Costa Rica’s New Tourism Chief Seeks to Streamline Tourism Industry

COSTA RICA'S LEADING ENGLISH LANGUAGE NEWSPAPER

Costa Rica’s new tourism boss, Marcos Borges, is moving to slash red tape and widen the country’s international flight map, signaling a more business-friendly approach that could reshape how visitors reach our country’s coasts.

Marcos Borges, a real-estate attorney with deep ties to the southern Pacific town of Uvita, has spent his first weeks in office launching a review of tourism regulations alongside the country’s hotel chambers. Many of the rules governing the sector are between 30 and 70 years old and need to be modernized to match how the industry actually operates today.

Borges has said his immediate priority is to identify legal and environmental bottlenecks that slow tourism investment — particularly along the Pacific south, where he previously advised developments. He has framed the effort as speeding up projects without abandoning the sustainability model that underpins Costa Rica’s brand, though the push to simplify environmental permitting is likely to draw scrutiny from conservation groups.

For visitors to our country, the more concrete near-term changes are in the air. Borges has backed keeping Liberia’s Daniel Oduber Quirós International Airport open 24 hours and expanding its capacity. He has also pointed to long-term studies for a new international airport in the southern Pacific zone, which he argues would spare visitors the three-to-four-hour drive from San José or Guanacaste to reach the region.

Connectivity has already begun to widen. The ICT recently helped open a direct route between Nashville, Tennessee, and Liberia, a link Borges said would connect Costa Rica with cities across the United States, its largest source market. U.S. arrivals to the Guanacaste airport rose 8% in the first quarter of 2026 compared with the same period a year earlier, according to ICT figures.

European routes are also a stated priority. Borges has said the institute is pursuing direct connections with Italy and Scandinavia, and recently promoted increasing high-season flights from Germany from three to five weekly. France remains Costa Rica’s top source market in continental Europe.

The backdrop is a tourism industry that drives a major share of Costa Rica’s economy but has seen growth flatten. The country received about 2.68 million air arrivals in 2025, up just 0.8% from 2024, though the ICT has reported a stronger close to the year, with December up more than 13%.

When she presented Borges, President Fernández singled out the Puntarenas, Brunca (southern) and Caribbean regions as priorities and flagged the politically sensitive Maritime-Terrestrial Zone — the regulated public coastline where much beach development is contested — as among the “delicate” issues on his desk. How Borges balances faster permitting against those tensions will shape what our country’s beaches and gateways look like for the next wave of arrivals.