The Future
Costa Rica's economic future rides on a wave created in the past, a constant see-sawing between the price of the country's bananas and coffee on world markets and the amount it pays for imports. Still, the economy continues to grow, in large part fuelled by tourism , and the government is beginning to claw back the massive public sector deficit through increased taxation, both on basic services like electricity and water and on restaurant meals and hotel bills. As the Costa Rican economy grows, however, so do other indicators: inflation runs around 17 percent, while the annual population growth is as high as 3.2 percent per annum - Costa Rica has the highest rural population density in Latin America, and there is tremendous pressure on land. The prognosis for the campesino, that now nearly forgotten former backbone of the country, is not good, as peasant agriculture becomes increasingly anachronistic in the face of the big banana, coffee, palmito and pineapple plantations. Furthermore, the burden of the welfare state in Costa Rica has become increasingly difficult for the state to carry. High external debts to service the country's respected system of social welfare mean that a staggering 30 percent of the government budget goes on keeping up interest payments to foreign banks. Meanwhile, the prognosis for the environment could be bleak if the authorities continue their strategy of attracting large hotel and development groups. Even bleaker is the fact that in recent years the country has gained a reputation as a sex tourism destination, with increasing evidence that minors are involved in the business. Even so, the country's legal and judicial institutions are doing their best to combat the country's most pressing social problems, such as drug trafficking, domestic violence and increasing crime and disorder.
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