Lessons from Costa Rica

Click here to read the full column, "(No) Drill, Baby, Drill". Selected teasers:

"More than any nation I’ve ever visited, Costa Rica is insisting that economic growth and environmentalism work together. It has created a holistic strategy to think about growth, one that demands that everything gets counted. So if a chemical factory sells tons of fertilizer but pollutes a river — or a farm sells bananas but destroys a carbon-absorbing and species-preserving forest — this is not honest growth. You have to pay for using nature. It is called 'payment for environmental services' — nobody gets to treat climate, water, coral, fish and forests as free anymore."

"'In Costa Rica, the minister of environment sets the policy for energy, mines, water and natural resources,' explained Carlos M. Rodríguez, who served in that post from 2002 to 2006. In most countries, he noted, 'ministers of environment are marginalized.' They are viewed as people who try to lock things away, not as people who create value. Their job is to fight energy ministers who just want to drill for cheap oil."