SAN JOSÉ – OECD countries unanimously decided last week to invite Costa Rica to become a member of the Organization.

Costa Rican President Carlos Alvarado Quesada and OECD Secretary-General Angel Gurría will sign an Accession Agreement in the coming days.

Costa Rica’s accession, extending the OECD’s membership to 38 countries, will take effect after the country has taken the appropriate steps at the national level to accede to the OECD Convention, and deposited its instrument of accession with the French government, the depository of the Convention.

“We are delighted to welcome Costa Rica into the OECD family at a time when multilateralism is more important than ever. The best way to address today’s global challenges is by having emerging, developing and advanced economies working side by side on solutions,” said Mr Gurría.

As part of its accession process, Costa Rica successfully completed in-depth technical reviews by 22 OECD Committees and has carried out important reforms that have allowed the country to align its legislation, policies and practices to OECD standards in areas such as competition, statistics, anti-bribery, corporate governance of state-owned enterprises, financial markets, tax transparency and industrial chemicals management.

“OECD membership has been a personal objective of the President and his government. We have been encouraged to see real cross-party commitment to the process and impressed by the engagement and reactivity of the Legislative Assembly, which enacted over a dozen laws including a comprehensive reform of competition policy and enforcement and fundamental reform of the national statistics system, as a direct result of OECD recommendations,” Mr Gurría added.

The OECD’s governing Council of member countries invited Costa Rica to open accession talks in April 2015. Costa Rica will become the Organization’s fourth member country from the Latin America and Caribbean region, joining Mexico, Chile and Colombia.–MercoPress