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9.
Summory
The tourist strategy refers to a series of
actions that will be needed to achieve the
development model planned, which aims at
positioning a tourist brand always hand in
hand with the concept of sustainability. The
following purposes are the genesis of this
plan:
- Keep the tourist industry as one of the
main driving forces of the countrys
economy, which generates direct and
indirect benets for human development.
- An activity with high-quality standards
and with a wide variety of competitive and
high-impact products in social well-being.
- Tourism will be the countrys sustainable
means, human wellbeing, and it will
promote opportunities for local direct
participation.
As part of the strategic selection for Costa
Rica, choosing a combination and describing
the most outstanding characteristics,
assumptions, or ambitions related to the
following decision is implied:
3 0|kXT:
Costa Rica should keep the differentiation it
has reached up to this moment in order to:
Gradually become the classic destination
par excellence for nature tourism.
Control the way how the territory is used,
and try to reduce impacts on tourist
resources.
Invest on improving tourist attractions to
expand the production base of tourism.
Strongly promote the innovation of tourist
products, strategic marketing planning
and integrated management of marketing
for the continuous improvement of
competitiveness.
Have an adequate system of tourist
governance through institutional
strengthening and private, public
and community inter-institutional
coordination.
Invest on improving human resources,
the preservation of values and the Costa
Ricans way of life.
Improve the level of training and
comprehensive training in sustainable
tourism both, in making civil society
aware and in obtaining professional
technical knowledge and tourism job
skills.
Promote fundraising strategies, economic
incentives, and nancial and non-nancial
mechanisms, micro-credit systems and
business promotion that allow executing
programs for sustainable tourism.
The Instituto Costarricense de
Turismo (Costa Rican Tourism
Board -ICT) aims at promoting a
development model focused on
a balance among the financial,
natural, human, and social capital.
This results in the attraction of
investments, the preservation and
rational use of biodiversity and
natural spaces, the participation and
integration of local communities, and
the preservation of Costa Ricans
customs and traditions, which take a
strategic significance for preserving
comparative and competitive
advantages of the country as a
tourist destination par excellence.
Costo klco's Xotlono| Sustolnoo|e Tourlsm |on 20I0-20I
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Improve the quality and focus on the business model that fulfills the expectations
of new demand segments intended.
Keep the offer of small and medium-sized businesses with high-quality
personalized services.
Improve the marketing capacities from private companies with the opening of
new channels.
Innovate with new tourist products, and simultaneously strengthen the market
and marketing to improve the presence in current and potential tourist markets.
Develop, equip and provide elements required to create, improve, and consolidate
new competitive tourist products able to attract new demand segments.
Strengthen the chambers and other union-like organizations to support the
management process of tourist spaces.
Promote local tourism as a way to socialize the benefits of tourism and
allow enjoyment, recreation and relaxation in an affordable way for the local
population.
Better Growing:
Costa Rica should grow better both, regarding volume and appropriate
demand proles for the countrys tourist model. Therefore, the following
should be done:
Improve the knowledge about markets that potentially generate the intended
prole.
Classify and determine the characteristics of the marketing chain intended for the
country, and support the opening of channels for private sectors that have less
capacity for this purpose (product networks, reservation centers, among others).
Expand the benets of the activity to companies, communities and tourist institutions
and to the society to enjoy recreation and social tourism.
Support the growth of internal tourism.

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To do this, the country needs the following:
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By looking at this strategy, it is possible to forecast
the future goals in hand with quality, growth, and
sustainability.
Increase, at least, 500 tourist companies certied under the standard of the
Certication for Sustainable Tourism (CST) program. It is calculated from
a base of 183 that were created in 2010, which corresponds to 53 new
companies per year -approximately. Currently, the country has 299 tourist
companies with CST.
Finally, increase by 10% the percentage of hotel rooms with tourist declaration
issued by ICT for them to represent about 60% of the national supply. It is
calculated from a base of 49% declared in 2010.
With this tourist strategy, it is intended that economic prots exceed two
thousand ve hundred million dollars by 2016; this is, an increase of more
than 500 million dollars since 2010.
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An average increase of 5% is expected regarding
the number of international tourists compared to
the number that arrived in 2010.
For 2016, it is estimated to have 2,700,000 tourists
arriving in Costa Rica.
2016
+500
tourism
enterprises
Source: ICT. Development and Planning Macro-process
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10.
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Costa Rica covers less
than one percent of
the planets surface
-51,100 square
kilometers (19,730
square miles), but
it hosts 5% of the
worlds biodiversity
and 3.5 percent of
the worlds marine
life, thus making it
one of the countries
with more biological
richness in the world.
Costa Rica has three
sites declared by
UNESCO as World
Heritage Sites:
Cocos Island
La Amistad
National Park
Guanacaste
Conservation
Area
Costa Rica hosts more
than 500 thousand
species of ora and
fauna, including:
more than 850
species of birds
150 species of
orchids
100 species of
frogs, and 150
species of bats.
In almost 26 years,
Costa Rica went from
having 21% of wooded
territory to over 52%,
making it one of the
few countries in the
world that recovers
its forests, which are
home to about 11% of
bat diversity and 10%
of the entire planet
Earth ferns.
Globally, Costa Rica
is the rst destination
leader in ecotourism
and then in sustainable
tourism a concept that
reaches a balance in its
economic development,
thus respecting the
patrimony and including
the communities as
part of that growth,
which makes hundreds
of tourists value our
country as a destination
par excellence and
responsible as well.
Sustainability is a concept related to an economic model; this is, an alternative way to set the
future development and, as such, it is applicable to tourism and to any other productive and
service activity as well. Sustainable tourism is the economic activity where the environment is
respected, thus causing the least impact possible and being friendly with the countrys social
and cultural environment.
As a model, sustainability should be promoted in a continuous change process where different
participants are involved and that includes, at least, private companies, municipalities,
government, communities, tourists, and workers.
Unlike the traditional model, this focuses on demand that is intensive in the use of articial capital
(nancial capital), the supply model trusted by Costa Rica looks for a balance among nancial,
and natural, human, and social capital? Therefore, elements such as attraction of investments,
the conservation and rational use of biodiversity and natural spaces, the participation and
integration of local communities and the preservation of our customs, traditions, and the way
of being, have a strategic signicance for keeping the countrys comparative and competitive
advantages as a tourist destination.
1. 3. 2. 4. 5.