What's 44 years old, four countries wide, and comes in more than 30 flavors? For any Costa Rican, it's a no-brainer: POPS, the premium ice cream company that, since its founding in 1968, has found a way to become a multinational success with an increasingly diversified product line while maintaining its roots as a Costa Rican institution. According to president Carlos Abreu, American Ice Cre...

Egencia, an Expedia, Inc. company, announced the expansion of the Egencia Global Alliance to include strategic partnerships with leading local travel management companies (TMCs) in Russia, Ukraine, Costa Rica, Ecuador, Peru, Venezuela, and Sri Lanka. The Egencia Global Alliance (EGA) is comprised of Egencia partners in 34 countries, bringing the company's presence to 54 countries worldwide. "Ou...

Ricardo Trivino, a Mexican-born rally driver, was crowned once again regional champion for the North America, Central America, and northern South America and Caribbean (NACAM) in Costa Rica. The Costa Rica-based rally became his 118th international rally. On his sixth win this year, the 39-year old rally driver is now getting ready to conquer Germany's rally circuit as part of the World Rally C...

A 60-year-old Quebec man was found dead three days ago in Costa Rica and his family told QMI Agency Thursday that they aren't buying the official story. Serge Gravel was found dead in a room he was renting on the West Coast of Costa Rica. He reportedly had three bullet wounds in his chest. The family said that Costa Rican authorities think Gravel committed suicide. Denise Gravel, the vict...

As forests in South and Central America are cleared for agriculture and other human uses, populations of these arboreal leaf eaters, which depend on large trees for both food and refuge, can become isolated and at risk. But one type of sustainable agriculture, shade grown cacao plantations, a source of chocolate, could become critical refuges and bridges between intact forests for the iconic anima...

The Evangelical Alliance of Costa Rica presented the Constitutional Court with some three thousand signatures against sex education programs provided by the Government to schools, on the grounds of unconstitutionality. It is the first mass action by the institution in what has been considered a declared war against Christian churches ever since the Ministry of Public Education (MEP) launched th...

The World Bank's private equity investment arm, IFC, is providing US$120mn in financing for Guatemalan mobile infrastructure provider Continental Towers for the building and maintenance of mobile phone towers across Central America, the former said in a release. The finance package is comprised of a US$40mn loan and US$80mn syndicated loan with participation from HSBC's Panamanian unit, Dutch d...

Central America, Ecuador, and Colombia supply the majority of the bananas to the United States. The region’s banana industry features an oligopic market dominated by three U.S.-owned multinational corporations, Chiquita (formerly United Fruit Company), Dole (formerly Standard Fruit Company), and Del Monte. From their massive plantations spread throughout Latin America, this “Wild Bunch” controls 6...

Costa Rica’s Nayara Hotel, Spa & Gardens has earned a coveted spot as one of the Top 100 Hotels in the Travel + Leisure 2012 World’s Best Awards readers’ survey, and wins the illustrious title as the No. 1 Resort in Central and South America. Once a hidden gem, Nayara Hotel, Spa & Gardens is fast becoming a favorite with honeymooners and couples in search of romance and adrenaline boosting adve...

Ascot Mining has decided to dispose of its stake in Canadian resource company Mineral Hill Industries to eliminate US$500,000 in associated debt. The company said the decision was made in response to the challenging market conditions for junior resource companies, which favour production and cash flow. “After much struggle, Ascot is now in an enviable position because it has a functioning go...

San Jose (Costa Rica), July 10 (IANS) The international football governing body FIFA praised Costa Rica's national futsal or indoor football team for its victory against Guatemala in the pre-World Cup. In a note titled "Costa Ricans break the monopoly" and published on its website, FIFA highlighted the victory of the Costa Rican team against Guatemala Monday, one of the best indoor football tea...

It seems that pineapple growers in Costa Rica have attempted to control export prices by reducing the amount of shipments made to the US in May and June. It is around that time that volumes usually rise dramatically pushing prices down. The volumes shipped to the US during this period were lower than usual with freight on board prices running at $9-10 per 27 pound box - considerably more than ...

UPS announced that it is making it easier for customers in Latin America and the Caribbean to conduct business around the world through the implementation of web-based shipping applications and visibility technology tools such as UPS Internet Shipping, UPS CampusShip(R), UPS Quantum View(R) Manage and UPS Developer Kit- Applications Programming Interfaces (API). The technology expansion will sa...

The law intends to make the cost of supervising the securities market be fully covered by its participants (Stock Market, Ceval, Brokerage Houses and Mutual Funds), who currently contribute 20%. José Rafael Brenes, head of the National Stock Exchange in Costa Rica, argues that this provision would be lethal to the system, since the cost of monitoring would represent 53% of market participant’s ...

A pastor accused of using his position to extort and rob people on behalf of the FARC was arrested with three men in western Colombia Tuesday. Wilson Enrique Gaitan, leader of the pentecoastal church "World Missionary Movement," is accused of heading the criminal gang "Pastors of Costa Rica," which tricked people out of money that was then passed to Colombia's biggest guerrilla group. Gaitai...

If Big Time Rush has a leader, Kendall is it! Music and dancing are in his blood. He never imagined he'd end up on the brink of superstardom, but he just might enjoy the ride. And if anyone can keep these guys together, it's Kendall. James can sing but so far his biggest hits are with the ladies! He dreams big and has the confidence to match. He may be a little clueless at times, but he always ...

SAN JOSE, COSTA RICA -- An advertisement that greets passengers at the international airport here says, “Welcome to the happiest country of the world.” Inflated claim? Maybe, but a study indeed ranks Central America’s verdant nation of Costa Rica as the planet’s most content. Its citizens generally live to old age, watched over by a government that spends heavily on schools and health care and ...

A team of 23 cooks in Costa Rica prepared what they described as the "biggest chop suey in the Americas," aiming to feed some 10,000 people, organizers said. The event was organized last Sunday by a brand of noodles at La Sabana Metropolitan Park in San Jose, where hundreds of locals of all ages came to savor the dish originally from China. In preparing the chop suey the cooks used 1.2 t...

Alton Biggs and his wife Louise recently traveled more than 2,000 miles to point out the behavior of monkeys and various other Central America animals for a group of teachers and friends. Among the 17 participants in the trip to Costa Rica were biology teachers, a nurse, an editor and one of Mr. Biggs’s previous students. This was Mr. and Mrs. Biggs’s second trip to the Central American coun...

DVDNow Kiosks, the world's largest network of independently owned and operated DVD rental kiosks, is launching Costa Rica's first-ever DVD rental kiosks beginning this month. With Costa Rica, the company now has operations in 15 countries. Scott McInnes, DVDNow Kiosks Founder and CEO, said, "Costa Rica is an untapped opportunity for our self-serve rental kiosks. Instead of going to a video stor...

After studying marine biology and spending family vacations in Costa Rica, a Carlsbad woman turned her fascination with sea turtles into an effort to help the endangered animals in the Central American country. Courtney King, a recent marine biology graduate from U.C. Davis, spent one of her last quarters abroad working on turtle conservation with the nonprofit Costa Rican organization Pretoma....

Debenhams has launched its first foreign language website in Europe's biggest economy, Germany, to capitalise on the "Britishness" of its brand ahead of the Olympics. The department store chain went live selling more than 140,000 products from women's dresses to homewares this weekend. Simon Forster, online director at Debenhams, said: "As Britain takes the lead role on the world stage with its...

Costa Rican and U.S. authorities in a joint operation seized 2,265 kilograms (1.13 tons) of marijuana in the Caribbean Sea that apparently was brought from Jamaica in a speedboat, the Security Ministry said. The operation was carried out last Tuesday some 180 kilometers (112 miles) off Costa Rica's Caribbean coast when the speedboat's crew - three Costa Ricans and three Nicaraguan who have not ...

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is a step closer to adding four macaw species to the "endangered" list, the agency announced Friday (July 6). The birds — the great green macaw, the hyacinth macaw, the scarlet macaw and the military macaw — warrant protection under the Endangered Species Act, a Service analysis has found. The proposal to list the birds as endangered is now open to a 60-day pe...

Costa Rica, Guatemala, Mexico and Panama will represent North, Central America and the Caribbean at the FIFA Futsal World Cup Thailand 2012 after all four advanced to the semi-finals of the CONCACAF Futsal Championship. The quartet's success comes at the expense of two FIFA Futsal World Cup veterans, with USA and Cuba - five and four-time participants respectively - both squeezed out. Hosts...

A 5/8 classification match of the Norceca Boys’ U19 Continental Championship took place on Friday, July 6, 2012 between Costa Rica and US Virgin Islands. The tournament is currently being hosted by Tijuana in Mexico where the venue of the matches is the Centro de Alto Rendimiento sports hall. The squad from Costa Rica was able to secure the fifth spot in the championship by making a clean sweep ov...

Tonight, people around the world will plug into their portable listening devices, simultaneously press play to a pre-set, universal playlist and dance together throughout various cities. The New Orleans edition of the Global Floating Dance Party will start in Lafayette Square at 10:00pm, make its way to Harrah’s Casino at 10:30pm, and end at the steps of the state Supreme Court on Royal Street in ...

The Contemporary art museum of Costa Rica based in San José is displaying works by Rebecca Alpizar in its “Para Verte Mejor” (The Better to See You With) exhibition until 4 August 2012. This exhibition explores self-portraits, the artist’s key topic, by seeking new approaches to self-representation so as to offer spectators a large panel of image readings through reflection and acquisition of i...

Mainz, Germany (Sports Network) - Mainz inked Costa Rican defender Junior Diaz to a three-year contract Friday. The 28-year-old Diaz will join the German Bundesliga side from Belgian side Club Brugge. A left back, Diaz spent last season on loan with Wisla Krakow in Poland. He also played for the Polish side from 2008-10. "Junior Diaz is a technically skilled, athletic defender who is strong ...

Oceánica de Seguros, founded on Venezuelan capital, is the tenth insurance company to be incorporated into the Costa Rican market after its de-monopolization in 2008. The superintendent of insurance, Javier Cascante, said the company, which is the eleventh to join the insurance market after its opening, will have a joint operating license, for personal and general policies. Nacion.com quoted...

San José, Costa Rica – The Americas’ largest wild cat, the elusive and iconic jaguar, received a historic seal of protection yesterday with the official recognition of Costa Rica’s Jaguar Corridor and the establishment of the country’s first official jaguar conservation strategy. On July 5th, Costa Rica’s Minister of Environment, Energy and Telecommunications (MINAET), Dr. René Castro, presided...

Workers digging a secondary drainage canal for a banana plantation in Costa Rica’s Osa canton discovered what is just the latest in series of stone spheres that raise more questions than they answer for archaeologists. Locally the stone spheres are known as Las Bolas. Over the years just over three hundred of them have been discovered across the Diqius Delta and on Isla del Cano in Costa Rica. ...

San Jose - Costa Rican authorities arrested a 37-year-old Mexican on Thursday, accusing him of running drug trafficking operations in Central America for Mexico's Gulf Cartel. Judicial police arrested Juan Manuel Garcia in a hotel in downtown San Jose hotel along with Francisco Gonzalez Rangel, 57, also Mexican and suspected of belonging to the same criminal group, officials said. “This is a...

UPDATE: The Costa Rica Star spoke with the owner of the Out of Bounds Hotel in San Rafael Escazu and she stated that they are closed for repairs at the moment and no clients are staying with them. She is in the process of renovating the Hotel and looking for a buyer, but also they will be taking clients starting Monday morning. The information from this article was taken from The Detroit News, h...

Annette Hallett, director of the next LTG production describes My Life as a Crazy Quilt as a collection of short plays that explore extraordinary interactions that occur between ordinary people. It promises to be a very entertaining evening that will both amuse and touch the hearts of the audience. About her cast Annette says, “I wanted to use some actors that were not quite so well known a...

Costa Rica-based melodic metal band SIGHT OF EMPTINESS will support AT THE GATES on July 21st at Pepper's Club in San Jose, Costa Rica. Commented SIGHT OF EMPTINESS singer Eduardo Chacón: "Chills, goosebumps and lots of great memories...supporting At the Gates in my country? What an honor! They are one of the main reasons why Sight of Emptiness actually exist. The progenitors of the Gothenb...

Milestone XProtect open platform IP video management software (VMS) has been implemented in more than 30 government judicial buildings in Costa Rica. The new surveillance system is the foundation for defense against violence for judicial employees to be less vulnerable to the risk of attacks in the office. With an increase in reported violent crimes throughout Costa Rica, the prosecution of mor...

Costa Rica and French Saint Martin played a match against each other on Tuesday, July 3, 2012 in Group A of the preliminary round of the NORCECA Boys’ U19 Continental Championship. The tournament is currently being staged in Tijuana, Mexico where the matches are being held at the Centro de Alto Rendimiento sports hall. When the match reached its close, Costa Rica had bagged itself a win by making ...

Kurà Design Villas, opening in November 2012, launches a new level of eco-friendly, boutique hotel design to the southern Pacific Coast of Costa Rica, thanks to the creative passions of its owners and their combined expertise in architecture and biology. Starting with a commitment to protect the local environment, Alejandra Umana ( the biologist) and Martin Wells ( the architect) are both Costa...

SAN JOSE - A bitter row has broken out in Costa Rica's Congress after opposition parties said they would not support President Laura Chinchilla's plans to tackle its yawning budget deficit until she dismisses two members of her cabinet. Chinchilla on Tuesday refused to submit to demands from the opposition after the two ministers were found to have violated an ethics code by a congressional wat...