Overview

As of 2010, Costa Rica has an estimated population of 4,640,000. Whites and mestizos make up 94% of the population, while 3% are Black, or Afro-Caribbean, 1% Native American, 1% Chinese, and 1% other.

There are also over 60,000 Native American or indigenous inhabitants, representing 1.5% of the population. Most of them live in secluded reservations, distributed among eight ethnic groups: Quitirrisí (in the Central Valley), Matambú or Chorotega (Guanacaste), Maleku (northern Alajuela), Bribri (southern Atlantic), Cabécar (Cordillera de Talamanca), Guaymí (southern Costa Rica, along the Panamá border), Boruca (southern Costa Rica) and Térraba (southern Costa Rica).

The population of European ancestry is primarily of Spaniard descent, with significant numbers of Italian, German, English, Dutch, French, Irish, Portuguese, Lebanese and Polish families, as well a sizable Jewish community. The majority of the Afro-Costa Ricans are Creole English-speaking descendants of 19th century black Jamaican immigrant workers.

The 2000 census classified 94% of the population as white or mestizo and less than 3% as black or Amerindian. Native and European mixed blood populations are far less than in other Latin American countries.

Exceptions are Guanacaste, where almost half the population is visibly mestizo, a legacy of the more pervasive unions between Spaniards colonists and Chorotega Amerindians through several generations, and Limón, where the vast majority of the Afro-Costa Rican community lives.

Costa Rica hosts many refugees, mainly from Colombia and Nicaragua. As a result of that and illegal immigration, an estimated 10–15% (400,000–600,000) of the Costa Rican population is made up of Nicaraguans. Some Nicaraguans migrate for seasonal work opportunities and then return to their country.

Costa Rica took in many refugees from a range of other Latin American countries fleeing civil wars and dictatorships during the 1970s and 80s, notably from Chile and Argentina, as well as people from El Salvador who fled from guerrillas and government death squads.

According to the World Bank, about 441,000 immigrants live legally in the country, the majority of them Nicaraguans, while 127,060 Costa Ricans live abroad in the United States, Panama, Nicaragua, Spain, Mexico, Canada, Germany, Argentina, France, and England.

Population and Ancestry

In 2009, Costa Rica has a population of 4,579,000 and it’s increasing at a rate of 1.52% per year, still relatively high. If this rate continues, the population will increase to 9,158,000 in about 46 years.[4] The population density is nearly 90 people per square km, the third highest in Central America.

Today most Costa Ricans are of primarily Spanish ancestry with minorities of German, Italian, French, Dutch, British, Swedish and Greek ancestry; or of Mestizo ancestry, both groups make up 94% of the population 80% being White and 14% being Mestizo. European and western-oriented, plus American pop culture has a large impact in Costa Rica, also thrived in a fairly democratic prosperous economy.

European immigration used Costa Rica to get across the isthmus of Central America as well to emigrate on the US West Coast (California) in the late 19th century and to the 1910′s before the Panama Canal opened.

Other European ethnic groups known to live in Costa Rica are Russians, Danes, Belgians, Portuguese, Croats, Hungarians, Turks, Armenians and Georgians. Without a doubt Costa Rica is the Central American country with the largest white population.

Costa Rica has three small minority groups: blacks, Indians and Asians (mostly Chinese). Blacks represent about 3% of the population. Indians and Asians represent 1.5% each.

Blacks live along the Caribbean Coast. Their ancestors came to Costa Rica from Jamaica in the late 19th century to build railroads and to work on the banana plantations. The Indians live primarily in isolated communities in the highlands and along both coasts. Most of them still keep their traditional ways of life.

Nearly all Costa Ricans speak Spanish; but many blacks speak a traditional Jamaican dialect of the English, also most of the Indians speak their own language. According to the World Factbook the main religions are: Roman Catholic, 76.3%; Evangelical, 13.7%; Jehovah’s Witnesses, 1.3%; other Protestant, 0.7%; other, 4.8%; none, 3.2%.

Approximately 40% live in rural areas and 60% in urban areas. The rate of urbanization estimated for the period 2005-2010 is 2.3% per annum, one of the highest among developing countries.

Emigration and Immigration

Costa Rica’s emigration is among the smallest in the Caribbean Basin. About 3% of the country’s people live in another country as immigrants. The main destination countries are the United States, Spain, Mexico and other Central American Countries. In 2005, there were 127,061 Costa Ricans living in another country as immigrants. Remittances were $513,000,000 in 2006 and they represented 2.3% of the country’s GDP.

Costa Rica’s immigration is among the largest in the Caribbean Basin. Immigrants in Costa Rica represent about 10.2% of the Costa Rican population. The main countries of origin are Nicaragua, Colombia and El Salvador. In 2005, there were 440,957 people in the country living as immigrants. Outward Remittances were $246,000,000 in 2006.

Costa Rica attracts a sizable number of East Asian and Southeast Asian nationalities, as well smaller numbers of Indians with other South Asians and increasingly Palestinians from the Middle East (usually they are Iraq War refugees), sometimes cross the Central American isthmus from the Pacific to the Atlantic side to finally enter the US in Florida and the Eastern Seaboard such as New York City.

See also: Costa Rica C.A. | Databook | People

Religion

Christianity is the predominant religion, and Roman Catholicism is the official state religion according to the 1949 Constitution, which at the same time guarantees freedom of religion.

According to the most recent nationwide survey of religion, conducted in 2007 by the University of Costa Rica, 70.5% of Costa Ricans are Roman Catholics, 44.9% of the population are practicing Catholics, 13.8% are Evangelical Protestants, 11.3% report they do not have a religion, and 4.3% belonged to another.

Because of the recent small but continuous immigration from Asia and the Middle East, other religions have grown, the most popular being Buddhism (because of a growing Chinese community of 40,000), and smaller numbers of Hindu, Jewish, Bahá’í, and Muslim adherents.

The Sinagoga Shaarei Zion synagogue is near La Sabana Metropolitan Park in San José. Several homes in the neighborhood east of the park display the Star of David and other Jewish symbols.

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormons) claim more than 35,000 members, and has a temple in San Jose that served as a regional worship center for Costa Rica, Panama, Nicaragua, and Honduras. However, they represent less than one percent of the population.

Languages

The primary language spoken in Costa Rica is Spanish. Some native languages are still spoken in indigenous reservations. The most numerically important are the Bribri, Maléku, Cabécar and Ngäbere languages, some of which have several thousand speakers in Costa Rica — others a few hundred. Some languages, such as Teribe and Boruca, have fewer than a thousand speakers.

A Creole-English language, Jamaican patois (also known as Mekatelyu), is spoken along the Caribbean coast. About 10.7% of Costa Rica’s adult population (18 or older) also speaks English, 0.7% French, and 0.3% speaks Portuguese or German as a second language.