Martin Mowforth gave a presentation on the negative impacts of pineapple production in Costa Rica. Pineapple monocultivation has resulted in land conflicts, pollution from pesticide spraying affecting water sources and health, poor labor practices violating worker rights, overuse of water resources, and disregard of protected cultural and wetland areas. Despite some reforms, the expansion of pineapple farms into protected lands and wetlands continues to cause environmental damage and contaminate water sources according to a recent report.

1. The following PowerPoint file is a presentation given by Martin
Mowforth at Cambridge University on 21st February 2020
during a two-day conference on ‘Power, Promise, Politics: The
Pineapple from Columbus to Del Monte’
Key words: pineapple production; monocultivation; Costa Rica; Del
Monte (PINDECO); pesticide contamination; labour rights abuses;
wetlands; protected areas.

2. DIRTY PINEAPPLES FROM COSTA RICA
Martin Mowforth
mmowforth@plymouth.ac.uk

3. My taste for pineapples began to turn a little sour in 1997 when
I spent some time in the village of Longo Maï, also known as
Finca Sonador, a village of Salvadoran refugees in the south of
Costa Rica.
The village was surrounded by pineapple fields which, although
providing quite a bit of employment, also caused many
problems for the residents.

5. PROBLEMS CAUSED BY PINEAPPLE PRODUCTION
Land availability – affecting:
land tenure of campesino population
food security of campesino population
social conflicts between campesino and indigenous populations
Pollution by spraying – affecting:
water purity
people and their health
long term soil quality
Labour practices – affecting:
health of employees
the right to belong to a union
Over-extraction of water – affecting:
amount of water available for communities
freshwater life
Cultural and archeological disregard

6. In January 2000, ENCA (the
Environmental Network for
Central America) published
an article entitled ‘Dirty
Pineapples’ – based on
information received from
UNAPROA.

7. UNAPROA:
Unión de Amigos para la Protección
del Ambiente
/
Union of Friends for the Protection of
the Environment.

8. FRENTE DE LUCHA CONTRA LA
CONTAMINACION DE PINDECO
Formed in 1995 to combat the pollution caused by PINDECO.
Formed by:
UNAPROA (Union of Friends for the Protection of the
Environment)
Iriria Tsochok (umbrella organisation representing indigenous
groups in Costa Rica)
Produces a newsletter called ‘El Picudo’
El picudo is a hardy insect that survives when all its natural
predators have been eliminated by the application of chemical insecticides
To the Frente, PINDECO is like el picudo – difficult to control and
extremely voracious

9. PINDECO
• Subsidiary of transnational agribusiness
company Del Monte
• Cultivates pineapples in southern Costa Rica
• Back in 2000, Sainsburys used to take 30,000
pineapples per week off PINDECO

10. The ENCA article found its way to the CEO of
Sainsburys, the UK supermarket chain, which takes
30,000 pineapples a week from PINDECO.
As a result, Sainsburys sent a copy to PINDECO and
asked for a response to the claims made in the article.

11. PINDECO immediately lashed out against UNAPROA and claimed
that they were calling for a boycott of PINDECO pineapples, which
was not the case.
Because of the stink caused by PINDECO, the issue was front page
news and headline TV news in Costa Rica for a week.
Through such media coverage, it was PINDECO’s intention to turn
the workers against UNAPROA, on the grounds that jobs would be
threatened by a boycott.

12. Sainsburys sent a team of three to Costa Rica to investigate.
They returned and reported back, but only minor changes
were made to PINDECO’s operations. The major damages
caused by pineapple cultivation continue to this day.

13. So PINDECO began to put up notices to show its commitment to
the environment. It even gained ISO certification.

14. But practices such as this, along with aerial spraying continued.

15. Dole and Del Monte are currently the
largest global suppliers of both fresh and
processed pineapple, with the latter being
the dominant company in Costa Rica after
buying out Pindeco in 2008.

16. Dollar value of pineapple exports, 2018

17. Dollar value of pineapple exports, 2018:
Share of global market

18. Table 2.XX5 Importance of Costa Rica in key European market imports of pineapples, 2008
Source:
Fresh pineapples: behind the ‘boom’- Presentation for EUROBAN. Banana Link,
www.bananalink.org.uk. Accessed 11/08/10.
Country: Tonnes of pineapple imported:
Percentage from Costa
Rica:
Germany 173,000 95+
United Kingdom 126,000 85
Italy 149,000 85+
France 93,000 60+

19. 1986 3,400
1996 7,500
2000 11,000
2008 42,500
2016 57,300
2017 66,300

20. Much of this rapid growth occurred as
cultivation spread across Costa Rica,
particularly to the north and north-east of the
country.

21. From the daily
La Nación,
17 July 2007

23. Since around 2007 (and possibly before), the
water table in the north-east of the country has
been contaminated to the extent that the
government has had to provide tankers of
potable water every day.

25. See ‘Poisoned Paradise’ by Jan Nimmo – 4 mins

26. In June 2006, the Rainforest Alliance launched its new
standards for pineapple production:
• No growth on slopes greater than 15% - to avoid erosion
and water runoff problems
• Pesticide spray booms must have a coloured sign
• Farms must provide shelter from rain and sun for workers
• Toilets must be reachable no more than 5 minutes from the
fields

27. So let’s see if these guidelines have made
any difference to what is happening in the
pineapple fields over the last two years.

28. Using satellite data, FECON (Costa Rican Federation for the
Conservation of Nature) in January this year (2020), denounced
pineapple monocultivation as:
• responsible for polluting the water sources of various local
communities
• ignoring relevant legislation relating to labour and
environmental practices
• responsible for the deforestation of 5,566 hectares of protected
areas (particularly wetland protected areas) between 2000 and
2015.

30. The 3 protected areas affected are:
• Maquenque Wildlife Refuge
• Barra del Colorado Wildlife Refuge
• Northern Frontier Corridor Refuge
The data shows that 3,824 hectares within these
protected areas are now planted with pineapples.

32. The same data also shows that 16,385 hectares of land
classed as wetlands are now sown with pineapples.
FECON notes that despite this uncontrolled expansion
of pineapple cultivation, the government either looks
the other way or even denies that pineapple expansion
is anything of a problem.

34. FECON adds that the current Costa Rican government
cut 2 billion colones (approx. $3.5 million USD) from
the 2019 budget provided to SINAC (National
Conservation Areas System), the organisation which
tries to monitor and regulate what happens in the
protected areas.

35. Meanwhile, back in the
south of the country,
specifically in the Térraba-
Sierpe wetlands …… in
2016 SETENA authorised
pineapple cultivation (by
PINDECO) that would
affect the wetlands area
with agrochemicals.

36. The move to allow pineapple cultivation there was
opposed not just by local inhabitants and Costa Rican
ecologists and environmentalists but also by the Costa
Rican residents ombudsman.
Fortunately in December (2019) the decision was
revoked by the government.

37. PROBLEMS CAUSED BY PINEAPPLE PRODUCTION
Land availability – affecting:
land tenure of campesino population
food security of campesino population
social conflicts between campesino and indigenous populations
Pollution by spraying – affecting:
water purity
people and their health
long term soil quality
Labour practices – affecting:
health of employees
the right to belong to a union
Over-extraction of water – affecting:
amount of water available for communities
freshwater life
Cultural and archeological disregard