Costa Rica may derail US free trade plans

[arcos]

Costa Rica may derail US free trade plans

As befits a man whose very surnames are enough to conjure up images of Latin American radicalism, Fabio Chaves Castro is threatening to derail an ambitious plan to open up trade between the United States and the five small republics of Central America.

If the union leader of Costa Rica's 15,000 telecoms and electricity workers have their way, a series of demonstrations over the next few weeks against the deal known as Cafta will eventually force the government to postpone an agreement for at least six months, which would potentially put the whole accord at risk

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Costa Rica's problem is that the government is far less able to accede to another US demand which was unexpectedly stressed by Robert Zoellick, US trade representative, during a visit to San José 10 days ago.

That demand is the liberalisation of industries like telecommunications, electricity and insurance that - almost uniquely in Latin America - remain in public hands.

Three years ago plans to privatise ICE, the telecoms and electricity company, were scrapped in the face of some of the largest and most violent protests in the largely peaceful history of Costa Rica. Public opinion remains opposed to change and President Abel Pacheco's centre-right government does not have the stomach to reopen a controversial issue it believed was safely buried until Mr Zoellick made his comments.

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http://news.ft.com/servlet/ContentServer?pagename=FT.com/StoryFT/FullStory&c=StoryFT&cid=1059480529071

[Lydia Leftcoast]

1. Yeah, that's "free trade" for you

The U.S. gets to tell other countries how to run their internal affairs.

Stand firm, Costa Rica.

[Noordam]

2. I do not think CR will go for this

and they know the price they will have to pay if this happens.

[madrchsod]

3. costa rica is retirement

heaven for alot of americans and is also a great place to vacation.if they want investment,tourists,and a decent life they will not go along with this crap. hell, they don`t have an army... bush will screw up even paradise to make his buddies money

[LynneSin]

4. I LOVE COSTA RICA

And I can't wait to go back and visit that liberal paradise again!!!

[srpantalonas]

5. Costa Rica SHOULD privatize telecom...

I've spent quite a bit of time in Costa Rica. It takes something like a year to get a cell phone number there. They should privatize, but ONLY allow Costa Rican companies in there. If they let the US or European companies get a piece of the action, it'll be yet another example of economic injustice.

That said, CAFTA itself is an abomination, designed so multi-nationals can get more cheap labor. There are NO provisions in CAFTA for Central American businesses, local investment or capitalization of local businesses--they just want the cheap labor of yet another asymetric economy.

Finally, Zoellick as a prick and a former beneficiary of Enron.

[TexasPatriot]

6. i've worked there too

and RACSA, the phone company, is an absolute nightmare. You all may not understand, but the streets in san jose dont have real addresses - they're referred to as 600m E of the Subaru dealer etc... people use the telephone poles for whatever they want - whenever they want.

I wouldnt worry about trying to compete there - no one in their right mind would try to open a utility in that place.

[arcos]

8. RACSA is a nightmare...

but again, things are better now. Dial up Internet service was lousy 5 years ago, but it is reliable nowadays. Cable is widely available too.

A lot of telecomunication companies are interested in investing in CR. Telefonica, AT&T, MCI, all have expressed real interest in participating in the market.

[TexasPatriot]

9. internet service is reliable?

i was building an internet facility - and everything went down. Turned out that RACSA didn't pay their bill - so the entire country was off the net for 5 hours while they paid it. That was what, 9 months ago?

That place is a disaster - and when the DA of NY realizes that all that internet sportsbook traffic is going through a France Telecom router in his state - he's going to permanently turn their 'reliable' internet service off.

[arcos]

12. didn't pay their bill?

I remember that Internet blackout, but where did you read that it was caused by lack of payment? They never said that.

[TexasPatriot]

13. heh

i was there working with the guy who wired the intel fab (he knows who to call). The resulting conversation about BGP and failover (no and no) left me wondering why anyone would want to put anything resembling infrastructure in CR. I'm not surprised it didn't make the press. Hard to explain that one to the angry customers.

[arcos]

7. No, they shouldn't be privatized...

You can get a cell phone instantly now. The problem was that Presidents Calderón, Figueres, and Rodríguez (90-94, 94-98 and 98-02) required ICE to give lots of money to the national budget. In fact, the Research and Development department of ICE Electricity had its budget cut by 92%. Obviously it had a huge impact in the quality of ICE's services.

But now you can get a cell phone number instantly, at any cell phone store, and they will buy 600,000 new lines in December. The massive DSL project is delayed (as usual), but it will be up and running early next year. Things are slowly getting better, but the government is still demanding a lot of money, and not allowing ICE to get loans for investment in new projects.

[no_arbusto]

10. Still no DSL?

I was in Costa Rica in 1999 and they were talking about this. I was there again last September and it seemed like the project was finally becoming a reality. Have they completed the GSM cell phone network? Last September, my Verizon (CDMA) phone got no service in San Jose (probably GSM), but was still able to get a signal from the old analog towers in remote areas such as Jaco and Monteverde which I thought was interesting. However, if I tried to make a call, the recording would say that my phone was unauthorized on the network. Anyway, Pura Vida.

[arcos]

11. GSM is up and running...

the GSM network has been running for nearly a year now. The DSL project has had several setbacks, but it will probably open in 3 or 4 months.

[ugarte]

14. Tenes razon vos

The government has long used el ICE as a cash cow.
Do NOT sell it.