Costa Rica ponders ways to sustain reforestation success

For free real time breaking news alerts sent straight to your inbox sign up to our breaking news emails Sign up to our free breaking news emails Sign up to our free breaking news emails SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. The money is one step toward the international community doing its part to preserve valuable forest, said Jorge Mario Rodríguez Zúñiga, director of the National Forestry Financing Fund, known by its Spanish initials FONAFIFO. Floripe Córdoba and Siegfried Kussmaul had decided even before the program launched that they wanted to let the forest retake the 8 acres near San Jose where they had grown coffee and raised cattle, though they said some neighbors thought they were “crazy.” They now get about $300 annually from the program, for them a largely symbolic amount since they live comfortably off his pension from years as a geology professor. Surrounded by cattle ranches, Kussmaul said, “The neighbors see us and say: ‘What a waste of land!’” The World Bank money is open to landowners not already enrolled in Costa Rica's program. FONAFIFO has been talking with Costa Rican tourism officials because that industry is one of the biggest beneficiaries of forest conservation, but no tax for that purpose exists and it's not the right time to launch one given lingering economic difficulties from the pandemic, Rodríguez said.