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Costa Rica Community currency project



Draft 1: Oct. 26, 2024 3:33 pm local time

Draft 2: Oct. 31, 2024 9:00 am local time.




For whatever reason, the universe / god / Jesus / Buddha or whatever else you want to call it, I will be in a very remote community in Costa Rica for the next 6 months during a very volatile time in the global economy. I'm looking into the possibility of helping create a local currency. The goals are:

  1. mitigating any risk that the crime rate doesn't increase ( I am a single woman living in a very remote area of Costa Rica). Safety and security are really important to me.

  2. The Costa Ricans can get paid fairly for their work

  3. The community pulls together in the even of an economic shock.

  4. The locals (Costa Ricans and foreigners who have made this their full time home for a few years) have enough food to eat and enough energy to contribute to the local economy in some productive way.



CONTEXT:

  • remote area of Costa Rica where mangoes, coconuts and many fruits are abundant

  • population: 200 - 500 depending on the season / weather

  • close to the Pacific ocean where the salt from the ocean makes it difficult to keep a car running reliably

  • there is no bank machine or ATM anywhere nearby (that you can walk to on foot)

  • the roads here are TERRIBLE!! I mean TERRIBLE. The government maybe clears the dirt road once or twice a year. It takes at least 6 hours to get here from the capital city of Costa Rica.


In Costa Rica the local currency is colones (CRC) . Thing are priced in thousands of colones here, which is "mille" in Spanish. For example, a coffee will cost you "uno mille", which means 1,000 colones. It's approximately 2 USD.


It is common for people to have bank accounts in both colones and USD. Costa Rica adopted a floating currency rate with the USD in ******** (insert reference)


The economy here works different for the Costa Ricans. I don't know for sure how the Costa Ricans transact among themselves. I am a female expat who has lived in this town off and on for 6 years. I own a property here but I am having difficulty getting the land title due to various reasons. My Spanish is OK and I have Costa Rican friends, but still I don't really know because I was not born here.


Here's my guess about how the economy works for Costa Ricans. Again... I don't really know if this is true but I assume it's reasonably accurate. The reason I can say that is because I am learning Spanish pretty quickly. I have can make jokes with Costa Ricans and they understand me. I get compliments (in Spanish) about how much my Spanish has improved since the last time I lived here.



ORDER OF IMPORTANCE FOR LOCAL EXCHANGE (for Costa Ricans)


  1. food


  1. colones


  1. cigarettes, alcohol and other things in that category


  2. USD


  1. skills that foreigners are willing to pay for in colones or USD (construction, restaurant skills, tourism, esthetics)


  2. local reputation and family reputation

  3. acres of land that can grow food & knowledge about how to grow food.



With the current developments with the USD and USA National Debt, it seemed timely to write this article given the large role the USD plays in the Costa Rican local economy. Tourist season will begin soon and with it will come perhaps a smaller amount of tourists and USD than previous years. And of course the variable of which party will will the USA Election in 2024 is on everyone's mind.



ORDER OF IMPORTANCE FOR LOCAL EXCHANGE (for Canadians)

  1. colones

  2. how many Costa Ricans you are "friends" with and how much they respect you

  3. amount of Spanish you know

  4. USD

I am Canadian so I have a lot of fun kidding people about the prices when they use USD.


My Spanish is almost good enough (but not quite) to make a joke that I am no gringo.


I say "Soy canadiense ....no entiendo dollares de Estados Unidos. "That's usually a good one to make people laugh.


If they don't laugh at that, I say "Qual es precio en colones. no tengo effectivo" or something like that.


Then, miraculously right before my eyes the price changes from 100 USD to 100 colones. That is a bit of an exaggeration but I am making a point here. The more you know Spanish and the better people respect you in the town, the lower the price is.


GREY ECONOMY

There is a grey economy here as there is in all countries.




NOTE: This is a public draft. I have a few Next Steps I need to take before I can finalize this.

  1. I will finish reading a book about Money and Healthy Communities.

  2. I need to find a place to live for the next 6 months (the one I was supposed to move to yesterday fell through for some reason I don't understand)

  3. I am recovering from getting bit from a scorpion yesterday (things like this happen in the jungle in Costa Rica)

Upcoming articles:

  • The history of the Costa Rican colone and the Central Bank of Costa Rica

  • Lessons learned from past attempts at building a local currency in this zone

  • Update on a current project for Spanish / English exchange





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