Costa Rica needs to adopt a human rights approach and promote community governance of the sea, while strengthening local and indigenous communities’ diverse organizational structures.

Costa Rica has never conducted a fisheries census. For this reason, the country lacks official information on the precise number of people working in fisheries, or of those active in the small-scale artisanal fisheries value chain. Current figures are mere extrapolations from non-fishery-related information sources, such as government institutions responsible for health, poverty and education, among other issues.

This weakness of information sources about small-scale fishworkers has been highlighted by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) and, at a domestic level, by representatives of small-scale fisheries, who stress the need for robust official statistics.