Los Santos Zone () is a mountainous region in the
San José Province
San José () is a province of Costa Rica. It is located in the central part of the country, and borders (clockwise beginning in the north) the provinces of Alajuela, Heredia, Limón, Cartago and Puntarenas. The provincial and national capi ...
of
Costa Rica
Costa Rica, officially the Republic of Costa Rica, is a country in Central America. It borders Nicaragua to the north, the Caribbean Sea to the northeast, Panama to the southeast, and the Pacific Ocean to the southwest, as well as Maritime bo ...
, in the center-south of the country. It is also known in Spanish as or just .
It corresponds to a wide sector of a series of intermontane valleys composed by the cantons of
Tarrazú,
Dota
''Dota'' is a series of strategy video games. The series began in 2003 with the release of ''Defense of the Ancients'' (''DotA''), a fan-developed multiplayer online battle arena (MOBA) custom map for the video game ''Warcraft III: Reign of Ch ...
and
León Cortés Castro
León Cortés Castro (December 8, 1882 – March 3, 1946) was a Costa Rican politician. He served as President of Costa Rica from 1936 to 1940. During his term he introduced new bank reforms, supported banana plantations in the South Pacific re ...
. The nearby districts of
San Cristóbal and
Frailes, both of
Desamparados canton, are under the socioeconomic influence of the zone.
Toponymy
The name alludes to the
catholic saint
In Christianity, Christian belief, a saint is a person who is recognized as having an exceptional degree of sanctification in Christianity, holiness, imitation of God, likeness, or closeness to God in Christianity, God. However, the use of the ...
names of the districts of
Santa María of Dota,
San Marcos,
San Carlos and
San Lorenzo of Tarrazú, and
San Pablo,
San Andrés,
San Antonio
San Antonio ( ; Spanish for " Saint Anthony") is a city in the U.S. state of Texas and the most populous city in Greater San Antonio. San Antonio is the third-largest metropolitan area in Texas and the 24th-largest metropolitan area in the ...
,
San Isidro of León Cortés Castro.
Conservation areas
The
Los Quetzales National Park is located in the area.
Economy
Agriculture
The region is recognized as a major
coffee production zone in the country. Apples are also cultivated in the region.
Remittances
The region's economy and social fabric has been deeply shaped by emigration to the United States, which started in the 1960s. A majority of the region's residents have family members who today reside in the United States, namely in the state of New Jersey. These immigrants play a critical role in bankrolling the region's coffee industry and keeping families afloat as global coffee prices decline.
[Kordick, Carmen. The Saints of Progress: Coffee, Migration, and Costa Rican National Identity. University of Alabama Press, 2019. ]
Tourism
The zone has many tourist attractions due to the coffee production of the region, Los Quetzales National Park and the easy access through the
Inter-American Highway
The Inter-American Highway (IAH) is the Central American section of the Pan-American Highway and spans between Nuevo Laredo, Mexico, and Panama City, Panama.
History
The idea of a road being built across all of Central America became a tangib ...
, (
Route 2) and close proximity to the
Greater Metropolitan Area.
References
{{reflist
Geography of San José Province