The exchange rate of the dollar against the colon fell 24% between June 2022 and December 2023. In July 2022, it was close to 700 colones per dollar and is now at 500, like a decade ago.
The trend put the growing export sector led by dynamic foreign capital companies that manufacture medical devices on alert. It happens with tourism and also with coffee producers, who export more than 85% of the harvest and who saw the value of sales decrease by almost 13% last year. “It is a continuous, abrupt devaluation and it does not seem to have an end,” lamented authorities of the local coffee sector.