Costa Rica, Feb. 6 to 10, 2013. "We really look forward to the fascinating, value-added education NAMA operators will experience from this unique, behind-the-scenes look at our industry. The inaugural coffee origi...

In the past The Costa Rica Star published about Stone Spheres found in farmers fields in Costa Rica. Costa Rican archeologist Ifigenia Quintanilla confesses those mysterious pre-Columbian stone spheres found in the country's southern Pacific zone still stump her after two decades of study. The scientist has lived in Spain since 1998 but confesses her fascination with the spheres that apparen...

A newly identified Latin plant is going Gaga. Duke University biologist Kathleen Pryer has named a new genus of ferns found in Central and South America, Mexico, Arizona, as well as Texas after pop singer Lady Gaga. The genus of ferns, in this case 19 species, will carry the name of the Grammy Award-winning star. According to Duke University, the fern has more in common with Lady Gaga than j...

Copenhagen-based Bacon has filmed in Costa Rica and found room for a George Clooney cameo, in a new spot for DNB Bank. The Treasure starts with a pirate chase and ends with a flash-forward to Clooney and his new wife finding the riches on a beach holiday. "The main part of the commercial was shot in Costa Rica in a small town called Puerto Viejo on the east coast." Mari Grundnes Paus, Produ...

On offer in Juan Santamaria International Airport are spaces for a gift shop, an ice cream parlor and coffee shop, a fast food outlet, and spaces for ATMs. Aeris Holding Costa Rica, the company managing the Juan Santamaria Airport, has opened a contest for 3 commercial spaces: a gift shop, with flowers, cards and other items, an ice cream parlor and coffee shop, selling juices and the like, and...

Negotiations are being conducted with the National Network of Spanish Railways for a passenger train to join the urban centers of Cartago and Alajuela. A statement from the Presidency reads: Vice president Liberman seeks options for passenger train between Alajuela and Cartago. Madrid, October 22, 2012: The Vice President, Luis Liberman, participated this morning in a series of meetings w...

The Financial Affairs Committee of the Legislative Assembly passed out a 6.4 trillion colon budget for 2013 in a special session last Saturday by a seven to one margin. But the fact that 43% of the cost must be paid by debt promises a stiff floor fight. The main opposition in committee came from Citizen Action Party (PAC) deputy Jeannette Ruiz. That Ruiz was speaking for PAC was underscored by ...

The Nationa Animal Health Service (Senasa) now has a new tool to halt illegal sail fishing. A three-year-old law has banned catching and selling the fish. But despite this, commercial fishermen have continued the practice, aided by the fact that, cut up into pieces and frozen, the meat is often passed off as that of legal species, including tuna. But a year ago, the Pronature organization do...

This article graciously provided to The Costa Rica Star by EmbassyMag.ca, written by Ally Foster. Observers raise concerns over academic freedom, but company says this shouldn’t be used to hurt the reputation of businesses Calgary-based extractive company Infinito Gold Ltd. has been involved in a legal storm in Costa Rica, launching lawsuits against two university professors in a move it has...