The first full day in Costa Rica, and I suppose everyone was really excited because we woke up at 6 am without an alarm. All four girls showered and ate breakfast by 7 am, so we were able to relax until 8 when we left for Tico Electronics. Breakfast was really good, beans and rice, fresh papaya and pineapple, and guava juice. If this is a typical Costa Rican breakfast I will be happy here, it is filling and really gets you ready for the day ahead. One thing I have noticed already is that while this is a rustic Costa Rican hotel, I have not seen a single Costa Rican guest. Everyone staying at the hotel is a foreign visitor, which probably shouldn't surprise me since it is the middle of the week. I suppose not many Costa Ricans travel for their work during the week, and the majority of them tend farms and cattle.
Tico Electronics was an interesting place, I did not know what we were going to see and it surprised me. We drove into a free trade area with many different businesses. When we walked into Tico, the only people I saw working there were women. They were all bent over their desks building something. Then, we went into a conference room where we were greeted by two men. They were clearly in charge of the place, and told us about how things were done. While claiming not to discriminate, I found that hard to believe after seeing almost all female workers and two guy supervisors. During the tour they maintained that women are more detail and attention oriented than men, which is usually true. It was hard to tell whether they were telling the whole truth or not. The workers here are only paid $4 an hour, which sounds terrible, but in Costa Rica this is actually good money.
The amount of skill necessary to do these tasks was actually very detailed and precise. It surprised me to see almost zero technology used in a place that makes technological objects. Almost everything here was done by hand, and most of it could be done by machine. It made me wonder how the company even stayed in business since machines can do the work with almost 100% precision. However, I suppose in Costa Rica, the infrastructure is not really there for high amounts of technology. Doing things by hand employs more people, and may be cheaper than paying for the maintenance of the machines.
Tico Electronics produces a large quantity of products, especially for the small size of their facility. They seem to train their workers well, and they spend the time to prevent workers from getting carpel tunnel in their hands and fingers. While Tico did seem a bit behind the times technologically, I was impressed by the working standards. These standards are probably what give them their ISO 9100 status. After taking a picture we went to lunch and then to the INCAE business school.
Driving into INCAE was impressive in itself. The landscape was beautiful, and all of the houses were well kept. During the lecture we found out that all of the professors and students are forced to live on campus, which didn't seem too bad after seeing how nice the houses were. Several other things about this school were fascinating, just because of how adamant about them our speaker was. For example, he compared INCAE to Harvard, and said that the professors who work at INCAE have the same status as a UN worker. At first I was doubtful of this, but then he explained that they have different license plates, and tax exemptions. He made it very clear that this school was an international school and did not want to be seen as the business school of Costa Rica. There are more than 25 countries represented in the school, and no more than 32% from any one country.
This school was just so different from anything I have ever seen before that it was difficult to wrap my head around. It takes between 15 months and 18 months to graduate, and focused on case studies as a way of learning. In sharp contrast from Tico Electronics, INCAE was obviously well up-to-date with technology. For all of its positives and impressive qualities, it was astounding that almost no one in the U.S. has ever heard of it. I found it hard to compare this school to Harvard considering how different their popularity is. Our speaker was clearly a very smart man, and believed in the school and what it was doing, yet; this model is just hard for me to understand.
After dinner we had two more lectures from Mauricio and Maria Paula. Mauricio's lecture on politics and the economy was not one of my favorite topics, but it was interesting. Some of Costa Rica's statistics seem impressive, but then looking at the details takes that away. For example, they only have a 6-8% rate of unemployment, however; the wages are very low and there are no unemployment wages at all. Workers are basically defenseless from being fired since there are no workers unions, and there is discrimination and inequality. The income distribution is becoming worse as time goes by, and the poverty level is not changing. All of these things make you wonder whether or not Costa Rica should really focus on becoming carbon neutral by 2020 or if other things require their attention.
Maria Paula's lecture was on tourism and development. We could tell how much she had studied and though about this subject and how much it influenced her. The tourism industry is an important topic in Costa Rica right now, especially because of how it is damaging their beautiful environment which is what tourists want to see. The hotels are using more water than is available, which is hurting towns downstream, and are pushing the locals away from the lifestyle they know. Now, instead of farming or “cattle-ing”, the people go into the tourist areas to work during the day and go back to their second-class homes at night. This is not fair to them because most of the time they never gave the tourist companies permission to use that land. Most people do not think about tourism hurting the locals because it does bring so much business to the area. However, much of that business may be going to the foreign company controlling that business instead of the locals working inside it.
It is sad to see how much Costa Rica is benefiting from tourism, yet how the locals may even be suffering because of it. One of our main topics, sustainable development, could really help Costa Rica solve this problem. They really need to meet current needs and solve current problems without compromising future ones. The water supply and treatment of waste water needs to become top priority before small towns are destroyed. Today was a long day, but we learned a lot. It was nice to see a couple completely different businesses, and how they affect and are affected by foreigners.
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