Last week was an important week for Panama as it struggles through some growing pains. Much of the country was being effected power problems which were caused by the growing economy and lack of rain fall.
Panama relies heavily on hydro power and over the past month it has been experiencing a small drought. The rainy season which normal starts in April did not pick up until late May. It has been raining but not nearly enough to power the ever increasing needs of its people.
Many were worried that if the rain did not return then drastic measures would have to be taken such as turning off power non essential parts of the country. It wouldn’t be the first time that Panama would have to respond this way. 12 years ago it was forced to cut the power to residential areas. This time the stakes are much higher. It would be a huge blow to the booming economy and might make inventors thin twice about panama.
Lucky the rain returned and they did not have to cut power. However they are not out of the woods let. Measures have been taken to reduce the country’s power consumption until water levels in the dams return to normal.
The government reduced the public work day from 8 hours to 5 hours. They also mandated that air conditioners only be used one hour after work starts to one hour before work ends. Big signs requiring lots of power are being turned off at night as well.
This is a big story in Panama and its great to see the government taking action to combat this problem. Hopeful they will be able to work through it and continue to grow.
Over the past ten years I have seen Panama transform from a sleepy little country into a booming developing nation. I started coming to David, Panama in 1998. It is the second largest city in the country but is comparable to a small town in the US.
Over the past few years I started to notice some big changes. I think it began around 2002 with the expansion of the Pan-American Highway which runs through the entire country. It was transformed over a number of years from a two lane road to a four lane highway.
After that you started to notice little changes such as new roads and a new immigration office along the Cost Rican border. In the past 3 years the grow has simply taken off. They have build a new hospitals, a mall, housing developments, and a central park that in one of the best in all of Central America.
For those of you who have read Thomas Freedman’s The world is Flat this is a true life example of globalization at work. The amount of changes and the speed they are happening are truly amazing.
It is however not with out growing pains. One of the challenges they have just begun to face is power consumption. The Panimain Government recently launched a campaign to get its citizens to cut back on energy usage.
This is very clear here at my father’s silk screening company. My brother first told me about Panama’s energy problems a month or so ago. A lot of energy produced for this area comes from a damn an hour or so out side the city. Recently there has been a droubt which has reduced the amount of power they are able to produce.
Power outages are common panama. (One of the reasons we used laptops in our pilot program.) However, during this trip we have had two power outages in less then a week. They didn’t last more then a few minuets but the effect is very noticeable.
As Panama grows it will continue to face many other challenges. It will be interesting to see how the country responds. To this point I am very impressed with the way the government has invested in infrastructure and embraced the “golden straight jacket.”
As I wrote before I am currently working in Central America on a project of mine to measure the impact of open-source system in developing nations. A case study of the work I have done thus far can be found here.
One of the interesting aspects of the trip so far is how connected the world has become. I am a person who spends most of his day online so constantly being connected is nothing “new” for me. What is new is traveling in Central America and feeling like I am I never left home.
Besides 2 days for travel I have been online the entire time. (My sister just got internet to house in Costa Rica.) However, even for those two days I was connected in some way. I was twittering from the airport and even on the bus on the way to panama.
Here is a perfect example of what I am talking about:
On the bus I realized would be arriving early to Panama. I didn’t have the number of any of my family members in Panama on my phone (holding out for iPhone 2.0) so I sent a text message to my sister back in Costa Rica. She called my father in Panama letting him know I would be early.
What amazes me about this is how connected the rest of the world is becoming. I don’t think this is anything new for people in America but here in Central America it is a real shock.
Since I was reunited with my family I have been coming to Costa Rica/Panama for 10 years. In those 10 years my level of connectedness has increased greatly. When I first came I could only call home to my parents to let them know I arrived. Now I email back and forth with them, Skype with my brother, IM with my friends and twitter with my business partners.
All of this is contributing to the feeling that even though I am away from “home” I never really left.
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