Environment benefits

Location

Panama has a strategic geographic location with several advantages. The first advantage is that it is spared from the devastating climate phenomena that often hit Central America and the Caribbean.

The second is that, thanks to the COPA Hub of the Americas, you get fast and frequent access to the major American cities, as well as to most countries in Central and South America and the Caribbean.

The third advantage has to do with product transportation across the Panama Canal and with the location of the major Pacific ports on Panamanian territory.

The activity generated by this international traffic creates great business opportunities and ensures excellent service quality.

Environment

A global world where every place is not the same. Political stability, legal certainty, infrastructure and incentives are some of the aspects that make one country more attractive than another when an organization is trying to decide where to operate from.

Panama is a great benefit for Panama, but also for those who are here. According to several studies published in late 2007, Panama is the number one country in Latin America in terms of economic globalization (Foreign Policy); it is the third in competitiveness (Global Economic Forum), and the fourth in the Institutional Quality Index.

Just look at some of its main advantages, not including here the quality and warmth of its people.

Communications

In addition to airline communications –the COPA Hub of the Americas, besides operation of the major airlines in the world, Panama has important commercial ports on the Pacific (Panama Ports Company) and the Atlantic (Manzanillo International Terminal), and it has road connections to Central America.

As far as telecommunications are concerned, the country is a fundamental node in the world broadband ring and trunk route system, because four of these routes go through Panama: the MAYA and ARCOS rings, connecting America and the Caribbean; Global Crossing, which connects Asia and America through Panama, the Caribbean and Europe; and OXYGEN route, linking the USA and the Caribbean.

A Dynamic Economy

Macroeconomic figures have been continuously improving in Panama in the last few years. A steady growth of 7 to 9 %, above the regional average; a rapidly expanding tourism industry; hundreds of large-scale real estate projects; rising agricultural exports, commercial agreements with various regional blocks; a very strong banking and financial muscle.

All of this, in addition to the construction of the third set of locks for the Panama Canal in the next few years, which means a big injection of resources, the creation of hundreds of new jobs, and one of the Government's and civil society's strongest commitments to achieving the desired sustainable development.

In fact, Panama is achieving the economic growth it needed to confirm its position in the United Nations Human Development Index, where it is already among the developed countries despite the challenges it still faces. Now, the task at hand is redistributing and covering that development boosted by economic activity.

The country is a member of the World Trade Organization and has free trade treaties with several countries. In addition, its economy is dollarized, which prevents any exchange rate surprises and facilitates export activities, as well as business in the largest free zone in the western hemisphere, located in Colon City.

Natural Heritage

Panama's biodiversity makes it particularly attractive for research in biosciences, ecology and all activities related to sustainable development, control of phenomena such as global warming, and the protection of natural resources.

Panama is the 28th country in the world with the greatest biological diversity, and the tenth country in the planet in relation to its size. It has 21 times as many plant species per square kilometer as Brazil, and a larger number of bird species than the United States and Canada together.

The Isthmus is a sort of world biodiversity reservoir, and being around it (there is a rainforest in the capital itself) or protecting it are powerful enough reasons to choose Panama.