Costa Rica Gets More Time to Join Trade Accord
Costa Rica got a seven-month extension to join the Central American Free Trade Agreement.
The small Central American country was facing a Feb. 29 deadline to become the last Central American member of the trade accord. But Costa Rican President Oacute;scar Arias said the United States and the other CAFTA members agreed to the Oct. 1 extension.
Costa Rica’s failure to be a part of CAFTA could pose major problems for U.S. apparel makers who import goods from that country duty-free under the Caribbean Basin Trade Partnership Act. The partnership act expires in eight months unless it is renewed by Congress.
Costa Rican voters went to the polls last year and approved membership in the seven-nation free-trade agreement between the United States, Guatemala, Nicaragua, Honduras, El Salvador and the Dominican Republic. All those countries, one by one, joined the trade pact in 2006 and 2007. But Costa Rica’s legislature has dragged its feet in changing the necessary laws needed to implement CAFTA.
Only about half the new legislation has passed a first hearing in the Costa Rican Congress, held up by the Citizen’s Action Party. But Arias is determined to get the trade package wrapped up in the next three months. —Deborah Belgum
