Pineapple problems
The history of large corporations in the Central America's and the importance of Climate Justice
Last year, I was fortunate enough to travel through Costa Rica with an incredibly knowledgeable National Geographic guide. On those long, humid bus rides, he would go into incredible detail about the history of the landscapes we passed by. At first glance, it’s a beautiful view. But under the lush greenery and orderly rows of crops, hides something ugly.
This article follows the story as I heard it from our guide, including how historical geopolitics impact his life to this day. Upon driving past a pineapple field, a story unfolded. A story of land shaped by corporate interests and monoculture. A story of the toll the agriculture industry has taken on people and nature.
Costa Rica is widely recognised as a global leader in sustainability and conservation. They pride themselves on their incredible biodiversity; the walls of San Jose airport exhibit the country’s picturesque landscapes, animals and impressive environmental statistics. There is an innate appreciation of wildlife that can be seen in the way locals excitedly show tourists where a sloth is sleeping nearby, or where street walls are adorned with hand-painted birds.
Costa Rica is known for their eco-tourism, and 99% of their electricity is from renewable energy sources. They have reversed deforestation trends, and nearly 27% of the land is protected.
But perhaps as expected, not everything is as ideal as it seems.
Pesticides
Despite its international reputation as a green paradise, Costa Rica is one of the highest users of pesticides per hectare in the world, far exceeding the levels used in the United States and Europe. This heavy reliance is driven by the country’s role in supplying “perfect” tropical produce to the US, UK and EU, where aesthetic standards for fruit and vegetables are notoriously strict. While Costa Rica’s tourism industry prides itself on its pristine biodiversity and ecological stewardship, its agricultural practices tell a different story.
The widespread use of agrochemicals has had devastating effects on both wildlife and human health. In some rural communities, like one near our National Geographic guide’s hometown, residents have no access to clean drinking water due to contamination from nearby plantations. Instead, the government is forced to deliver water by truck twice a week. This contradiction is troubling, yet perhaps unsurprising.
People
Behind the scenes of Costa Rica's pineapple exportation lies not only environmental costs, but signficant human costs as well. The industry relies on cheap labour, often employing poor migrants, largely from Nicaragua, who are subjected to long hours, low wages, and hazardous working conditions. Reports have highlighted cases of constant workers rights violations, violence and death threats directed at workers attempting to unionise.
Whats more, the use of pesticides doesn’t just affect the environment. It also poses health risks to workers and nearby communities. A study from Costa Rica this year has linked exposure to endocrine-disrupting pesticides with reduced fertility rates among agricultural workers, particularly impacting male reproductive health.
The pineapple market in Costa Rica is dominated by multinational corporations such as Chiquita, Del Monte, and Dole, which collectively control a significant portion of the country's exports. These companies have been accused of tax avoidance and threatening to withdraw operations if faced with increased taxation, leveraging the potential loss of employment to influence government decisions.
While organic and fair-trade initiatives offer more sustainable alternatives, they face challenges such as higher production costs and slower yields. Despite growing consumer awareness, the demand in the West for inexpensive, cosmetically ‘perfect’ fruit continues to drive practices that prioritise profit over people and the environment.
We made a pit stop in San Ramon where a Costa Rican grandmother welcomed us into her kitchen and taught us how to make tortillas from scratch. Hanging above bunches of bananas was a sign: “Mi casa, su casa.” The warmth of her hospitality was unforgettable, but looking back while writing this, I can’t help but draw a parallel. Here was a home of joy and abundance, shared freely and generously with a bunch of random foreigners. In many ways, Costa Rica has opened its home to the world, but in doing so, it’s also been asked to give more than it can sustainably afford, at the cost of the well-being of the locals.
This narrative is not unique to Costa Rica; it’s the same story of exploitation and environmental degradation for different countries and different fruits of Central America.
Banana republics
To fully grasp the extent of these patterns, we need to take a stroll through the history books.
By 1870, Costa Rica was one of the most important coffee producers in the world. Most of it was growing in the Central Valley due to its ideal climate. However, getting the coffee to international markets, especially in Europe, was a major logistical challenge.
At that time, there was no direct access to the Caribbean coast. Coffee was transported from the Central Valley to the Pacific port of Puntarenas by oxen carts, a journey that took months.
From Puntarenas, coffee was shipped to South America, then around Cape Horn to Europe. Without the Panama Canal (which would not open until 1914), this route was time-consuming and inefficient. During the voyage, the coffee often deteriorated in quality, arriving in England in poor condition.
So Costa Rica needed a faster connection to the Caribbean Sea to save time, money and prevent their produce from being stolen1. So, the government proposed a railway to link the Central Valley with the Caribbean coast, specifically the port of Limón. This railway would significantly reduce transportation time and costs for exporting coffee.
The Costa Rican government, under President Tomás Guardia, sought a loan from British investors to finance the construction of the railway. But the project soon ran into trouble: the complex terrain and shortage of money meant construction was challenging. Progress stalled, and the government was unable to complete the railway on its own.
Around this time, Henry Meiggs, an American businessman who was building railroads in Peru and Chile, got involved. Meiggs sent his nephew, Minor Cooper Keith, to oversee the construction of the railway in Costa Rica. Keith negotiated new terms with the Costa Rican government and British lenders. In exchange for his continued work on the railway, he got significant concessions for himself, including land ownership and the rights to operate the railway for 99 years. He also received the rights to exploit natural resources, like minerals and timber, in the lands adjacent to the railway. These concessions were enormous, effectively giving Keith and his business near-monopolistic control over vast regions of Costa Rica.
Coffee was a seasonal crop, and the railway wasn't profitable year-round. So naturally, Keith needed an additional source of revenue. He began cultivating bananas on the land along the railway, partly to feed the workers, but mostly for their export potential. He initially began exporting them to the United States. Over time, bananas became a major export for Costa Rica and a critical part of the nation's economy. This eventually led to the founding of the United Fruit Company (known across Latin America as El Pulpo (the Octopus), for the extent to which its “tentacles” reached into every corner of politics in the region).
But the railway needed labourers, and the Costa Rican population was too small to meet demand. The company brought in Chinese and Italian migrants, who struggled with tropical diseases and poor working conditions. Italians were among the first to organise strikes in Costa Rica. Later, Jamaicans were brought in to work on cocoa plantations and to continue railway construction. They were promised a return home after the job was done, but those promises were never kept. Instead, they were given land, and so marginalised communities grew along the tracks.
The term “banana republic” was coined to describe nations like Costa Rica, where foreign corporations dominated the economy and often influenced or controlled political decisions. These were countries with fragile democracies or dictatorships, whose economies relied almost entirely on the export of a single product - bananas -under the thumb of powerful multinational corporations like United Fruit.
The state of banana republics today
Today, the ghost of El Pulpo remains. Companies like United Fruit (now Chiquita) remain active in Costa Rica. The blue plastic bags we I covering banana bunches in plantations across the country aren’t just for show. They're to protect the fruit from birds, UV rays, fungus, and blemishes. This once again reminds us of the demands of foreign markets that expect their bananas to look perfect, regardless of the hidden cost (in this case, plastic pollution).
While the Pacific side of the country has seen increased development, the Caribbean coast, which was once a hub of banana empire activity, was largely abandoned by the big companies after disease outbreaks and strikes in the 1930s. Land was left behind, and the government introduced programs allowing people to purchase, improve, and resell it. This is how many locals, like our guide’s family in Cariari, came to settle in the region.
But the colonial patterns never fully disappeared, they simply changed form. In recent years, gentrification has crept into the North Pacific province of Guanacaste, where expats drive up the cost of living. Costa Rica's minimum wage is around $600 per month, whether you're a janitor, a banana plantation worker, or a driver. Meanwhile, the cost of imported goods, including essential technologies, is heavily taxed, straining working families and making self-sufficiency harder to attain.
Today, pineapples have become Costa Rica’s new monoculture, driven by the same export demands, the same pesticide-heavy practices, and the same human and environmental costs. Fields once dominated by El Pulpo are now filled with rows of pineapples, soaked in chemicals and worked by underpaid labourers. The fruit may be different, but the problems remain the same.
The importance of climate justice
As if poor working conditions were not enough, they’re being exacerbated by climate change. Rising temperatures, unpredictable rains, prolonged droughts, and crop diseases are making an already exploitative system even worse. Fewer work days, more exposure to harmful pesticides, and less access to clean water. The same plantations offer no safety net when nature turns against their workers.
This is why climate justice is essential. It encompasses not just how to protect the planet, but who we protect. Costa Rica may market itself as a green paradise, but unless sustainability includes the people who are growing the pineapples, picking the bananas, and have been the foundation of the country’s economy, it remains a half-truth. Without justice, green is just another export.
This topic could be its own article entirely, but for Costa Rica, it is evident that the benefits drawn from the country’s green practices, like eco-tourism and green investment, are not shared equally amongst the people. Rural workers are left out of the sustainable narrative. While agriculture no longer defines Costa Rica, it is what helped build it. Costa Rica continues to rely heavily on its agricultural exports to meet global demand and sustain its economy. The country cannot market itself as a green paradise abroad while ignoring the poor conditions of those who keep its fields producing.
Pineapples may be sweet, but their legacy is bitter. There is an urgent need to reconcile the country's green image with the realities of its agricultural practices. It’s more important than ever that the government does not perpetuate the history of exploitation. Instead, it must actively invest in fair wages, environmental protections, and the health and dignity of the people who form the backbone of its agricultural system.
If you learned something or have anything to add, please tell me by leaving a comment :)
If you know someone who you think would enjoy this article, then please do share it!
Thank you for reading Earth Exposure, and if you haven’t already, subscribe!
You can also leave a contribution (no matter how small) in the Earth Exposure tip jar <3
It’s a common anecdote among Costa Ricans that Panama stole and labelled it ‘Cafe de Chile’ to benefit from trade deals and tariffs. Ironically, they didn’t even produce coffee at the time.
I didn't know that agriculture in Costa Rica was so problematic, the topic has certainly been ignored in the reports of the country's eco-friendliness that I've read.