Costa Rica: Agricultural innovations drive forest restoration and crop yields

Researchers in Costa Rica have demonstrated the effectiveness of using coffee pulp to accelerate tropical forest regeneration. An experiment conducted in Coto Brus involved applying 360 cubic meters of coffee pulp to a degraded plot. After two years, the treated area showed 80% canopy cover compared to only 20% in the control group, with vegetation height reaching four meters. The pulp also increased soil nutrients such as nitrogen, phosphorus, and carbon while suppressing invasive grasses.

In a separate agricultural development, students from the Colegio Humanístico Costarricense in Nicoya created a plant-based formulation to attract honeybees to melon crops. By mimicking bee communication pheromones using extracts from lemongrass and rose, the students successfully increased bee visits. Field tests at the Melones del Sol farm in Guanacaste showed that treated melon plots produced 24% more fruit than those using standard management practices.