Archive for October 8th, 2009
Thursday, October 8th, 2009
The 2010 presidential elections that will end on Sunday, February 7th, officially kicks off today.
Laura Chinchilla, candidate for the Partido Liberación Nacional (PLN), is the front runner. Her main competition will be from Ottón Solís for the Partido Acción Ciudadana (PAC); Otto Guevara of the Movimiento Libertario (ML) and Rolando Araya for Alianza Patriótica.
All but Chinchilla have experience in running for president. (more…)
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Thursday, October 8th, 2009
Costa Rica will sell close to 3,000 tons of carbon credits to Equator, a United States company that specializes in carbon credit management, according to the Ministry of Environment, Energy and Telecommunications (MINAET).
The sale represents Costa Rica’s first carbon credit transaction and is the result of negotiations in New York City last week after a United Nations summit on climate change. The sale is expected to bring $9 million to the country.
The government will deposit the money into the National Forestry Financing Fund and use part of the cash to replant 2,000 hectares of forest near Cinchona, a town north of San José that was destroyed by an earthquake on Jan. 8.
The rest of the money will be used for conservation practices such as support for the environmental services program that pays rural residents to protect nearby natural resources, such as forests and waterways.
Equator will buy one million carbon credits that Costa Rica produced from 2002 through 2009 – called “old carbon” – and almost two million credits for “new carbon” that the country expects to produce from 2010 through 2013.
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Thursday, October 8th, 2009
The Ministry for Foreign Affairs is following the broad court case on corruption in Costa Rica, where civil servants and businessmen as well as the country’s former president have been defendants. The court handed down its decision on the case on Tuesday, 6 October 2009.
In accordance with an agreement made between a Finnish exporter and a local buyer, hospital equipment was supplied to Costa Rica in 2003. The deal was financed with credit from a Finnish bank; the credit was guaranteed by the government guarantee agency Finnvera. The Ministry for Foreign Affairs granted interest support for the credit out of development cooperation funds. Interest support was granted for the 32 million dollar loan taken out by the State of Costa Rica, which Costa Rica used to purchase hospital equipment from the company that was then Instrumentarium. The deal was linked with serious suspicion of corruption in 2004.
The Costa Rican authorities then launched their own investigation. Commissioned by the Ministry for Foreign Affairs, the international goods inspection service company SGS (Societé Générale de Surveillance S.A.) carried out an independent investigation of the delivery of hospital equipment to Costa Rica in early 2005.
In Finland, the Central Criminal Police is conducting a preliminary investigation of alleged misconduct. The preliminary investigation was begun following the request for an inquiry made by the Ministry for Foreign Affairs in 2005.
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Thursday, October 8th, 2009
U.S. computer giant Hewlett-Packard (HP) opened a research and development center Tuesday in Heredia, north of San José, a development that is expected to create about 150 jobs.
HP’s new Development and Pro Curve Investigation center houses a laboratory that will be used to create products, technology strategies, integrated circuits for high-speed Internet, software for wireless Internet and software for security management and Web solutions. All products created within the center will be given a seal that reads “Made in Costa Rica.”
“I am thankful that Hewlett-Packard has chosen Costa Rica to continue its Curve model,” President Oscar Arias said at the inauguration ceremony. “I am also happy that all of the people of Costa Rica’s public and private sectors have made it possible that businesses like HP could come to Costa Rica and grow here.”
Most of the software created in the lab will focus on enhancing wireless software and capabilities. The Pro Curve line, which is the world’s second largest LAN (Local Area Network) vendor for businesses, provides wired and wireless enterprise networking products, services and solutions. Pro Curve aims to adapt software to cater to users, applications and the needs of organizations.
The center will be the first of its kind in Latin America and only the sixth HP wireless research and development center in the world. The lab is located in the Ultrapark Free Trade Zone in Heredia, north of San José.
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Thursday, October 8th, 2009
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