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Costa Rica is famous for Whale Watching |
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The Whale Watching tourism activity has grown 74% in Central America, and particularly Costa Rica, in the last 10 years. This non-lethal activity benefits directly 91 communities from 18 countries, and has quadrupled its potential at a regional level in the last 15 years, generating around $280 million just in Latin America, according to data from the International Fund for Animal Welfare, Global Ocean, and the Whale and Dolphin Conservation Society.
 There are eight main communities that benefit from whale watching on the Pacific coast and one on the Atlantic coast in Costa Rica. There are some 52 whale watching operators in these areas at these locations that, in 2007, took in around 100,000 tourists, with the majority (85%) being foreigners.
The Humpback whale is the most widely viewed cetacean on the Costa Rican coasts because it is very migratory. It spends the summers in the cold waters at high latitudes and reproduces in tropical or subtropical climates. This species has been protected since 1967. Today there are less than 10,000 of this species worldwide.
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