Honduras

views updated May 23 2018

HONDURAS

LOCATION, SIZE, AND EXTENT
TOPOGRAPHY
CLIMATE
FLORA AND FAUNA
ENVIRONMENT
POPULATION
MIGRATION
ETHNIC GROUPS
LANGUAGES
RELIGIONS
TRANSPORTATION
HISTORY
GOVERNMENT
POLITICAL PARTIES
LOCAL GOVERNMENT
JUDICIAL SYSTEM
ARMED FORCES
INTERNATIONAL COOPERATION
ECONOMY
INCOME
LABOR
AGRICULTURE
ANIMAL HUSBANDRY
FISHING
FORESTRY
MINING
ENERGY AND POWER
INDUSTRY
SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY
DOMESTIC TRADE
FOREIGN TRADE
BALANCE OF PAYMENTS
BANKING AND SECURITIES
INSURANCE
PUBLIC FINANCE
TAXATION
CUSTOMS AND DUTIES
FOREIGN INVESTMENT
ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT
SOCIAL DEVELOPMENT
HEALTH
HOUSING
EDUCATION
LIBRARIES AND MUSEUMS
MEDIA
ORGANIZATIONS
TOURISM, TRAVEL, AND RECREATION
FAMOUS HONDURANS
DEPENDENCIES
BIBLIOGRAPHY

Republic of Honduras
República de Honduras

CAPITAL: Tegucigalpa

FLAG: The national flag consists of a white horizontal stripe between two blue horizontal stripes, with five blue stars on the white stripe representing the five members of the former union of Central American provinces.

ANTHEM: Himno Nacional, beginning "Tu bandera es un lampo de cielo" ("Thy flag is a heavenly light").

MONETARY UNIT: The lempira (l), also known as the peso, is a paper currency of 100 centavos. There are coins of 1, 2, 5, 10, 20, and 50 centavos, and notes of 1, 2, 5, 10, 20, 50, and 100 lempiras. l1 = $0.05285 (or $1 = l18.92) as of 2005.

WEIGHTS AND MEASURES: The metric system is the legal standard; some old Spanish measures are still used.

HOLIDAYS: New Year's Day, 1 January; Day of the Americas, 14 April; Labor Day, 1 May; Independence Day, 15 September; Birthday of Francisco Morazán, 3 October; Columbus Day, 12 October; Army Day, 21 October; Christmas, 25 December. Movable religious holidays include Holy Thursday, Good Friday, and Holy Saturday.

TIME: 6 am = noon GMT.

LOCATION, SIZE, AND EXTENT

Situated in Central America, Honduras has a total area of 112,090 sq km (43,278 sq mi), with a length of 663 km (412 mi) enewsw and 317 km (197 mi) nnwsse. Comparatively, the area occupied by Honduras is slightly larger than the state of Tennessee. It is bounded on the n and e by the Caribbean Sea, on the s by Nicaragua and the Gulf of Fonseca, on the sw by El Salvador, and on the w by Guatemala, with a total boundary length of 2,340 km (1,454 mi), of which 820 km (509 mi) is coastline.

Under the terms of an arbitration award made by Alfonso XIII of Spain in 1906, Honduras received a portion of the Mosquito (Miskito) Coast, or La Mosquitia, north and west of the Coco (Segovia) River. Citing Honduras's failure to integrate the territory, Nicaragua renewed its claim to the entire Mosquito Coast in the 1950s and brought the case to the International Court of Justice (ICJ). In February 1957, Honduras created the new Department of Gracias a Dios, made up of the former Mosquitia territory. The ICJ determined in 1960 that Nicaragua was obligated to accept the 1906 arbitration ruling concerning that country's boundary with Honduras. The judges ruled, by a vote of 141, that once a valid arbitration award was made in an international dispute, it became effective, and remained so, despite any lapse of time in carrying it out.

The two tiny Swan Islands (Islas del Cisne), lying at 17°23 n and 83°56 w in the west Caribbean Sea some 177 km (110 mi) nne of Patuca Point, were officially ceded by the United States to Honduras on 20 November 1971. For administrative purposes, they are included under the Department of Islas de la Bahía, whose capital is Roatán on Roatán Island. The Swan Islands had been effectively held by the United States, which asserted a claim in 1863 to exploit guano, and had housed a weather station and an aviation post.

The capital city of Honduras, Tegucigalpa, is located in the south central part of the country.

TOPOGRAPHY

Honduras is mountainous, with the exception of the northern Ulúa and Aguán river valleys on the Caribbean Sea and the southern coastal area. There are four main topographic regions: the eastern lowlands and lower mountain slopes, with 20% of the land area and no more than 5% of the population; the northern coastal plains and mountain slopes, with 13% of the land and about 20% of the population; the central highlands, with 65% of the area and 70% of the population; and the Pacific lowlands and their adjacent lower mountain slopes, with 2% of the area and 5% of the population.

The width of the Caribbean coastal plain varies from practically no shore to about 120 km (75 mi), and the coastal plain of the Gulf of Fonseca is generally narrow. The highest elevations are in the northwest (almost 3,000 m/10,000 ft) and in the south (over 2,400 m/8,000 ft). Many intermontane valleys, at elevations of 910 to 1,370 m (3,000 to 4,500 ft), are settled. The old capital city, Comayagua, lies in a deep rift that cuts the country from north to south. Tegucigalpa, the modern capital, is situated in the southern high-lands at about 910 m (3,000 ft). There are two large rivers in the north, the Patuca and the Ulúa. Other important features include the Choluteca, Nacaome, and Goascorán rivers in the south, Lake Yojoa in the west, and Caratasca Lagoon in the northeast.

CLIMATE

The northern Caribbean area and the southern coastal plain have a wet, tropical climate, but the interior is drier and cooler. Temperature varies with altitude. The coastal lowlands average 31°c (88°f); from 300 to 760 m (1,000 to 2,500 ft) above sea level the average is 29°c (84°f); and above 760 m (2,500 ft) the average temperature is 23°c (73°f). There are two seasons: a rainy period, from May through October, and a dry season, from November through April. Average annual rainfall varies from over 240 cm (95 in) along the northern coast to about 84 cm (33 in) around Tegucigalpa in the south. The northwest coast is vulnerable to hurricanes, of which the most destructive, Hurricane Fifi in September 1974, claimed some 12,000 lives, caused $200 million in property damage, and devastated the banana plantations.

FLORA AND FAUNA

Honduras has a rich and varied flora and fauna. Tropical trees, ferns, moss, and orchids abound, especially in the rain forest areas. Mammal life includes the anteater, armadillo, coyote, deer, fox, peccary, pocket gopher, porcupine, puma, tapir, and monkeys in several varieties. Fish and turtles are numerous in both fresh water and marine varieties. Among the reptiles are the bushmaster, coral snake, fer-de-lance, horned viper, rattlesnake, and whip snake, caiman, crocodile, and iguana. Birds include the black robin, hummingbird, macaw, nightingale, thrush, partridge, quail, quetzal, toucanet, wren, and many others. As of 2002, there were at least 173 species of mammals, 232 species of birds, and over 5,600 species of plants throughout the country.

ENVIRONMENT

The major environmental problems are soil erosion and loss of soil fertility (in part because of traditional slash-and-burn cultivation) and rapid depletion of forests for lumber, firewood, and land cultivation. From 199095, the annual rate of deforestation was at about 2.34%. In 2000, about 48% of the total land area was forested.

Enforcement of antipollution laws has been weak, and Honduras also lacks an integrated economic development and land-use policy. Rivers and streams in Honduras are threatened by pollution from mining chemicals. The nation has 96 cu km of renewable water resources with 91% used in farming activities. About 99% of city dwellers and 82% of people living in rural areas have access to pure drinking water. Air pollution results from a lack of pollution control equipment for industries and automobiles. The Secretariat of Planning, Coordination, and Budget (Secretaría de Planificación, Coordinación, y PresupuestoSECPLAN), the Ministry of Natural Resources, and several other agencies are vested with environmental responsibilities.

In 2003, 6.4% of the total land area in Honduras was protected. The Río Plátano Biosphere Reserve is a natural UNESCO World Heritage Site and there are six Ramsar wetland sites. According to a 2006 report issued by the International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources (IUCN), threatened species included 10 types of mammals, 6 species of birds, 10 types of reptiles, 53 species of amphibians, 14 species of fish, 2 species of invertebrates, and 111 species of plants. Endangered or extinct species in Honduras included the tundra peregrine falcon, jaguar, three species of turtle (green sea, hawksbill, and olive ridley), and three species of crocodile (spectacled caiman, American, and Morelet's). The Caribbean monk seal, the Lago Yojoa palm, and the Swan Island hutia have become extinct.

POPULATION

The population of Honduras in 2005 was estimated by the United Nations (UN) at 7,212,000, which placed it at number 96 in population among the 193 nations of the world. In 2005, approximately 4% of the population was over 65 years of age, with another 41% of the population under 15 years of age. There were 102 males for every 100 females in the country. According to the UN, the annual population rate of change for 200510 was expected to be 2.8%, a rate the government viewed as too high. Of particular concern was the high rate of adolescent pregnancy, with 50% of the population under 19 years of age. The projected population for the year 2025 was 10,700,000. The population density was 64 per sq km (167 per sq mi), with the majority of the population living in the western portion of the country.

The UN estimated that 47% of the population lived in urban areas in 2005, and that urban areas were growing at an annual rate of 2.99%. The capital city, Tegucigalpa, had a population of 1,007,000 in that year. San Pedro Sula, the second-largest city, had an estimated population of 486,000; La Ceiba, 250,000; and El Progreso, 115,000.

Honduras has the highest number of HIV/AIDS cases in Central America, with the rate of infection increasing rapidly among women and those under age 19. In 2003 Honduras began receiving monies from the Global Fund for Aids, Tuberculosis, and Malaria to address its HIV/AIDS situation.

MIGRATION

Before 1969 there was a steady flow of immigrants from El Salvador. The steps taken by the Honduran government in 1969 to curb this influx were a contributing cause of the war with El Salvador during the same year. When the Sandinistas took over in Nicaragua in 1979, former National Guard members began to arrive in Honduras, and by 1983 there were 5,00010,000 of them along the border. In addition, at least 25,000 Miskito Amerindians from Nicaragua and about 21,000 Salvadorans had fled to Honduras by the end of 1986. Many of them later returned. By the end of 1992 about 100,000 citizens of Central American nations had taken refuge in Honduras.

As a result of the Central American refugee problem of the 1990s, Honduras has adopted a restrictive policy toward refugees. There were very few refugees among the 44,000 migrants living in Honduras in 2000. In 2004 worker remittances were $1,134 million. In 2005, the net migration rate was estimated as -1.95 migrants per 1,000 population. The government viewed the migration levels as satisfactory.

ETHNIC GROUPS

The vast majority (90%) of the Honduran people are mestizo, a mixture of European and Amerindian. About 7% of the population is purely Amerindian, the largest proportion being in the Copán area near the Guatemalan border. Africans, about 2% of the population, live mostly along the north coast. About 1% of the population is European, chiefly of Spanish origin.

LANGUAGES

The official language is Spanish. However, English is used widely, especially in northern Honduras. The more important Amerindian languages include Miskito, Zambo, Paya, and Xicaque.

RELIGIONS

The Roman Catholic Church reports a membership that comprises slightly more than 80% of the country's total population. However, according to estimates based on a 2002 poll of citizens 18 or older, only 63% of the population identify themselves as Roman Catholic. Approximately 23% report themselves to be evangelical Christians, and 14% designate themselves as belonging to other religious groups. The remainder were either "others" or provided no answer. The primary religious groups include Roman Catholics, Jews, Greek Orthodox, Episcopalians, Lutherans, Jehovah's Witnesses, Mennonites, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (Mormons), the Union Church, and about 300 evangelical Protestant churches (including the Abundant Life, Living Love, and the Grand Commission church). There are small numbers of Muslims and Jews.

Religious freedom is guaranteed by the constitution of 1982. Though there is no state religion, many consult with the Roman Catholic Church and some Catholic leaders have been appointed to semiofficial commissions on key political and social issues. Certain Christian holidays are celebrated as public holidays.

TRANSPORTATION

In 2002 there were 13,603 km (8,461 mi) of highways, about 2,775 km (1,726 mi) of which were paved. Of the 112,300 registered vehicles in 2003, only 25,000 were passenger cars, while commercial vehicles totaled 87,300. The Pan American Highway virtually bypasses Honduras, entering from El Salvador and running to the eastern Nicaraguan border. The 362-km (225-mi) Inter-Ocean Highway is the only surface connection between the Pacific and the Caribbean that includes in its path both Tegucigalpa and San Pedro Sula. In 1971, a paved highway was opened between Tegucigalpa and San Pedro Sula and west to the Guatemalan border. Tegucigalpa is served by secondary roads to the north and east, while San Pedro Sula is connected both to the important Caribbean ports of Puerto Cortés, Tela, and Trujillo and to the western Mayan shrine site of Copán. Road improvements near the Nicaraguan border were undertaken with US military aid beginning in 1983.

Rail service exists only in the north, connecting the industrial and banana-growing northeastern coastal zone with the principal ports and cities. As of 2004, National Railway of Honduras, owned and operated by the government, maintains all 699 km (435 mi) of narrow gauge track.

Four principal portsPuerto Cortés, Tela, La Ceiba, and Puer- to Castillaserve the country on the Caribbean side. Another Caribbean port, Roatán, is offshore, in the Bay Islands, and Puerto de Henecán, on the Pacific coast, opened in 1979, replacing Amapala as a port facility, although the latter retains a naval base. La Ceiba and Tela are primarily banana-trade ports. Puerto Castilla (completed in 1980) serves the Olancho forestry project; and Puerto Cortés and Puerto de Henecán handle general traffic. River traffic is negligible, with only 465 km (289 mi) accessible and only to small craft, as of 2004. In 2005, the Honduran merchant fleet comprised 137 vessels of 1,000 GRT or more, totaling 598,600 GRT.

Air service is important in the transportation of passengers and cargo. In 2004 there were an estimated 115 airports in Honduras, 11 of which had paved runways as of 2005. The two principal airports are Ramon Villeda, at San Pedro Sula, and Toncontín, about 6.4 km (4 mi) from Tegucigalpa. Toncontín is served by Transportes Aéros Nacionales de Honduras/Servicio Aéreo de Honduras (TAN/SAHSA), Líneas Aéreas Costarricenses (LACSA), Challenge, and TACA airlines and the domestic carrier Lineas Aéreas Nacionales (LANSA). TAN/SAHSA flies to the United States, Mexico, and other Central American countries and also provides domestic passenger service. In 2001, San Pedro Sula International Airport serviced 510,000 passengers on scheduled domestic and international flights.

HISTORY

Before the Spaniards entered the land now called Honduras, the region was inhabited by the war-like Lencas and Jicaques, Mexican Amerindian traders, and Paya hunters and fishermen. The Mayan ceremonial center at Copán in western Honduras flourished about the 8th century ad but was in ruins when Columbus reached the mainland on his fourth voyage in 1502. He named the region Honduras, meaning "depths."

Colonization began in 1524 under Gil González de Ávila. In 1536, Pedro de Alvarado, who came from Guatemala at the bidding of Hernán Cortés in Mexico, founded San Pedro Sula, and another faction founded Comayagua in 1537. After the treacherous murder by the Spaniards of an Amerindian chieftain named Lempira in 1539, his followers were subjugated. In that year, Honduras was made part of the captaincy-general of Guatemala, and for most of the period until 1821, it was divided into two provinces, Comayagua and Tegucigalpa. Some silver was produced in the mines of Tegucigalpa, but the area was otherwise ignored by the Spanish empire.

Honduras joined other provinces of Central America in declaring independence from Spain in 1821. It came under the Mexican empire of Agustín de Iturbide in 182223. Honduras was a member of the United Provinces of Central America from 1824 to 1838. During that time, a liberal Honduran, Francisco Morazán, became president and struggled unsuccessfully to hold the federation together. He was exiled in 1840 and assassinated in 1842.

After Honduras declared itself independent on 26 October 1838, conservatives and liberals fought for political control. From 1840 to 1876, conservative leaders held power either as presidents or as army leaders. The second half of the 19th century brought the development, by US companies, of banana growing in northern Honduras. During the administration of liberal president Marco Aurelio Soto (187683), there was a "golden age" in Honduran letters and education.

US corporate interests, especially the United Fruit Co. (now Chiquita Brands International Inc.) and military dictators, dominated Honduran economic life during the first half of the 20th century. Honduran politics was dominated by the conservative Gen. Tiburcio Carías Andino (193248). In 1948, his handpicked successor, Juan Manuel Gálvez, took office. Gálvez proved to be more than a mere puppet, but was conservative nonetheless. When the election of 1954 produced no presidential candidate with a majority vote, he transferred the presidency to the vice president, Julio Lozano Díaz, who governed for almost two years. After an abortive attempt to have himself elected president, Díaz was deposed in 1956 by high army officers, who set up a junta. Democratic elections were held in 1957, and José Ramón Villeda Morales of the Liberal Party was elected president.

In 1963, just before completing the final months of his six-year term, Villeda was turned out of office by a coup. The liberal government was succeeded by a conservative coalition of military, Nationalist Party, and Liberal Party leaders under an air force officer, Col. Oswaldo López Arellano. This government was legalized almost two years later by an elected constituent assembly, which adopted a new constitution and proclaimed López president in June 1965.

During López's second term, a bitter and destructive four-day war broke out in July 1969 between Honduras and El Salvador. Although the immediate cause of the war was animosity arising from a World Cup elimination-round soccer match between the two countries, the underlying causes were a long-standing border dispute and the long-term migration of some 300,000 Salvadorans in search of land, which the Honduran government made it illegal for Salvadoran immigrants to own. Salvadoran troops won the ground war, but Honduran planes controlled the air. Out of this stalemate and with the help of the OAS, a compromise ceasefire was arranged. In June 1970, the two nations accepted a sevenpoint peace plan, creating a "no-man's-land" demilitarized zone along their common frontier. In the fall of 1973, Honduras and El Salvador began bilateral talks to resolve their differences. Progress was slow, and it was not until October 1980 that Honduras and El Salvador signed a treaty settling the dispute.

In the 1970s, López and the military continued to dominate Honduran politics. A civilian, Ramón Ernesto Cruz Uclés, was elected president in 1971, but lasted only briefly. By 1972, General López was back in power. General López assumed the title of chief of state, and suspended the National Congress and all political party activities. It was later discovered that in 1974 officials in the López administration had accepted a $1.25-million bribe from United Brands (formerly United Fruit and now Chiquita) in exchange for a 50% reduction in the banana tax. A Honduran investigative commission insisted on examining López's Swiss bank account, and the scandal came to be known as "Bananagate" in the United States. Finally, in April 1974, López was overthrown by a group of lieutenant colonels.

This military group was something of a reformist group, seeking social reforms and the removal of the senior officer corps. Political activity continued to be banned following the coup of 1975. Meanwhile, a significant grassroots movement, the National Front of United Peasants, had come to the fore and was pressuring the successive military governments to enact a program of large-scale land redistribution.

There followed two more military governments led by Col. Juan Alberto Melgar Castro (197578) and Gen. Policarpo Paz García (197883). This period saw strong economic growth and the building of a modern infrastructure for Honduras. At the same time, there was a gradual movement toward the democratization of the system.

Elections to a constituent assembly took place in April 1980, followed by general elections in November 1981. Under a new constitution in 1982, Roberto Suazo Córdova of the Liberal Party became president. The armed forces retained broad powers, including veto power over cabinet appointments and responsibility for national security. The military continued to grow in response to domestic instability and the fighting in neighboring Nicaragua and El Salvador. By 1983, several thousand anti-Sandinista guerrillas (popularly known as "contras") in Honduras were working for the overthrow of the Sandinista government, while the Honduran army, backed by the United States, was helping Salvadoran government forces in their fight against leftist guerrillas.

This stability became apparent in November 1985, when Hondurans elected José Simón Azcona Hoyo to the presidency in the first peaceful transfer of power between elected executives in half a century. Azcona was elected with only 27% of the vote, due to a peculiarity of Honduran electoral laws. Azcona attempted to distance himself from the United States in foreign policy and was critical of US contra policy. He signed the Central American peace plan outlined by President Oscar Arias Sánchez of Costa Rica; however, he did not move to close down contra bases as promised. The Suazo government worked closely with the United States on matters of domestic and foreign policy. US military presence in Honduras grew rapidly. Several joint military maneuvers took place during 198387, and the US CIA used Honduras during that time as a base for covert activities against the Sandinista regime. In exchange, the United States sent large amounts of economic aid to Honduras. Suazo also worked closely with the Honduran military, allowing it to pursue its anticommunist agenda freely. This arrangement led to an unprecedented political stabilization in Honduras.

In 1989, Rafael Leonardo Callejas of the National (conservative) Party was elected. With the Nicaraguan issue fading after the Sandinistas' electoral loss, Callejas focused on domestic issues, applying a dose of both conservative economics and IMF austerity measures to the Honduran economy. Callejas moved to reduce the deficit and allow for a set of market adjustments, which in the short term produced a good deal of dislocation but led to higher rates of growth thereafter. Most significantly, Callejas maintained good relations with the military. In an unprecedented show of restraint, the military sat on the sidelines as voters went to the polls in November 1993.

The voters themselves showed a good deal of resentment toward the Callejas reforms. The Liberal Party returned to power in the person of Carlos Roberto Reina. While it was unlikely that its economic problems would be solved quickly, Honduras nevertheless had achieved a level of political stability that few could have anticipated in decades past. Reina, known for his support of human rights and clean government, called for a "moral revolution" to combat crime, poverty, and widespread corruption in both the public and private sectors. In late 1994, corruption charges were filed against former president Callejas and other top government officials. Reina also took steps to further reduce the influence of Honduras's powerful military, most notably the abolition of the draft, including the notorious press-gang conscription by which young men were seized off the streets and forced into military service. The liberal administration also dismantled the military-controlled Public Security Forces (FUSEP), replacing them with a new civilian force.

Reina proved less successful in dealing with the economic problems of his nation, long considered the poorest in Central America. An already difficult situation was exacerbated by the 1994 drought that slashed production of hydroelectric power, creating an energy crisis that drove up food and fuel prices and caused chronic power outages. The struggle to improve economic conditions continued through 1996, with the government caught between an international financial community demanding tough structural reforms and a beleaguered population unwilling to tolerate the sacrifices entailed by such programs. In November of 1997, Carlos Rober- to Flores of the Liberal Party won the presidential elections with 52.8%. His party also won 62 out of 128 seats in the unicameral National Assembly. But the fury of Hurricane Mitch in October 1998 destroyed Honduras's economy and placed an even heavier burden on President Flores' challenges. The subsequent economic crisis of 1999 further worsened the economic situation.

Discontent with the government helped opposition candidate Ricardo Maduro win the 2001 presidential election with 52.2% of the vote. His National Party also came ahead in the legislative election with 46% of the vote, but it only gained 61 seats in the 128-seat assembly, forcing Maduro to seek the support of the smaller centrist parties to pass his legislative initiatives. The economy has continued to perform poorly. More than 50% of Hondurans live in poverty. In March 2005, the Honduran Congress ratified the Central American Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA) with the United States.

Crime and violence are significant problems in Honduras. Youth gangs known as maras are thought to have tens of thousands of members, and use threats and violence to control poorer areas in the main urban centers. In December 2004, gang members massacred 28 bus passengers in the northern city of Chamalecon. At the same time, police officers have been implicated in high-profile crimes; in January 2001, the Honduran Committee for the Defense of Human Rights reported that more than 1,000 street children had been murdered in 2000 by death squads backed by the police. Also, former military and security personnel, along with right wing paramilitary groups, are thought to be behind the murder of members of indigenous minority rights groups.

Presidential and legislative elections were held on 27 November 2005. Although National Party presidential candidate Porfirio Lobo Sosawho came in second place behind Liberal Party candidate José Manuel Zelaya Rosalescontested the results of the election, the National Party after 10 days conceded the election to Zelaya. Zelaya took 49.9% of the vote to Lobo's 46.2%. In the elections for the National Congress, the Liberal Party won 62 of 128 seats, with the National Party winning 55. The Democratic Unification Party won 5 seats, followed by the Christian Democratic Party with 4 and the Innovation and Unity Party-Social-Democracy with 2.

GOVERNMENT

The constitution of 1965, suspended following the 1972 coup, was superseded by a governing document adopted in November 1982 (amended in 1995). It defines Honduras as a democratic republic headed by a president who must be a native-born civilian. The president is elected by direct popular vote for a four-year term. The executive branch also includes a cabinet of 14 ministers. A constitutional change approved by the legislature in November 1982 deprived the president of the title of commander-in-chief of the armed forces, transferring that responsibility to the army chief of staff.

The 1982 constitution provides for the popular election of deputies to the unicameral National Congress, consisting of 128 deputies. The deputies, who are directly elected for four-year terms, must be natives or residents of the constituencies they represent. Voting is compulsory for all men and women 18 years of age and older.

POLITICAL PARTIES

The two major parties in Honduras are the Liberal Party (Partido LiberalPL) and the National Party (Partido NacionalPN). Both descend from the old Liberal and Conservative Parties from the 19th century. Although generally the National Party remains more conservative in nature, the two parties are very close ideologically.

The National Party was in power from 1932 to 1954 under Carías and Gálvez. In 1965, a PN-backed constituent assembly promulgated a new constitution, designated its membership as the National Congress for a six-year term, and proclaimed Gen. Oswaldo López Arellano as president. In the 1971 elections, the PN candidate, Gen. Ramón Ernesto Cruz, received about 52% of the vote and was elected president. Their most recent success came in 1989 when Rafael Leonardo Callejas became president. In the 1997 elections, its presidential candidate was Alba Gunera, the first woman to seek Honduras's presidency. She gained 42% of the vote. The National Party won 54 seats in the National Assembly in 1997, but it benefited from Ricardo Maduro's victory in 2001 and increased its parliamentary representation to 61 seats.

The Liberals rely on their following in urban areas and among the laboring classes and have had some successes over the last half-century. In 1957, José Ramón Villeda Morales was elected to the presidency, and governed until 1963, when he was removed by a coup. The next successes came in 1981 with the election of Suazo, and then in 1985 with the election of José Simón Azcona Hoyo, in 1993 with Carlos Roberto Reina and in 1997 with Carlos Flores, who became president with 52% of the vote. The Liberal Party also won 67 out of the 128 seats in the National Assembly, but its support fell in 2001 when it captured only 40.8% of the vote and clinched 55 seats.

Two minor parties occupy mildly leftist positions: the Christian Democratic Party, under Marco Orlandi, and the National Innovation and Unity Party, led by Olban Valladares. Each of those parties won three and four seats respectively in the National Assembly in 2001. In 1997, a Social Democratic party made its debut. The Partido de Inovación y Unidad-Social Democracia (Party for Innovation and Unity-Social Democracy) won five seats in the National Assembly in 1997 and four seats in 2001.

In the December 1996 primaries preceding the November 1997 presidential elections, the Liberal Party nominated Carlos Rober- to Flores. Nora Gúnera de Melgar won the National Party nomination. Flores went on to win the election and his party won 62 of 128 seats in the National Assembly. In 2001, Ricardo Maduro became the National Party candidate and won the presidential election. His party captured 61 of the 128 seats in the Assembly.

In 2005, Liberal Party presidential candidate José Manuel Zelaya Rosales beat National Party candidate Porfirio Lobo Sosa. Zelaya took 49.9% of the vote to Lobo's 46.2%. In the elections for the National Congress, the Liberal Party won 62 of 128 seats, with the National Party winning 55. The Democratic Unification Party won 5 seats, followed by the Christian Democratic Party with 4 and the Innovation and Unity Party-Social-Democracy with 2.

LOCAL GOVERNMENT

Honduras is divided into 18 departments, each with a governor popularly elected for a two-year term. Departments are divided into municipalities (298 in 2005) governed by popularly elected councils. Localities with populations between 500 and 1,000 have a mayor, a legal representative, and a council member. A council member is added for each additional 1,000 residents, but the total is not to exceed seven. A special law governs the Central District of Tegucigalpa and Comayagüela.

Under the jurisdiction of the local government, municipal land is granted or lent to peasants in the district in sections known as ejidos. The ejido system is designed to aid landless peasants and has become an important function of local administration.

JUDICIAL SYSTEM

Judicial power is exercised by the nine-member Supreme Court (with seven substitutes) and courts of appeal, as well as by courts of first instance, justices of the peace, and courts of limited jurisdiction. The Supreme Court appoints the judges of the courts of appeal and the courts of first instance, who, in turn, appoint local justices of the peace. The justices of the Supreme Court are elected by the National Assembly and serve for seven-year terms. The Supreme Court has the power to declare laws unconstitutional.

There is a military court of first instance from which appeals can be taken to the civilian judicial system. In practice, the civilian courts are not independent. Because of underfunding and corruption, the formal resolution of legal disputes in courts is often the product of influence and political pressure.

The constitution provides for an independent judiciary and the right to a fair trial. A public defender program provides services to indigent defendants.

Honduras accepts the jurisdiction of the International Court of Justice with reservations.

ARMED FORCES

The Honduran military as of 2005 had an active force of 12,000 personnel with 60,000 registered as reservists. As of that year, there were 8,300 personnel in the Army, 2,300 in the Air Force, and 1,400 in the Navy, which included 830 Marines. The Army's major armament included 12 light tanks, 57 reconnaissance vehicles, and over 118 artillery pieces. Naval equipment consisted of 31 patrol/coastal vessels and one amphibious landing craft. The Air Force had 18 combat capable aircraft made up of 8 fighters and 10 operating fighter ground attack aircraft. Paramilitary forces consisted of an 8,000 member Public Security Force. The defense budget in 2005 was $52.4 million.

INTERNATIONAL COOPERATION

Honduras is a charter member of the United Nations, having joined on 17 December 1945; it is part of ECLAC and serves in several specialized agencies, such as FAO, IFC, UNESCO, UNIDO, ILO, IMF, WHO, and the World Bank. Honduras served on the UN Security Council from 199596. It is one of five members of the Central American Bank for Economic Integration (BCIE) and the Central American Common Market (CACM). In 2004, Honduras, the United States, Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Nicaragua, and the Dominican Republic signed the USCentral America Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA). The agreement must be ratified by all participating countries before it enters into force.

Honduras is also part of G-77, the Latin American Economic System (LAES), the OAS, the Association of Caribbean States (ACS), and the Río Group. Honduras has observer status with the Latin American Integration Association (LAIA) and belongs to the Central American Parliament (PARLACEN), the Central American Integration System (SICA), and the Central American Security Commission (CASC). The country is a signatory of the 1947 Río Treaty, an inter-American security agreement.

Honduras is a member of the Agency for the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons in Latin America and the Caribbean (OPANAL) and is a signatory to the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons. In environmental cooperation, Honduras is part of the Basel Convention, the Convention on Biological Diversity, Ramsar, CITES, the London Convention, International Tropical Timber Agreements, the Kyoto Protocol, the Montréal Protocol, MARPOL, the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty, and the UN Conventions on the Law of the Sea, Climate Change, and Desertification. Honduras is also part of the Central American-US Joint Declaration (CONCAUSA).

ECONOMY

Honduras is one of the poorest and least developed countries in Latin America. The economy has been based mostly on agriculture, and over a third of the labor force in 2001 were still involved in this sector. However, agriculture's contribution to the overall GDP fell from 27% in 1998 to 18% in 2000 mainly due to the damage done to export crops by Hurricane Mitch in October 1998. About 16% of the land is arable, located mostly along the coastal plains. Coffee and bananas account for 65% of total Honduran export revenues. The vast majority of banana holdings are controlled by two US companies, United Brands and Standard Fruit, and most other profitable agricultural enterprises are owned by a small number of private citizens. With its economy enormously dependent on banana production, the country is vulnerable to weather and world market price variations. Honduras also has extensive forest, marine, and mineral resources, although widespread slash-and-burn agricultural methods continue to destroy forests. Hondurans, however, are becoming more concerned about protecting their environmental patrimony, in part because of the benefits of ecotourism.

In 1995, the Honduran economy rebounded from the severe recession experienced in 1994. Real GDP growth in 1995 was 3.6%. It was led by a solid expansion in agricultural production spurred by soaring world coffee prices, excellent basic grains harvests, and a resurrected banana industry as well as a growing maquila (Free Trade Zone of assembly plants) sector that employed 65,000 people by year's end. Honduras also received abundant rainfall which replenished the nation's dams and enabled the country to generate adequate hydroelectric energy, thus avoiding the drought-related power cuts which adversely affected economic performance in 1994. In 1996, Honduran GDP grew about 3.5%. However, inflation for 1996 reached 24.9%, well above the government's target of 16%. End of period inflation declined to 12.8% in 1997.

The economy, however, has still not recovered from the devastation left by Hurricane Mitch in late 1998, a Category Five Hurricane, rated the worst in 200 years, with winds reaching 200-mph and dumping unprecedented amounts of rain in their wake. The dead were officially counted at almost 6,000, but the total number buried in the mud slides will likely never be known. Hurricane Mitch destroyed 2080% of the 1998 coffee and banana crops, and caused an estimated $3 billion in damages, equal to half of the annual GDP. End of period inflation rose to 15.9%. In 1999 the Paris Club creditor countries extended a three-year moratorium on debt repayments by Honduras and wrote-off about two-thirds of its $1.7 billion external debt contingent on the implementation of austerity, liberalization, and privatization program under the IMF's Poverty Reduction and Growth Facility (PRGF). In February 1999, a man-made disaster, a fire at the El Cajón hydroelectric plant, shut down 60% of the country's electricity until May. In all, GDP in 1999 fell 1.9% as the fall in production and export revenues was offset by increases in construction under the National Reconstruction and Transformation Plan presented by the government in May. Inflation was held to 10.9%, but the country's trade deficit, which had amounted to 10.7% of GDP in 1997, more than doubled as a proportion of GDP, to 23.8% in 1999.

In 2000, GDP growth rose to 5% as the reconstruction program continued, although the trade deficit remained high21.1% of GDP. Inflation dipped slightly to 10.1% and Honduras qualified for debt forgiveness and restructuring under the Highly Indebted Poor Countries (HIPC) initiative which included adhering to a program of civil service reform that meant large layoffs in the public sector. Honduras joined Guatemala and El Salvador in a free trade agreement with Mexico, but ended up placing trade sanctions on Nicaragua over border and fishing rights disputes. In 2001, though reconstruction continued, Honduras was hit by a serious drought that helped reduce GDP growth to 3.5%. The trade deficit increased slightly as a percent of the GDP to 23% as exports were further depressed by a declining external demand. Inflation fell to 10%. In 2002, GDP grew about 1.4% and inflation fell to 7.7%, although the IMF withheld further disbursement of debt relief under the HIPC because the targets under the PRGF program had not been sufficiently met. The trade deficit remained inordinately high, amounting to about 25% of GDP.

The economy expanded by 5.0% in 2004, up from 3.0% in 2003; in 2005, the GDP growth rate was estimated at 4.0%, while the GDP per capita, at purchasing power parity, reached $2,900. The inflation rate was fairly stable and at 8.1% in 2004 it did not pose a major problem to the economy. The unemployment rate however, was, at 28%, very high and, together with the unequal distribution of income, represented one of the main concerns of the government. Honduras remains one of the poorest countries in the Western hemisphere and is dependent on the economy of the United States, its largest trading partner.

INCOME

The US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) reports that in 2005 Honduras's gross domestic product (GDP) was estimated at $20.6 billion. The CIA defines GDP as the value of all final goods and services produced within a nation in a given year and computed on the basis of purchasing power parity (PPP) rather than value as measured on the basis of the rate of exchange based on current dollars. The per capita GDP was estimated at $2,900. The annual growth rate of GDP was estimated at 4%. The average inflation rate in 2005 was 9.2%. It was estimated that agriculture accounted for 12.7% of GDP, industry 31.2%, and services 56.1%.

According to the World Bank, in 2003 remittances from citizens working abroad totaled $867 million or about $124 per capita and accounted for approximately 12.6% of GDP. Foreign aid receipts amounted to $389 million or about $56 per capita and accounted for approximately 5.7% of the gross national income (GNI).

The World Bank reports that in 2003 household consumption in Honduras totaled $5.13 billion or about $736 per capita based on a GDP of $6.9 billion, measured in current dollars rather than PPP. Household consumption includes expenditures of individuals, households, and nongovernmental organizations on goods and services, excluding purchases of dwellings. It was estimated that for the period 1990 to 2003 household consumption grew at an average annual rate of 3.1%. It was estimated that in 1993 about 53% of the population had incomes below the poverty line.

LABOR

In 2005, the Honduran workforce totaled an estimated 2.54 million (excluding the armed forces). In 2002, agriculture accounted for 37.4% of the labor force, with services at 41.2%, and industry at 21.4%. The unemployment rate in 2005 was estimated at 28%.

Honduras did not have effective labor legislation until 1954. It joined the ILO in 1955 and subsequently adopted several labor codes, most notably that of 1959, which established the Ministry of Labor. The code also provided for union organization, collective bargaining, arbitration, social security, and fair labor standards. The principal labor organizations in 2002 were the Confederation of Honduran Workers (CTH), the General Workers' Central (CGT), and the Unitary Confederation of Honduran Workers (CUTH). Although retribution against union activity is prohibited by law, it frequently occurs. Only 14% of the workforce was unionized in 2002.

The law sets the maximum at an 8-hour day, a 44-hour week, and a 24-hour rest period each week. Because of high unemployment and a lack of government enforcement, however, these regulations are often not enforced. The labor code disallows children under 16 from working; however, in actuality, economic necessity and a lack of government enforcement mean that many children do work, especially on small farms in rural areas and as street vendors in cities. As of 2002, the daily minimum wage ranged from $2.25 to $4.08.

AGRICULTURE

Over 16% of the national territory is agriculturally productive; because of the uneconomical system of land use, much arable land has not been exploited. Agriculture is the primary sector of the economy, accounting for about 13% of GDP and 32% of employment in 2003. Farming methods are inefficient, and crop yields and qualities are low. The principal export crops are bananas and coffee; the major subsistence crops are corn, sorghum, beans, and rice. In 200204, crop production was 11% higher than during 19992001. The trade surplus in agricultural products totaled $173.7 million in 2004. Crop production for 2004 included: sugarcane, 5,363,000 tons; bananas, 965,000 tons; sorghum, 52,500 tons; dry beans, 69,900 tons; rice, 29,100 tons.

Since 1972, agrarian reform has been an announced priority of the national government. In January 1975, plans were made for the distribution of 600,000 hectares (1,483,000 acres) of land among 100,000 families over a five-year period. The program was suspended in 1979 because of lack of funds and pressure from landowners; by that time, only about one-third of the goal had been met. The reform program was revived in the early 1980s, and in 1982, lands totaling 27,960 hectares (69,090 acres) were distributed to 4,000 peasant families. By 1986, however, land reform was at a virtual standstill; peasant groups, demanding immediate land distribution, staged "land invasions" and seized the offices of the National Agrarian Institute in San Pedro Sula. The agricultural modernization law eliminated subsidized credit to small farmers, while high commercial interest rates squeezed small farmers from the credit market.

ANIMAL HUSBANDRY

Honduran consumption of milk and meat is traditionally low. However, pastures account for 13.8% of the total land area. Poor transportation facilities are a barrier to the development of stock raising and dairying, two potentially profitable economic activities. Honduras has nearly 100,000 livestock operations, mostly small or medium-sized producers. About 50% of all cattle ranches are 50 hectares (124 acres) or smaller, and 95% of all ranches have less than 100 head. In 2005, the cattle population was estimated at 2,500,000 head; hogs, 490,000; horses and mules, 250,600; and chickens, 18,700,000. That year, 1,761,950 tons of raw milk and 40,900 tons of eggs were produced. During 200204, livestock and poultry production had increased 6% since 19992001.

FISHING

There is commercial fishing in Puerto Cortés, and other areas are served by local fishermen. A small local company operates a cannery for the domestic market on the Gulf of Fonseca. There is a commercial fishing concern on the island of Guanaja, and a large refrigeration-factory ship is engaged in freezing shrimp and lobster near Caratasca. In 2003, the total catch was 30,835 tons. Shrimp accounted for about 65% of the total catch, taken mostly from southern shrimp farms. Exports of fish products amounted to $46.3 million in 2003.

FORESTRY

About 48% of Honduras is covered by forests, including stands of longleaf pine and such valuable hardwoods as cedar, ebony, mahogany, and walnut. Total roundwood production in 2004 amounted to 9.5 million cu m (335 million cu ft), and forest products exports were valued at $43.1 million. The National Corporation for Forestry Development (Corporación Hondureña de Desarrollo Forestal), established in 1974, is charged with the overall preservation, exploitation, and exportation of Honduran forest resources. The privatization of government-owned woodlands is expected to intensify the use of forestry resources. A restriction on the export of raw wood also is causing growth in the woodworking industry for semifinished wood products.

MINING

The mineral resources of Honduras consisted of cadmium, cement, gold, gypsum, iron oxide pigments, lead, limestone, marble, pozzolan, rhyolite, salt, silver, and zinc, a leading export commodity. However, inadequate transportation continued to hamper full development of the country's mineral resources. In the mid-1990s, the El Mochito Mine, in Santa Bárbara, was the country's only large operating base metal mine. By the end of 2002, the mine's proven and probable reserves stood at 3.2 million tons at an average grade of 6.8% zinc, 1.9% lead, and 78 grams per ton of silver. Estimated and indicated reserves were placed at 4.3 million tons, with inferred reserves at 2.4 million tons. Lead and zinc concentrates from the mine contributed less than 2% to GDP, which grew 5% in 2001, with the completion of reconstruction from Hurricane Mitch. Under 0.3% of the Honduran labor force was employed in the mining sector.

In 2003, production of mined zinc was estimated at 46,500 metric tons, up from 46,339 metric tons in 2002. Lead mine output in 2003 was estimated at 8,000 metric tons. Silver and gold production in 2003 totaled 2,040 kg and 3,029 kg, respectively in 2003. Limestone output that same year was estimated at 1.23 million metric tons, unchanged from 2001 and 2002.

ENERGY AND POWER

Honduras has no known proven reserves of oil, natural gas, coal or refining capacity. Therefore, it must import all the refined petroleum products natural gas or coal that it consumes. However, it is nearly self-sufficient for its own electricity needs. In 2002, imports and consumption of refined oil products averaged 38,710 barrels per day and 38,340 barrels per day, respectively. Coal was also imported that year, amounting to 186,000 short tons of hard coal, of which consumption came to 155,000 short tons. There were no imports or consumption of natural gas in 2002.

Honduras's electric power sector is heavily reliant upon fossil fueled plants and hydropower. However, the country is facing increasing demand for electric power and the possibility of power shortages due to underperforming hydroelectric facilities. In 1998, for example, a drought induced by El Niño forced the government to declare an energy emergency. Since then, the government has sought to diversify its sources of electric power via the construction of thermal power plants. In 2002, electric power generating capacity was 0.923 million kW, with hydropower accounting for 0.435 million kW and conventional thermal plants 0.488 million kW. In the same year, consumption of electricity totaled 3.371 billion kWh, while output came to 3.195 billion kWh, with hydropower accounting for 1.594 billion kWh, and 1.601 billion kWh from conventional thermal plants.

INDUSTRY

Industry as a whole supplied 32% of Honduras's GDP in 2000 and employed 21% of the work force. Manufacturing has traditionally been limited to small-scale light industry supplying domestic requirements.

Assembly plant operations developed in the 1970s, especially after a free-trade zone was established in Puerto Cortes in 1975. San Pedro Sula is the center for matches, cigars, cigarettes, cement, meatpacking, sugar, beer and soft drinks, fats and oils, processed foods, shoes, and candles. Tegucigalpa has plants for the manufacture of plastics, furniture, candles, cotton textiles, and leather. The country has also established a well-known apparel assembly industry in the maquiladora sector, which employed over 125,000 workers in 2001. As of 2002, Honduras was the second-largest exporter of maquiladora items to the US market.

Production in the manufacturing industry, mainly of nondurable goods, has realized significant growth in the late 1990s and into the 2000s. The largest growth has been seen in the construction sector, which rebounded after the destruction wrought by Hurricane Mitch in 1998. The electric, gas, and water sectors gained almost 9%. However, in 1999 a fire temporarily closed the Cajon hydroelectric plant that had supplied 40% of the country's electricity. The electronic distribution system was privatized in 2000.

The industrial production growth rate in 2003 was 7.7%, higher than the overall GDP growth rate, and an indicator that industry was an economic growth engine. In 2005, industry accounted for 31.2% of the GDP and it employed around 21% of the labor force. Services were by far the largest sector, with a 56.1% share of the economy, while agriculture was the smallest one, with a 12.7% share.

SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY

The Honduran Academy (founded in 1949), the Honduran Coffee Institute, and the National Agriculture Institute are all located in Tegucigalpa. The José Cecilio del Valle University (founded in 1978) has engineering and computer science departments, and the National Autonomous University of Honduras (founded in 1847) has faculties of medicine, pharmacy, dentistry, and engineering. The Pan-American Agricultural School (founded in 1942) has students from 20 Latin American countries. The National Museum in Tegucigalpa has natural history exhibits. In 198797, science and engineering students accounted for 24% of college and university enrollments.

In 2000, there were 74 researchers and 261 technicians per million people who were actively engaged in research and development (R&D) activities. For that same year, R&D spending by Honduras totaled $8.346 million, or 0.05% of GDP. In 2002, high technology exports by Honduras totaled $5 million, accounting for 2% of that country's manufactured exports.

DOMESTIC TRADE

The principal distribution centers include Puerto Cortes and San Pedro Sula, the latter of which is the commercial and industrial capital on the nation. Tegucigalpa is a leading center of retail trade. In major cities, shops are comparable to those in Central American towns. In the countryside, small markets and stores supply staple needs. As of 2002, there were about 55 foreign franchise companies present in the country. That number is expected to rise rapidly as local business managers become interested in franchise agreements. Foreign investment is encouraged, but in certain industries, the law requires that majority ownership be by Hondurans. The government maintains a certain degree of price management and controls over some items, including coffee, medicine, gasoline, milk, and sugar. A 12% sales tax applies to many goods and services, with the exception of staple food items and certain health and educational expenses.

Business hours are generally from 8 am to noon and 1:30 or 2 to 5 or 6 pm on weekdays and 8 to 11 am on Saturdays. Banks in Tegucigalpa are open from 9 am to 3 pm, Monday through Friday.

FOREIGN TRADE

Honduras remains at the forefront of Central American economic integration efforts. In May 1992, Honduras signed several trade agreements with its neighbors, including Free Trade Agreements with Guatemala and El Salvador, and a Honduran/Salvadoran/Guatemalan Northern Triangle Accord, with the intent of accelerating regional integration. Honduras is also a member of the WTO and the CACM. Free trade agreements were under discussion with Chile, Panama, Mexico, the Andean Community, Taiwan, and the Dominican Republic in 1999.

The most important export from Honduras is coffee (33%), followed by printed matter (13%), and the cultivation of fruits and nuts (10%). Other major exports include shrimp and lobster (3.5%), wood and logging products, including paper (4.1%), and tobacco (2.4%).

In 2005, exports reached $1.7 billion (FOBFree on Board), while imports grew to $4.1 billion (FOB). In 2004, the bulk of exports went to the United States (54.4%), El Salvador (8.1%), Germany (5.9%), and Guatemala (5.4%). Imports included manufactures

CountryExportsImportsBalance
World961.83,105.3-2,143.5
United States448.91,210.7-761.8
El Salvador138.7171.7-33.0
Guatemala63.3261.6-198.3
Germany53.638.515.1
Netherlands27.115.112.0
Belgium23.423.6-0.2
Costa Rica22.1149.9-127.8
Japan17.4168.4-151.0
Nicaragua16.548.9-32.4
Jamaica15.115.1
() data not available or not significant.

and industrial raw materials, machinery and transport equipment, minerals and fuels, and food and animal products, and mainly came from the United States (37.5%), Guatemala (6.9%), Mexico (5.4%), Costa Rica (4.3%), and El Salvador (4%).

BALANCE OF PAYMENTS

Since 1973, trade balances have been negative. Investment income repatriated by foreign companies in Honduras is an endemic burden on the local economy. The Honduran authorities have generally adhered to the policies of fiscal and monetary restraint that were introduced early in 1959, following a period of exceptional strain on the country's international reserves. The fall in reserves resulted from a decline in income from the banana industry and reduced international prices for other major exports. Political instability in the region in the late 1970s to the mid-1980s, together with low commodity prices and high oil prices, had an adverse effect on the balance of payments. The 1990s brought a continuation of the negative trade balance (averaging 7% of GDP), especially after the increase of imports after Hurricane Mitch. However, increases in agricultural and clothes exports are forecast to improve the balance of payments situation. International reserves reached $700 million in 1999 due, in part, to increased remittances from abroad, and international aid following the hurricane ($300 million from the United States alone).

The US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) reported that in 2001 the purchasing power parity of Honduras's exports was $2 billion while imports totaled $2.7 billion, resulting in a trade deficit of $700 million.

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) reported that in 2001 Honduras had exports of goods totaling $1.93 billion and imports totaling $2.81 billion. The services credit totaled $481 million and debit $653 million.

Exports of goods reached $1.6 billion in 2004, up from $1.4 billion in 2003. Imports increased from $3.1 billion in 2003, to $3.7

Current Account-279.2
   Balance on goods-987.2
     Imports-3,065.4
     Exports2,078.2
   Balance on services-77.0
   Balance on income-183.3
   Current transfers968.2
Capital Account21.0
Financial Account-20.0
   Direct investment abroad
   Direct investment in Honduras198.0
   Portfolio investment assets-4.1
   Portfolio investment liabilities
   Financial derivatives
   Other investment assets-77.6
   Other investment liabilities-136.3
Net Errors and Omissions76.1
Reserves and Related Items202.1
() data not available or not significant.

billion in 2004. The resource balance was consequently negative in both years, deteriorating from -$1.7 billion in 2003, to -$2.1 billion in 2004. The current account balance followed a similar path, worsening from -$292 million in 2003, to -$391 million in 2004. Foreign exchange reserves (including gold) reached $2.2 billion in 2005, covering more than six months of imports.

BANKING AND SECURITIES

In 1950, the Central Bank of Honduras (Banco Central de Honduras), the sole bank of issue, was established to centralize national financial operations and to replace foreign currencies then in circulation. In 2002, there were 22 commercial banks in Honduras with an estimated $3.4 billion in assets. In addition, there are some 150 nonbank financial institutions, many of them associated with the major banks. The Banco Atlántida, the most important commercial bank, accounts for over one-half of the total assets of private banks. US banks play a significant role in the commercial system: the Atlántida is affiliated with Chase Manhattan, and the second-largest commercial bank, the Banco de Honduras, is affiliated with Citibank of New York.

The government-controlled banks, including the National Development Bank, the National Agricultural Development Bank, and the Municipal Bank, provide credit for development projects. The National Development Bank extends agricultural and other creditmainly to the tobacco, coffee, and livestock industriesand furnishes technical and financial assistance and other services to national economic interests. The Municipal Bank gives assistance at the local level.

In 1990, the Central Bank devalued the lempira and let it float freely until 1994, when a currency auction was created. The year of 1995 saw the Financial Sector Reform Law, which created a modern Banking Commission. Elements of Central Bank reforms in 1997 included the abolition of the government's right to borrow at below-market rates of interest. The International Monetary Fund reports that in 2001, currency and demand depositsan aggregate commonly known as M1were equal to $800.6 million. In that same year, M2an aggregate equal to M1 plus savings deposits, small time deposits, and money market mutual fundswas $3.3 billion.

In 1990, a stock exchange opened in San Pedro Sula to raise short-term bond finance for local businesses.

INSURANCE

The oldest insurance company in Honduras is Honduras Savings (Ahorro Hondureño), established in 1917. Five other companies deal with life insurance and other types of policies. The number and the role of foreign companies in the insurance sector have decreased because of government incentives to domestic underwriters. In 2002, direct premiums written totaled $190 million, of which the largest portion, $142 million, was nonlife premiums. In 2003, the top nonlife insurer was Ahorro, with gross written nonlife premiums of $19.3 million. In that same year, the country's leading life insurer was Palic, with gross written life insurance premiums of $16.5 million.

PUBLIC FINANCE

The US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) estimated that in 2005 Honduras's central government took in revenues of approximately $1.6 billion and had expenditures of $1.9 billion. Revenues minus expenditures totaled approximately -$245 million. Public debt in 2005 amounted to 70.5% of GDP. Total external debt was $4.675 billion.

TAXATION

Personal income in Honduras is taxed according to a progressive schedule with rates running from 1025%. In 2001, the personal exemption level equaled six times the average income in Honduras whereas the threshold for the 25% bracket was 36 times the average income (down from over 100 times the average in 1997). Social security taxes are also collected. No distinction is made for tax purposes between individuals and businesses. Agricultural activities and industries classified as "basic" receive favorable depreciation rates. The corporate tax rate is 25%, with a 5% solidarity tax added. Profits from branch operations are taxed at 15%. The main indirect tax is a value-added tax (VAT) with a standard rate of 12%. An increased rate of 15% is applied to some items. Excise taxes are imposed mainly on beer and cigarettes, but also on imported matches, soft drinks, imported sugar, and new motor vehicles. New industries are exempted from income and production taxes and import duties for up to 10 years.

District and municipal governments obtain their revenues from taxes on amusements and livestock consumption, and from permits, licenses, registrations, certifications, storage charges, transfers of real estate, and fines.

CUSTOMS AND DUTIES

Most imports from outside the CACM are subject to a common external tariff (CET) ranging from 020%. Duties are levied ad valorem over the cost, insurance, and freight (CIF) value of goods. Honduras also imposes a sales tax (12% on most goods, 15% for alcohol and tobacco) and consumption tax on selected imports: 20% on alcoholic beverages, 35% on motor vehicles, and 55% on cigarettes. Capital goods are admitted at a tariff rate of only 1%.

In June 1992, the Central Bank of Honduras eliminated the need for most import permits and foreign exchange authorizations.

FOREIGN INVESTMENT

Traditionally, the Honduran attitude toward foreign enterprise has been favorable. Foreign capital is treated in the same way as domestic capital; however, firms in the distribution, health services, telecommunications, fishing and hunting, mining, insurance and financial services, or lumber business must have 51% Honduran ownership. Honduran economic development has been powerfully influenced by foreign investment in agriculture, industry, commerce, and other economic sectors.

Since 1910, the Standard and Fruit and Steamship Co. and United Brands (formerly the United Fruit Company) have developed railroads, ports, plantations, cattle farms, lumber yards, breweries, electric power, housing, and education. All contracts, aside from commodity exports, were canceled on 15 September 1975; plans to convert banana-marketing operations into a joint venture fell through, however, and in 1976, the government instead expropriated large tracts of land from the banana producers. Mines have been developed by the New York and Honduras Rosario Mining Co.

In 1998, annual foreign direct investment (FDI) inflows into Honduras totaled almost $100 million, down from $128 million in 1997. Annual FDI inflows more than doubled from 1999 to 2001, averaging $238 million.

The United States has historically been, and remains today, Honduras's largest investor, accounting for at least three-quarters FDI in Honduras. More than 100 American companies operate there. About 75% of those companies produce apparel, but the largest US investments in Honduras have been in the agribusiness sector. Other important sectors include petroleum products, marketing, electric power generation, banking, insurance, and tobacco.

US franchises have substantially increased their presence in recent years, mostly in the fast food sector. Other major investors include Japan, El Salvador, Korea, Hong Kong, and Taiwan. Total capital inflows reached $198 million in 2003 (or 3.0% of the GDP), up from $172 billion in 2002, but still far from the 2000 historical high of $282 million.

ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT

During the administration of President Callejas, between 1990 and 1993, economic policy was mostly based on neoliberal ideas. This included a move from an inward-oriented policy to an export-oriented one. In addition, privatization was deeply emphasized. During that period, GDP was characterized by consistent growth. At the same time the country's galloping inflation was reduced to single digits. Government corruption, however, prompted citizens to vote Callejas out of office.

The November 1993 elections gave birth to a new political era in Honduras. President Reina of the Liberal Party was expected to slow down the pace of market-oriented reforms, but to continue privatization. Strong growth in nontraditional exports and the prospects for an improvement in coffee prices helped to finance the current account deficit. The continuation of foreign aid and investment was essential to closing the Honduras trade gap.

Reforms in the late 1990s were focused on alleviating the lot of the poorest citizens in Honduras, and improving international competitiveness. Hurricane Mitch in 1998 damaged the economy (particularly banana exports), as did low world coffee prices in the early 2000s, and cold weather and heavy rains in 200203 harmed the harvest (coffee revenues were down to $161 million in 2001, from $340 million in 2000). The garment-manufacturing industry, the third-largest in the world, turned in a strong performance in early 2003. In 2000, Honduras became eligible under the International Monetary Fund (IMF)/World Bank Heavily Indebted Poor Countries (HIPC) Initiative for $900 million in debt service relief.

The economic growth of 2005 was mainly led by an increase in consumption and exports. However, consumption levels are expected to grow slower than the overall economic growth (despite a rise in remittances from abroad) due to the impact on wages of above-target inflation. Maquilas and tourism, as well as major public development projects, will likely benefit the economy in coming years, although they can also lead to high levels of indebtedness.

SOCIAL DEVELOPMENT

The social insurance program covers accidents, illness, maternity, old age, occupational disease, unemployment, disability, death, and other circumstances affecting the capacity to work. Social security services are furnished and administered by the Honduran Social Security Institute and financed by contributions from employees, employers, and the government. Workers contribute 1% of their earnings toward retirement, disability, and survivor insurance, while employers paid 2% of their payroll. Retirement is set at age 65 for men and age 60 for women. These programs exclude domestic, temporary and some agricultural workers. Workers' medical benefits include medical care and surgery, hospitalization and medications, and appliances.

Violence against women remains widespread although the penal code classifies domestic violence and sexual harassment as crimes. These laws are not effectively enforced. Cultural attitudes toward women limit career opportunities, and women mostly work in low status jobs. Women are treated equally under the law in divorce cases. There is a growing problem of child abuse, and trafficking in children continues.

The government's human rights record has improved since 1995, but serious abuses still occur, including torture and killing by the police. Human rights groups have challenged the existence of organized death squads.

HEALTH

Health conditions in Honduras are among the worst in the Western Hemisphere. There are an estimated 83 physicians, 25 nurses, and 1 dentist per 100,000 people. The Inter-American Cooperative Public Health Service, created in 1942 under the joint sponsorship of Honduras and the United States, has contributed to public health through malaria control, construction of water systems and sewage disposal plants, personnel training, and the establishment of a national tuberculosis sanatorium. US Peace Corps volunteers help train personnel for urban and rural clinics. Nearly 39% of children under five years of age were considered malnourished as of 2000. Honduras started fortifying sugar with vitamin A in 1996. Health care expenditure was relatively high, estimated at 8.6% of GDP.

Major causes of illness and death are diseases of the digestive tract, intestinal parasites, accidents, suicides, influenza, pneumonia, cancer, and infant diseases. Malnutrition, impure water, poor sewage disposal, and inadequate housing are the major health problems. In 2000, 90% of the population had access to safe drinking water and 77% had adequate sanitation. In 1995, there were 4,717 cases of cholera, of which 77 turned fatal. In 1995, there were 1,022 malaria cases per 100,000 people. Honduras has been hard hit by AIDS. The HIV/AIDS prevalence was 1.80 per 100 adults in 2003. As of 2004, there were approximately 63,000 people living with HIV/AIDS in the country. There were an estimated 4,100 deaths from AIDS in 2003. Immunization rates for children up to one year old were as follows: tuberculosis, 99%; diphtheria, pertussis, and tetanus, 94%; polio, 93%; and measles, 89%. The government pays 79% of routine immunization bills. As of 2002, the birth rate was estimated at 31 per 1,000 people and the general mortality rate at 5 per 1,000 people. About 50% of married women (ages 15 to 49) were using contraception. In 2000 the total fertility rate was 3.9 children per mother during her childbearing years. The infant mortality rate in 2005 was 26.47 per 1,000 live births. Life expectancy in the same year was an average of 69.30 years.

HOUSING

Housing shortages and lack of access to basic utilities in existing housing units has been an ongoing problem throughout most of the country. In recent years, the government has initiated and participated in several programs focusing on low-income housing construction. These have included a $30-million low-cost housing program sponsored by the Housing Finance Corp. and a $19-million venture undertaken by the National Housing Institute.

As of 2000, about 90% of the population had access to improved water sources; 77% of the population had access to improved sanitation systems. As of the 2001 census, there were about 1,487,319 housing units in the nation. The vast majority of housing units are individual homes, about 66% of which are considered to be deficient. Many homes are simply made of cardboard or plastic structures that house from 4 to 10 people in a single room.

EDUCATION

Public education is free and compulsory for six years (ages 6 to 12). After these six years of primary education, students take three years of lower secondary school and two years of upper secondary school. In the upper level, students choose between literary or scientific tracks. Students may also choose to attend a three-year technical school at the upper level. The academic year runs from February to November.

In 2001, about 21% of children between the ages of four and six were enrolled in some type of preschool program. It is estimated that about 79% of all students complete their primary education. The student-to-teacher ratio for primary school was at about 34:1 in 2003. As of 1998, there were 169,430 students enrolled in secondary schools.

The major university is the National Autonomous University of Honduras, founded at Tegucigalpa in 1847, with branches at San Pedro Sula and La Ceiba. There are several other universities, as well as technical and agricultural schools. In 2001, about 15% of the tertiary age population were enrolled in some type of higher education program. The adult literacy rate for 2004 was estimated at about 80%.

As of 2003, public expenditure on education was estimated at 4% of GDP.

LIBRARIES AND MUSEUMS

Although the National Archive and Library of Honduras was established in 1880 to conserve and maintain the records of the republic, no great attention has been shown to government documents and other records in modern times. The National Archive and Library (40,000 volumes) includes land titles dating from 1580, historical documents dating from the 17th century, a newspaper collection from 1880 onward, a civil registry, and a collection of laws since 1880. The Ministry of Education has charge of the National Archive, as well as of other libraries and museums. The National University's library in Tegucigalpa contains over 200,000 volumes.

In Tegucigalpa, the National Museum exhibits historical and archeological works and the Miguel Paz Baraona Historical Museum highlights the personal effects of the national hero as well as the country's history. Also in Tegucigalpa are the National Art Gallery, the Museum of Natural History, and the Museum of Military History. The Museum of Anthropology in San Pedro Sula covers regional history from 1500 bc to present day and houses an impressive collection of Mayan artifacts. The Mayan Museum of Sculpture is in Copan. A Colonial Museum in Comayagua contains a collection of religious art and artifacts.

MEDIA

The government owns and operates postal, telephone, and telegraph services. Tegucigalpa and San Pedro Sula are linked by a multiplex radio relay network. The Tropical Radio Co. provides international radiotelegraph and radiotelephone service. In 2003, there were an estimated 48 mainline telephones for every 1,000 people; about 342,200 people were on a waiting list for telephone service installation. The same year, there were approximately 49 mobile phones in use for every 1,000 people.

As of 1998, Honduras had 241 AM and 53 FM radio stations. In 1997, there were 11 television stations. In 2003, there were an estimated 411 radios and 119 television sets for every 1,000 people. About 21.6 of every 1,000 people were cable subscribers. Also in 2003, there were 13.6 personal computers for every 1,000 people and 25 of every 1,000 people had access to the Internet. There were 31 secure Internet servers in the country in 2004.

The country's principal newspapers (with 2004 circulation) were El Heraldo (30,000), Tiempo (30,000), and La Tribuna (20,000), all published in Tegucigalpa, and La Prensa (62,000), published in San Pedro Sula. La Tribuna is owned by President Flores.

The constitution provides for freedom of speech and press, and the government is said to generally respect these rights. The media itself, however, is said to be subject to a high degree of politicization and corruption.

ORGANIZATIONS

The Chamber of Commerce and Industries has its headquarters in Tegucigalpa; chambers of commerce also function in San Pedro Sula, La Ceiba, and other towns. Business and industry organizations include the Federation of Agricultural Producers and Exporters, the Honduran Manufacturers Association, and the Honduran Association of Sugar Producers. Various professional associations are also active.

The National Federation of University Students of Honduras is an active student movement. Other national youth organizations include scouting and YMCA/YWCA programs. There are several sports associations promoting amateur competition in such pastimes as tennis, football (soccer), badminton, tae kwon do, and baseball. There are also active branches of the Special Olympics.

Volunteer service organizations, such as the Lions Clubs International, are present. There are national chapters of the Red Cross, Habitat for Humanity, Caritas, and CARE.

TOURISM, TRAVEL, AND RECREATION

The main tourist attraction is the restoration at Copán, the second-largest city of the ancient Mayan Empire. There are many beaches on the northern and southern coasts where there is vibrant underwater life. Fishing is popular in Trujillo Bay and Lake Yojoa. A valid passport is needed for entry, and all visitors need visas except for nationals of the United States, and of the countries of Central and South America. Evidence of vaccination against yellow fever is required if traveling from an infected country.

Approximately 610,535 tourists visited Honduras in 2003, an 11% increase from 2002. About 57% of the visitors came from Central America. There were 18,590 hotel rooms with 26,897 beds that same year. The average length of stay was estimated at 10 nights. Gross tourism expenditures totaled $341 million.

In 2004, the US Department of State estimated the cost of staying in Tegucigalpa at $173 per day. Daily costs in San Pedro Sula were estimated at $163 in 2002.

FAMOUS HONDURANS

José Cecilio del Valle (17801834), a member of the French Academy of Sciences, was an intellectual, a political leader, and the author of the Central American declaration of independence. Francisco Morazán (17991842) was the last president of the United Provinces of Central America, which lasted from 1823 to 1839. Father José Trinidad Reyes (17971855) founded an institute in 1847 that became the National University. Outstanding literary figures were Marco Aurelio Soto (18461908), an essayist and liberal president; Ramón Rosa (184893), an essayist and biographer; Policarpo Bonilla (18581926), a politician and author of political works; Alberto Membreño (18591921), a philologist; Juan Ramón Molina (18751908), a modernist poet; Froilán Turcios (18751943), a novelist and writer of fantastic tales; Rafael Heliodoro Valle (18911959), a historian and biographer; and Ramón Amaya Amador (19161966), a journalist and left wing political figure. Contemporary writers include Eduardo Bähr (b.1940), Roberto Sosa (b.1930), Amanda Castro (b.1962), Javier Abril Espinoza (b.1967), and Roberto Quesada (b.1962).

DEPENDENCIES

Honduras has no territories or colonies.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Binns, Jack R. The United States in Honduras, 19801981: An Ambassador's Memoir. Jefferson, N.C.: McFarland and Co., 2000.

Calvert, Peter. A Political and Economic Dictionary of Latin America. Philadelphia: Routledge/Taylor and Francis, 2004.

D and B's Export Guide to Honduras. Parsippany, N.J.: Dun and Bradstreet, 1999.

Euraque, Dar'io A. Reinterpreting the Banana Republic: Region and State in Honduras, 18701972. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1996.

Health in the Americas, 2002 edition. Washington, D.C.: Pan American Health Organization, Pan American Sanitary Bureau, Regional Office of the World Health Organization, 2002.

Kelly, Joyce. An Archaeological Guide to Northern Central America: Belize, Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador. Norman, Okla.: University of Oklahoma Press, 1996.

Meyer, Harvey Kessler. Historical Dictionary of Honduras. 2nd ed. Metuchen, N.J.: Scarecrow Press, 1994.

Honduras

views updated Jun 27 2018

HONDURAS

Compiled from the December 2005 Background Note and supplemented with additional information from the State Department and the editors of this volume. See the introduction to this set for explanatory notes.

Official Name:
Republic of Honduras


PROFILE

Geography

Area:

112,090 sq. km. (43,278 sq. mi.); about the size of Louisiana.

Cities:

Capital—Tegucigalpa (1,150,000); San Pedro Sula (800,000-900,000).

Terrain:

Mountainous.

Climate:

Tropical to subtropical, depending on elevation.

People

Nationality:

Noun and adjective—Honduran(s).

Population (2004 est.):

6.8 million.

Growth rate (2004 est.):

2.24%.

Ethnic groups:

90% mestizo (mixed Indian and European); others of European, Arab, African, or Asian ancestry; and indigenous Indians.

Religion:

Roman Catholic, Protestant minority.

Language:

Spanish.

Education:

Years compulsory—6. Attendance—88% overall, 31% at junior high level. Literacy—76.2%.

Health:

Infant mortality rate—29.64/1,000. Life expectancy—66.2 yrs.

Work force:

Services—42.2%; natural resources/agriculture—35.9%; manufacturing—16.3%; construction/housing—5.6%.

Government

Type:

Democratic constitutional republic.

Independence:

September 15, 1821.

Constitution:

1982; amended 1999.

Branches:

Executive—president, directly elected to 4-year term. Legislative—unicameral National Congress, elected for 4-year term. Judicial—Supreme Court of Justice (appointed by Congress and confirmed by the president); several lower courts.

Political parties:

National Party, Liberal Party, Innovation and National Unity Party, Christian Democratic Party, and the Democratic Unification Party.

Suffrage:

Universal and compulsory at age 18.

Administrative subdivisions:

18 departments.

Economy (2003)

GDP:

$17.46 billion.

Growth rate:

2.5%.

Per capita GDP:

$2,600.

Natural resources:

Arable land, forests, minerals, and fisheries.

Agriculture (11% of GDP):

Products—coffee, bananas, shrimp and lobster, sugar, fruits, basic grains, and livestock.

Manufacturing (18% of GDP):

Types—textiles and apparel, cement, wood products, cigars, and foodstuffs.

Trade:

Exports—$1.37 billion: apparel, coffee, shrimp, bananas, palm oil, gold, zinc/lead concentrates, soap/detergents, melons, lobster, pineapple, lumber, sugar, and tobacco. Major market—U.S. (69%). Imports—$3.11 billion: fabrics, yarn, machinery, chemicals, petroleum, vehicles, processed foods, metals, agricultural products, plastic articles, and paper articles. Major source—U.S. (53%).


PEOPLE

About 90% of the population is mestizo. There also are small minorities of European, African, Asian, Arab, and indigenous Indian descent. Most Hondurans are Roman Catholic, but Protestant churches are growing in number. While Spanish is the predominant language, some English is spoken along the northern coast and is prevalent on the Caribbean Bay Islands. Several indigenous Indian languages and Garífuna (a mixture of Afro-indigenous languages) are also spoken. The restored Mayan ruins near the Guatemalan border in Copan reflect the great Mayan culture that flourished there for hundreds of years until the early 9th century. Columbus landed at mainland Honduras (Trujillo) in 1502. He named the area "Honduras" (meaning "depths") for the deep water off the coast. Spaniard Hernan Cortes arrived in 1524. The Spanish founded several settlements along the coast, and Honduras formed part of the colonial era Captaincy General of Guatemala. The cities of Comayagua and Tegucigalpa developed as early mining centers.


HISTORY

Independence

Honduras, along with many other Central American provinces, gained independence from Spain in 1821. The country was then briefly annexed to the Mexican Empire. In 1823, Honduras joined the newly formed United Provinces of Central America. Social and economic differences between Honduras and its regional neighbors exacerbated harsh partisan strife among Central American leaders and brought on the federation's collapse in 1838. Gen. Francisco Morazan—a Honduran national hero—led unsuccessful efforts to maintain the federation, and restoring Central American unity remained the chief aim of Honduran foreign policy until after World War I.

Since independence, Honduras has been plagued with nearly 300 incidents of unrest, including internal rebellions, civil wars, and changes of government—more than half of which occurred during the 20th century. The country traditionally lacked both an economic infrastructure and social and political integration. Its agriculture-based economy was dominated in the 1900s by U.S. companies that established vast banana plantations along the north coast. Foreign capital, plantation life, and conservative politics held sway in Honduras from the late 19th century until the mid-20th century. During the relatively stable years of the Great Depression, authoritarian Gen. Tiburcio Carias Andino controlled Honduras. His ties to dictators in neighboring countries and to U.S. banana companies helped him maintain power until 1948. By then, provincial military leaders had begun to gain control of the two major parties, the Nationalists and the Liberals.

From Military to Civilian Rule

In October 1955—after two authoritarian administrations and a 1954 general strike by banana workers on the north coast—young military reformists staged a palace coup that installed a provisional junta and paved the way for constituent assembly elections in 1957. This assembly appointed Dr. Ramon Villeda Morales as President and transformed itself into a national legislature with a 6-year term. The Liberal Party ruled during 1957-63. At the same time, the military took its first steps to become a professional institution independent of leadership from any one political party, and the first class of the newly created military academy graduated in 1960. In October 1963, conservative military officers preempted constitutional elections and deposed Villeda in a bloody coup. These officers exiled Liberal Party members and took control of the national police. The armed forces, led by Gen. Lopez Arellano, governed until 1970. Popular discontent continued to rise after a 1969 border war with El Salvador. A civilian President—Ramon Cruz of the National Party—took power briefly in 1970 but proved unable to manage the government. In December 1972, Gen. Lopez staged another coup. Lopez adopted more progressive policies, including land reform, but his regime was brought down in the mid-1970s by corruption scandals.

Gen. Lopez's successors continued armed forces modernization programs, built army and security forces, and concentrated on Honduran Air Force superiority over its neighbors. The regimes of Gen. Melgar Castro (1975-78) and Gen. Paz Garcia (1978-83) largely built the current physical infrastructure and telecommunications system of Honduras. The country also enjoyed its most rapid economic growth during this period, due to greater international demand for its products and the availability of foreign commercial lending.

Following the overthrow of Anastasio Somoza in Nicaragua in 1979 and general instability in El Salvador at the time, the Honduran military accelerated plans to return the country to civilian rule. A constituent assembly was popularly elected in April 1980, and general elections were held in November 1981. A new constitution was approved in 1982, and the Liberal Party government of President Roberto Suazo Cordoba took office following free and fair elections.

Suazo relied on U.S. support to help during a severe economic recession which was the result of regional instability caused by the revolutionary Sandinista government in Nicaragua and the chaos of the brutal civil war in El Salvador. Close cooperation on political and military issues with the United States was complemented by ambitious social and economic development projects sponsored by the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID). Honduras became host to the largest Peace Corps mission in the world, and nongovernmental and international voluntary agencies proliferated.

As the November 1985 election approached, the Liberal Party had difficulty settling on a candidate, and interpreted election law as permitting multiple presidential candidates from one party. The Liberal Party claimed victory when its presidential candidates, who received 42% of the vote, collectively outpolled the National Party candidate, Rafael Leonardo Callejas. Jose Azcona Hoyo, the candidate receiving the most votes among the Liberals, assumed the presidency in January 1986. With the endorsement of the Honduran military, the Azcona administration ushered in the first peaceful transfer of power between civilian presidents in more than 30 years. Four years later, Rafael Callejas won the presidential election, taking office in January 1990. Callejas concentrated on economic reform, reducing the deficit, and taking steps to deal with an

overvalued exchange rate and major structural barriers to investment. He began the movement to place the military under civilian control and laid the groundwork for the creation of the public ministry (attorney general's office).

Despite his administration's economic reforms, the nation's fiscal deficit ballooned during Callejas' last year in office. Growing public dissatisfaction with the rising cost of living and with widespread government corruption led voters in 1993 to elect Liberal Party candidate Carlos Roberto Reina over National Party contender Oswaldo Ramos Soto, with Reina winning 56% of the vote.

President Reina, elected on a platform calling for a "moral revolution," actively prosecuted corruption and pursued those responsible for human rights abuses in the 1980s. He created a modern attorney general's office and an investigative police force and was successful in increasing civilian control over the armed forces and transferring the police from military to civilian authority.

Reina also restored national fiscal health by substantially increasing Central Bank net international reserves, reducing inflation, restoring economic growth, and, perhaps most importantly, holding down spending.

Carlos Roberto Flores Facusse took office on January 27, 1998, as Honduras' fifth democratically elected President since democratic institutions were restored in 1981. Like three of his four predecessors, Flores was a member of the Liberal Party. He was elected by a 10% margin over his main opponent, National Party nominee Nora de Melgar. Upon taking office on January 27, 1998, Flores inaugurated programs of reform and modernization of the Honduran government and economy, with emphasis on helping Honduras' poorest citizens while maintaining the country's fiscal health and improving international competitiveness.

In October 1998, Hurricane Mitch devastated Honduras, leaving more than 5,000 people dead and 1.5 million displaced. Damages totaled nearly $3 billion. The Honduran Government agreed to a new transparent process to manage relief funds, which included significant donor oversight. This open process greatly facilitated the relief and reconstruction effort. President Flores and his administration successfully managed more than $600 million in international assistance. Civil society's role in the government-coordinated reconstruction process was lauded internationally. President Flores also moved judicial and penal reforms forward. He established an anticorruption commission, supported passage of a new penal code based on the oral accusatorial system, and saw passage of a law that created an independent Supreme Court. Flores cemented the transition from military to civilian rule by eliminating the military's commander in chief position, and by signing a law that established a civilian Minister of Defense with formal authority over the military.

Ricardo Maduro Joest of the National Party was elected to the Honduran presidency on November 25, 2001, outpolling the Liberal candidate, Rafael Pineda Ponce, by 8 percentage points. He was inaugurated on January 27, 2002. The elections, characterized by international observer teams as free, fair, and peaceful, reflected the maturing of Honduras' democratic institutions. During his campaign, President Maduro promised to reduce crime, reinvigorate the economy, and fight corruption. Working to fulfill this promise, Maduro's first act as President was to deploy a joint police-military force to the streets to permit wider neighborhood patrols in the ongoing fight against the country's massive crime problem. While the initial result of this policy was overwhelmingly positive, the policy appears to have had only a minimally positive long-term effect on the country's crime rate. President Maduro has been a strong supporter of the global war on terrorism and joined the U.S.-led coalition in Iraq with a contribution of 370 troops. Under President Maduro's guidance, Honduras also participated in the successful Central America Free Trade Agreement talks and actively promoted greater Central American economic integration.


GOVERNMENT

The 1982 constitution provides for a strong executive, a unicameral National Congress, and a judiciary appointed by the National Congress. The president is directly elected to a 4-year term by popular vote. The Congress also serves a 4-year term; congressional seats are assigned the parties' candidates in proportion to the number of votes each party receives in the various departments. The judiciary includes a Supreme Court of Justice, courts of appeal, and several courts of original jurisdiction—such as labor, tax, and criminal courts. For administrative purposes, Honduras is divided into 18 departments, with municipal officials selected for 4-year terms.


POLITICAL CONDITIONS

Reinforced by the media and several political watchdog organizations, human rights and civil liberties are reasonably well protected. There are no known political prisoners in Honduras, and the privately owned media frequently exercises its right to criticize without fear of reprisals. Organized labor now represents approximately 8% of the work force and its economic and political influence has declined. Honduras held its sixth consecutive democratic elections in November 2001, to elect a new president, unicameral Congress, and mayors. For only the second time, voters were able to cast separate ballots for each office, and for the first time, voters denied the presidentelect's party an absolute majority in the Congress. The incidence of cross-voting between presidential and congressional candidates was marked.

Political Parties

The two major parties—the Liberal Party and the National Party—run active campaigns throughout the country. Their ideologies are mostly centrist, with diverse factions in each centered on personalities. The three smaller registered parties—the Christian Democratic Party, the Innovation and National Unity Party, and the Democratic Unification Party—have increased their political muscle in the National Congress by doubling their representation in the 2001 elections. Despite significant progress in training and installing more skillful advisers at the top of each party ladder, electoral politics in Honduras remain traditionalist and paternalistic.

Principal Government Officials

President: Ricardo MADURO
First Vice Pres.: Vicente WILLIAMS
Second Vice Pres.: Armida DE LOPEZ
Third Vice Pres.: Alberto DIAZ
Min. of Agriculture & Livestock: Mariano JIMENEZ
Min. of Culture, Arts, & Sports:
Min. of Defense: Federico BREVE Travieso
Min. of Education: Roberto MARTINEZ Lozano
Min. of Finance: William CHONG Wong
Min. of Foreign Relations: Mario FORTIN Midence
Min. of Industry & Commerce: Irving GUERRERO Cubas
Min. of Governance & Justice: Jose Roberto PACHECO Reyes
Min. of Labor: German LEITZELAR
Min. of Natural Resources & Environment: Patricia PANTING
Min. of the Presidency: Ramon MEDINA Luna
Min. of Public Employees' Retirement & Pension (INJUPEMP): David Mendoza LUPIAC
Min. of Public Health: Elias LIZARDO
Min. of Public Works, Transportation, & Housing: Jorge CARRANZA
Min. of Security: Oscar ALVAREZ
Min. of Tourism: Thiery De PIERREFEU
Min. Without Portfolio (health sector): Carlos VARGAS
Min. Without Portfolio (housing sector): Johnny KAFATI
Min. Without Portfolio (investment promotion sector): Camilo ATALA
Min. Without Portfolio (public service sector): Eduardo KAFATI
Min. Without Portfolio (strategic affairs and communication sector): Ramon MEDINA
Pres., Central Bank: Maria Elena MONDRAGON de Villar
Ambassador to the US:
Permanent Representative to the UN, New York: Manuel ACOSTA BONILLA

Honduras maintains an embassy in the United States at 3007 Tilden Street NW, Washington, DC 20008 (tel. 202-966-7702).


ECONOMY

Honduras is one of the poorest and least developed countries in Latin America. Industrial development has been limited, and historically the economy has been dependent on exports of coffee and bananas. In the past 15 years, however, the economy has been diversified, with the development of non-traditional exports such as cultivated shrimp, melons, and tourism, and the establishment of a growing maquila industry (primarily, assembly for re-export of textiles and apparel). Investment incentives aimed at attracting foreign capital in export industries have been introduced. Meanwhile the coffee industry has suffered from low world prices, and banana production has yet to reach pre-Hurricane Mitch levels. Coffee and bananas now account for less than 15% of Honduran export earnings. Honduras also has extensive forest, marine, and mineral resources, although widespread slash-and-burn agricultural methods continue to destroy Honduran forests.

Family remittances from Hondurans living abroad (mostly in the United States) rose 19% to $860 million in 2003, and are soon expected to pass the maquila sector as the country's largest source of foreign exchange.

The exchange rate as of July 2004 was 18.26 Honduran Lempira to the dollar, compared to 17.18 Lempira to the dollar a year earlier. The currency has been undergoing a steady and controlled devaluation of roughly 6% per year for the last several years. Inflation, as measured by the consumer price index, was 7.7% in 2003, identical to the rate of 2002 and considerably lower than the double-digit inflation rates of the 1990s. International reserves, which had fallen from $1.235 billion at the end of 2002 to $1.16 billion at end of 2003, rebounded to $1.248 million by April 2004.

Unemployment was officially estimated at around 27.5% in 2003. The economic slowdown in the United States in 2001 and 2002 caused a downturn in the growth of Honduras' maquila sector, but investment and employment revived in 2003. Employment in the sector is almost back to its 2000 peak of 125,000 workers.

In July 2000, Honduras reached its decision point under the Heavily Indebted Poor Countries (HIPC) initiative, qualifying the country for interim multilateral debt relief. However, fiscal problems soon derailed the government's International Monetary Fund (IMF) program and put the HIPC debt relief on hold.

After the Honduran Government took several important measures to control government spending and improve its fiscal situation, the IMF approved a new 3-year Poverty Reduction and Growth Facility program in February 2004. This in turn made possible the signing of a debt relief agreement with Paris Club creditors in April 2004, and Honduras reached the HIPC completion point in 2005.


NATIONAL SECURITY

With the cessation of the 1980s civil wars in El Salvador and Nicaragua, the Honduran armed forces refocused their orientation toward combating transnational threats such as narcoterrorism and organized crime syndicates. Honduras supports efforts at regional integration and deployed troops to Iraq in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom. However, the resolution of the civil wars in El Salvador and Nicaragua and across-the-board budget cuts made in all ministries greatly reduced funding for the Honduran armed forces, and the abolition of the draft created staffing gaps in the now all-volunteer armed forces.

The military is now far below its authorized strength. In January 1999, the constitution was amended to abolish the position of military commander in chief of the armed forces, thus codifying civilian authority over the military. Former President Flores also named the first civilian Minister of Defense in the country's history.


FOREIGN RELATIONS

Honduras is a member of the United Nations, the World Trade Organization (WTO), the Organization of American States (OAS), the Central American Parliament (PARLACEN), the Central American Integration System (SICA), and the Central American Security Commission (CASC). During 1995-96, Honduras, a founding member of the United Nations, for the first time served as a nonpermanent member of the UN Security Council. Honduras is currently a member of the UN Human Rights Commission.

Honduras is a strong proponent of Central American cooperation and integration, and continues to work towards the implementation of a regional customs union, which would ease border controls and tariffs among Honduras, Guatemala, Nicaragua, and El Salvador.

In 1969, El Salvador and Honduras fought the brief "Soccer War" over disputed border areas and the emigration of some 300,000 Salvadorans to Honduras in search of land and employment. The catalyst was nationalistic feelings aroused by a series of soccer matches between the two countries, but the roots of the conflict lay in local disputes over land ownership and usage. The two countries formally signed a peace treaty on October 30, 1980, which put the border dispute before the International Court of Justice (ICJ). In September 1992, the Court awarded most of the disputed territory to Honduras. In January 1998, Honduras and El Salvador signed a border demarcation treaty to implement the terms of the ICJ decree although delays continue due to technical difficulties. Honduras and El Salvador maintain normal diplomatic and trade relations; however, they continue to disagree over the status of their maritime borders in the Gulf of Fonseca.

Honduras and Nicaragua had tense relations throughout 2000 and early 2001 due to a maritime boundary dispute off the Atlantic Coast. Relations between the two countries have since improved, although some animosity remains.


U.S.-HONDURAN RELATIONS

Overview

The United States and Honduras have close and friendly relations. Honduras is supportive of U.S. policy in the United Nations and other fora. As a nonpermanent member of the UN Security Council, Honduras played a very helpful role in 1996, most notably in advancing the process of selecting a new UN Secretary General during its October presidency of the Council. The United States also continued to be able to count on Honduras' strong support in the war on terrorism.

The United States favors stable, peaceful relations between Honduras and its Central American neighbors. During the 1980s, Honduras supported U.S. policy in Central America opposing a revolutionary Marxist government in Nicaragua and an active leftist insurgency in El Salvador. The Honduran Government also played a key role in negotiations that culminated in the 1990 Nicaraguan elections. Honduras continues to participate in the UN observer mission in the Western Sahara, contributed troops for the reconstruction of Iraq, and remains interested in participating in other UN peacekeeping missions.

The United States is Honduras' chief trading partner, supplying 53% of its imports and purchasing 69% of its exports in 2003. U.S.-Honduran trade is dominated by the Honduran maquila industry, which imports yarn and textiles from the United States and exports finished articles of clothing. Other leading Honduran exports to the United States include coffee, bananas, seafood (particularly shrimp), minerals (including zinc, lead, gold, and silver), and other fruits and vegetables. The United States encourages U.S. investment that contributes to Honduran development and bilateral trade.

U.S. direct investment in Honduras is valued at $601 million, about 44% of the total foreign direct investment (FDI) in the country of $1.37 billion. FDI flow into Honduras in 2003 totaled $176 million, with the United States leading the way with investments totaling $145 million, or 82% of the total FDI. The largest U.S. investments in Honduras are in the maquila sector, in which apparel and textile export revenues totaled $2.53 billion in 2003. There are also significant U.S. investments in fruit production—particularly bananas, melons, and pineapple—tourism, energy generation, shrimp culture, animal feed production, telecommunications, fuel distribution, cigar manufacturing, insurance, brewing, leasing, food processing, and furniture manufacturing. Many U.S. franchises, particularly in the restaurant sector, operate in Honduras.

From January to December of 2003, the United States negotiated a free trade agreement with Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, and Nicaragua. Further negotiations in 2004 brought the Dominican Republic into the agreement as well. The agreement was signed in May 2004, but must be ratified by the U.S. Congress and by those of the other participating countries before it enters into force. The agreement, known as the U.S.-Central America Free Trade Agreement or CAFTA, will eliminate tariffs and other barriers to trade in goods, services, agricultural products, and investments. Additionally, CAFTA is seen as a mechanism to solidify democracy, encourage greater regional integration, and provide safeguards for environmental protection and labor rights.

The United States maintains a small presence at a Honduran military base; the two countries conduct joint peacekeeping, counternarcotics, humanitarian, disaster relief, and civic action exercises. U.S. troops conduct and provide logistics support for a variety of bilateral and multilateral exercises—medical, engineering, peacekeeping, counternarcotics, and disaster relief—for the benefit of the Honduran people and their Central American neighbors. U.S. forces—regular, reserve, and National Guard—benefit greatly from the training and exercises.

As of early 2001, the U.S.-trained Honduran demining unit had cleared nine major minefields measuring about 333,000 square meters, and more than 2,200 mines had been destroyed. The project was completed in 2004, and Honduras has been declared mine free.

U.S. Policy Toward Honduras

U.S. policy toward Honduras is aimed at consolidating stable democracy with a justice system that protects human rights and promotes the rule of law. U.S. Government programs are aimed at promoting a healthy and more open economy capable of sustainable growth, improving the climate for business and investment while protecting U.S. citizen and corporate rights, and promoting the well-being of the Honduran people. The United States also works with Honduras to meet transnational challenges—including the fight against terrorism, narcotics trafficking, money laundering, illegal migration, and trafficking in persons—and encourages and supports Honduran efforts to protect the environment. The goals of strengthening democracy and promoting viable economic growth are especially important given the geographical proximity of Honduras to the United States. Approximately 800,000 to 1 million Hondurans reside in the United States; consequently, immigration issues are an important item on our bilateral agenda.

U.S.-Honduran ties are further strengthened by numerous private sector contacts, with an average of between 80,000 and 110,000 U.S. citizens visiting Honduras annually and about 11,000 Americans residing there. More than 150 American companies operate in Honduras.

Economic and Development Assistance

To help strengthen Honduras' democratic institutions and improve living conditions, the United States has provided substantial economic assistance. The United States has historically been the largest bilateral donor to Honduras. The USAID budget for Honduras was $45 million in fiscal year 2004. Over the years, U.S. foreign assistance has helped advance such objectives as fostering democratic institutions, increasing private sector employment and income, helping Honduras fund its arrears with international financial institutions, providing humanitarian aid, increasing agricultural production, and providing loans to microbusinesses.

October 1998's Hurricane Mitch—the worst natural disaster ever to strike the Western Hemisphere—left hundreds of thousands homeless, devastated the road network and other public infrastructure, and crippled certain key sectors of the economy. Estimates show that Hurricane Mitch caused $8.5 billion in damages to homes, hospitals, schools, roads, farms, and businesses throughout Central America, including more than $3 billion in Honduras alone.

In response, the United States provided more than $461 million in immediate disaster relief and humanitarian aid spread over the years 1998-2001. This supplemental assistance was designed to help repair water and sanitation systems; replace housing, schools, and roads; provide agricultural inputs; provide local government crisis management training; grant debt relief; and encourage environmental management expertise. Additional resources were utilized to maintain anti-crime and drug assistance programs. The vast majority of the U.S. reconstruction projects were scheduled to finish by December 31, 2001, with the exception of some water and sanitation and transparency projects that were extended for another 14 months. In 2001, the United States also provided food aid in response to a short drought and the depressed state of the agriculture sector. Subsequently, the United States provided $265,000 in disaster assistance after Tropical Storm Michelle inundated the north coast with floods.

New and existing U.S. economic programs—some with proposed enhancements that have taken on even greater importance since the hurricane—include the Caribbean Basin Economic Recovery Act, Overseas Private Investment Corporation financing for private investment and insurance against risks of war and expropriation, U.S. Trade Development Agency grant loans for pre-feasibility studies of projects with U.S. product and services export potential, and U.S. Export-Import Bank short- and medium-term financing for U.S. exports to Honduran importers. All of these provide greater economic opportunity for U.S. and Honduran businessmen and women.

The Peace Corps has been active in Honduras since 1962, and currently the program is one of the largest in the world. In 2004, there were 223 Peace Corps Volunteers working in the poorest parts of Honduras.

The U.S. Government strongly supports the professionalization of the civilian police force as an important element in strengthening the rule of law in Honduras. The American Embassy in Tegucigalpa provides specialized training to police officers through the International Criminal Training Assistance Program.

Security Assistance

The role of the Honduran armed forces has changed significantly in recent years as many institutions formerly controlled by the military are now under civilian authority. The defense and police budgets have hovered at around $35 million during the past few years. Honduras receives modest U.S. security assistance funds and training.

In the absence of a large security assistance program, defense cooperation has taken the form of increased participation by the Honduran armed forces in military-to-military contact programs and bilateral and multilateral combined exercises oriented toward peacekeeping, disaster relief, humanitarian/civic assistance, and counternarcotics. The U.S. Joint Task Force Bravo (JTF-B), stationed at the Honduran Soto Cano Air Base, plays a vital role in supporting combined exercises in Honduras and in neighboring Central American countries. While JTF-Bravo has been involved in several multilateral exercises and numerous smaller humanitarian deployments, it played an absolutely critical role in helping the United States to respond to Hurricanes Mitch and Keith, and the earthquakes in El Salvador by saving lives, repairing critical infrastructure, and in meeting high priority health and sanitation needs. U.S. forces also delivered millions of dollars worth of privately donated goods to those in need.

U.S. Business Opportunities

U.S. Department of Commerce trade data show that bilateral trade between the two nations totaled $5.83 billion in 2002, the most recent year for which statistics are available. Exports of goods and services from the U.S. totaled $2.56 billion 2002, and Honduran exports to the U.S. totaled $3.26 billion. U.S. investors account for nearly two-thirds of the estimated stock of $1.3 billion in foreign direct investment in Honduras. More than 150 American companies operate in Honduras; U.S. franchises are present in increasing numbers.

Opportunities for U.S. business sales include textile machinery, construction equipment, automotive parts and accessories, telecommunications equipment, pollution control/water resources equipment, agricultural machinery, hotel and restaurant equipment, computers and software, franchising, and household consumer goods. Best prospects for agricultural products are corn, milled rice, wheat, soybean meal, and consumer-ready products.

U.S. citizens contemplating investment in real estate in Honduras should proceed with extreme caution, especially in the Bay Islands or coastal areas, because of frequently conflicting legislation, problems with land titles, and a weak judicial system. Investors or their attorneys should check property titles not only with the property registry office having jurisdiction in the area in which the property is located (being especially observant of marginal annotations on the deed and that the property is located within the area covered by the original title), but also with the National Agrarian Institute (INA) and the National Forestry Administration (COHDEFOR). Investors in land should be aware that even clear title is not a guarantee that a future dispute over land would be resolved equitably.

Principal U.S. Embassy Officials

TEGUCIGALPA (E) Address: Avenida La Paz, Tegucigalpa, Honduras; APO/FPO: Unit 2900, Box 68, APO AA 34022; Phone: (504) 236-9320; Fax: (504) 236-9037; Workweek: M-F, 8 - 5 local time; Website: www.usmission.hn

AMB:Charles A. Ford
AMB OMS:Barbara A. Matchey
DCM:James Williard
DCM OMS:Peggy Laurance
CG:Ian Brownlee
POL:Derrick Olsen
COM:Mitch Larsen (resident in Guatemala)
MGT:Jesse I. Coronado
AFSA:Derrick Olsen
AGR:Steve Huete (resident in Guatemala)
AID:Paul Tuebner
CLO:Sigret Sanes
DAO:Derek R. Dickey, USAF
DEA:John Mark Discenza
ECO:Patrick Dunn
GSO:Ana P. Baide
ICASS Chair:Paul Tuebner
IMO:Mari Jain Womack
INS:Luis Figueroa (acting)
IPO:Monica Barreto
LAB:Derrick Olsen
LEGATT:David Wattley (resident in Panama)
NAS:Roberto Coronado
PAO:Melissa Cooper
RSO:Bruce Lizzi
State ICASS:Patrick Dunn
Last Updated: 12/27/2005

Other Contact Information

American Chamber of Commerce
Hotel Honduras Maya
Apartado Postal 1838
Tegucigalpa, Honduras
Tel: (504) 232-7043/232-6035
Fax: (504) 232-9959

Branch office in San Pedro Sula
Tel: (504) 557-6402/559-6412
Fax: (504) 557-6402

Caribbean/Latin American Action
1818 N Street, NW
Suite 310
Washington, DC 20036
Tel: 202-466-7464
Fax: 202-822-0075

U.S. Department of Commerce International Trade Administration Office of Latin America and the Caribbean
14th and Constitution Avenue, NW
Washington, DC 20230
Tel: 202-482-0057
800-USA-TRADE
Fax: 202-482-0464
Internet: http://www.ita.doc.gov

U.S. Agency for International Development
1300 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW
Washington, DC 20523-0001
Tel: 202-712-4810
Fax: 202-216-3524
Internet: www.usaid.gov


TRAVEL

Consular Information Sheet

December 29, 2005

Country Description:

Honduras is a democracy with a developing economy. The national language is Spanish, although English is often spoken in the Bay Islands. The climate is generally pleasant and temperate, with dry and wet seasons. During the dry season, widespread forest fires and agricultural burning can lead to severely degraded air quality throughout the country leading to respiratory problems and airport closures. The terrain ranges from mountainous to coastal beaches and jungle lowlands. Facilities that would normally be used by tourists, including hotels and restaurants are generally adequate in the capital city of Tegucigalpa, San Pedro Sula, Tela, La Ceiba, the Bay Islands and near the Copan ruins. Large sections of the country, however, lack basic public services or even a governmental presence. Currency exchange is readily available at banks and hotels in the major cities.

Entry/Exit Requirements:

A U.S. passport valid for at least three months from the date of entry is required to enter and depart Honduras. A visa is not required, but tourists must provide evidence of return or onward travel. Parents should not rely on birth certificates for travel of their children; rather, they should obtain U.S. passports for infants and minors born in the U.S. prior to travel. U.S. citizens are encouraged to carry a photocopy of their U.S. passports with them at all times so that if questioned by local officials, proof of identity and U.S. citizenship are readily available to those officials.

For U.S. citizen children born in the United States to Honduran parents, Honduran Immigration provides an "evidence of continuance" (Constancia de Permanencia) stamp placed in the U.S. passport that allows the child to enter, depart, and remain in Honduras. Visitors are given a permit to remain in Honduras for 30 days. Honduran immigration may grant up to two thirty-day extensions for a total of 90 days. Thereafter, tourists must leave the country in order to qualify for a renewed visitor's permit. For more information concerning entry and exit requirements for Honduras, travelers may visit the Embassy of Honduras in Washington D.C. web site http://www.hondurasemb.org. On departure, visitors are required to pay an exit fee, either in U.S. dollars or in local currency. The current fee for international departures is USD $31.42. The fees are subject to change.

In an effort to prevent international child abduction, many governments have initiated special procedures at entry/exit points regarding the travel of minors. These often include requiring documentary evidence of relationship and permission for the child's travel from the parent(s) or legal guardian not present. Having such documentation on hand, even if not required, may facilitate entry/exit. Minors who are dual U.S.-Honduran nationals or who are resident in Honduras require notarized consent from both parents if traveling alone or in someone else's custody, or from the absent parent if traveling with only one parent. In cases where one parent has sole custody, the custodial parent must submit the custody decree to Honduran immigration upon departure.

For more information concerning entry and exit requirements, travelers may contact the Embassy of Honduras at 3007 Tilden Street N.W., Washington, D.C. 20008, telephone (202) 966-7702, or a Honduran consulate in Atlanta, Boston, Chicago, Houston, Jacksonville, Los Angeles, Miami, New Orleans, New York, Phoenix, San Francisco, San Juan or Tampa. The Honduran Embassy's e-mail address is [email protected]. Interested individuals may visit the Honduran Embassy's website for additional contact information through http://www.hondurasemb.org/. For tourist information or suggestions, please contact the Honduras Institute of Tourism at 1-800-410-9608 (in the United States) or at 1-800-222-TOUR (8687) (within Honduras only) or visit their website http://www.hondurastips.honduras.com/.

Dual Nationality:

Honduran law permits dual nationality only for minors under the age of 21 and those Honduran-born citizens who have become naturalized citizens of other countries. U.S. citizens who become Honduran citizens by naturalization are not considered to have dual nationality under Honduran law. Dual nationals, in addition to being subject to all Honduran laws affecting U.S. citizens, may be subject to other laws that impose special obligations on Honduran citizens. For more information, please contact Honduran Immigration in Tegucigalpa (tele-phone 504-238-5613), San Pedro Sula (telephone 504-550-3728), Roatan (telephone 504-445-1226), La Ceiba (telephone 504-442-0638), or Puerto Cortes (telephone 504-665-0582).

Safety and Security:

Political demonstrations sometimes disrupt traffic, but they are generally announced in advance and are usually peaceful. Travelers should avoid areas where demonstrations are taking place, and they should keep informed by following the local news and consulting hotel personnel and tour guides.

There have been kidnapping attempts and threats against U.S. citizens. For more information, we strongly encourage travelers to visit the U.S. Embassy's web site at http://honduras.usembassy.gov/ and click on Crime and Security Matters. There have also been incidents involving roadblocks and violence connected with land disputes that can delay travel, particularly in the north coast area near Trujillo.

The areas off both coasts of Honduras are the subject of maritime border disputes between Honduras and its neighbors. The Honduran Navy patrols these areas, and all private vessels transiting Honduran territorial waters should be prepared to be hailed and possibly boarded by Honduran military personnel to verify documentation. While the Honduran Navy previously used private vessels as patrol vessels, this is no longer the case. In the event that any vessel is hailed in Honduran waters in the Caribbean by a non-military vessel or any suspicious vessel and directed to prepare for boarding, the vessel should immediately contact the U.S. Coast Guard Operations Center by radio or INMARSAT at 305-415-6800. Anyone needing more information can also contact the U.S Embassy during working hours and request to speak with the U.S. Military Group (USMILGP) office.

While the Honduran side of the Honduras-Nicaragua border has been largely cleared of land mines, travelers should exercise caution there. For the latest security information, Americans traveling abroad should regularly monitor the Department's Internet web site at http://travel.state.gov where the current travel information, including travel advisories, can be found. Up-to-date information on safety and security can also be obtained by calling 1-888-407-4747 toll free in the U.S., or for callers outside the U.S. and Canada, a regular toll-line at 1-202-501-4444. These numbers are available from 8:00 a.m. to 8:00 p.m. Eastern Time, Monday through Friday (except U.S. federal holidays).

Crime:

Crime is endemic in Honduras and requires a high degree of caution by U.S. visitors and residents alike. U.S. citizens are encouraged to follow local news reports.

Poverty, gangs, and low apprehension and conviction rates of criminals contribute to a high crime rate, including horrific acts of mass murder. Many men in Honduras carry firearms and machetes, and disputes are often settled with violence. Both violent and petty crime, including sexual assault, carjacking, kidnappings, muggings, and home invasions, are prevalent throughout the country. While crime affects everyone in Honduras, criminals have at times targeted persons, particularly those coming from airports and hotels, as well as wealthy-looking residents in San Pedro Sula, Tela, Trujillo, and Tegucigalpa. Twomen teams on medium-sized motorcycles often target pedestrians. There have also been reports of armed robbers traveling in private cars targeting pedestrians on isolated streets. The Honduran government has instituted a "zero tolerance" policy on crime. As part of this policy, the police sometimes patrol jointly with armed soldiers in major cities in an effort to reduce crime.

Fifty U.S. citizens have been murdered in Honduras since 1995, with a very significant recent increase in the number, and most cases remain unresolved. There are problems with the judicial process, including corruption, an acute shortage of trained personnel, equipment, staff, and financial resources. The Honduran law enforcement authorities' ability to prevent, respond to, and investigate criminal incidents and prosecute criminals remains limited. Honduran police generally do not speak English. The government has established a special tourist police in the resort town of Tela and other popular tourist destinations, including Tegucigalpa, San Pedro Sula, La Ceiba, and Roatan, but the number deployed is small and coverage is limited. Tourists in these cities should still remain vigilant for criminal elements as they visit these tourist sites.

The San Pedro Sula area has seen occasional armed robberies against tourist vans, minibuses, and cars traveling from the airport to area hotels, even sometimes targeting the road to Copan. Armed men have forced vehicles transporting tourists off the road and robbed the victims, occasionally assaulting the driver or passengers. Several U.S. citizens have recently been murdered in San Pedro Sula and the vicinity shortly after arriving in the country. Assaults in this area may be based on tips from sources at airport arrival areas so visitors are strongly urged to exercise caution in discussing travel plans in public areas.

Copan, the Bay Islands, and other tourist destinations have a lower crime rate than other parts of the country, but thefts, break-ins, assaults, and murders do occur. During a wave of home invasion robberies in Roatan in late 2005, assailants shot two foreign residents, killing one U.S. citizen. Exercise particular caution walking on isolated beaches, especially at night. Seven U.S. citizens have been murdered in Roatan since 1998, most recently in late 2005. Coxen Hole should be avoided after dark.

The Government of Honduras has a very limited presence in Northern Olancho, Colon and Gracias a Dios Departments, which is well known for lumber and narcotics smuggling and violence. Travelers in those areas should use extra caution.

Incidents of crime along roads in Honduras are common. There have been frequent incidents of highway robbery on a number of roads including Limones to La Union, Olancho (route 41) via Salama and northward to Esquipulas Del Norte. For more information, please see the section below on Traffic Safety and Road Conditions.

Travelers should always drive with their doors locked and windows rolled up to avoid potential robberies at traffic lights and other places, such as congested downtown streets. Avoid driving at night. All bus travel should be during daylight hours and on first-class conveyances, not on economy buses. Please pick taxis carefully, and note the driver's name and license number. Instruct the driver not to pick up other passengers, agree on the fare before you depart, and have small bills available for payment, as taxi drivers often do not make change.

Do not resist a robbery attempt. Most criminals have weapons, and most injuries and deaths have resulted when victims have resisted. Two foreign tourists were murdered in July 2002 while resisting an armed robbery on a public bus in which they were traveling. In 2004, an American citizen was murdered while attempting to flee an armed robbery in progress and another American was shot while resisting a carjacking. Two American citizens were murdered while resisting armed robberies in 2005.

Do not hitchhike or go home with strangers, particularly from nightspots. When ever possible, travel in groups of two or more persons. Use the same common sense while traveling in Honduras that you would in any high crime area of a major U.S. city. Do not wear excessive jewelry. Do not carry large sums of money, or display cash, ATM credit cards, or other valuables you do not need.

Avoid walking at night in most areas of Honduras. Do not hike alone in backcountry areas, or walk alone on beaches, historic ruins, or trails.

There have been incidents of armed assaults against private sailing vessels by criminals posing as fishermen off the northeast coast of Honduras, particularly in the numerous small islands northeast of the coast of the Department of Gracias a Dios. Sailors should contact the Coast Guard and yacht facility managers in their areas of travel for current information.

Individuals and groups should register their travel plans with the State Department via the Internet at the Department's secure web site: https://travelregistration.state.gov/. They may also wish to send passport, date of birth, and emergency contact information to the American Citizens Services Unit of the U.S. Embassy in Tegucigalpa via fax at 011-504-238-4357, prior to travel. Individuals as well as groups should always keep in their possession a photocopy of their U.S. passport data page and leave a copy at home with a friend or family member.

The theft abroad of a U.S. passport should be reported immediately to the U.S. Embassy in Tegucigalpa and to local police. If you are the victim of a crime while overseas, in addition to reporting to the local police, please contact the U.S. Embassy in Tegucigalpa or the Consular Agency in San Pedro Sula for assistance. The Embassy and Consular Agency staff can, for example, assist you to find appropriate medical care, to contact family members or friends and explain how funds could be transferred. Although the investigation and prosecution of most crimes is solely the responsibility of local authorities, Consular staff can help you to understand the local criminal justice process and to find an attorney if needed.

Medical Facilities:

Medical care in Honduras varies greatly in quality and availability. Outside Tegucigalpa and San Pedro Sula, medical care is inadequate to address complex situations. Support staff facilities and necessary equipment and supplies are not up to U.S. standards anywhere in Honduras. Facilities for advanced surgical procedures are not available. Wide areas of the country, including the popular tourist areas of the Bay Islands of Roatan, Utila, and Guanaja, do not have a general surgery hospital. Ambulance services are limited in major cities and almost non-existent elsewhere.

Scuba diving is popular in the Bay Islands, but the limited medical facilities there pose a special risk in the event of an emergency. There is a decompression chamber on Roatan and Utila for divers, but no advanced medical care on either island for diving related accidents.

Medical Insurance:

The Department of State strongly urges Americans to consult with their medical insurance company prior to traveling abroad to confirm whether their policy applies overseas and whether it will cover emergency expenses such as a medical evacuation. U.S. medical insurance plans seldom cover health costs incurred outside the United States unless supplemental coverage is purchased. Further, U.S. Medicare and Medicaid programs do not provide payment for medical services outside the United States. However, many travel agents and private companies offer insurance plans that will cover health care expenses incurred overseas including emergency services such as medical evacuations.

When making a decision regarding health insurance, Americans should consider that many foreign doctors and hospitals require payment in cash prior to providing service and that a medical evacuation to the U.S. may cost thousands of dollars. Uninsured travelers who require medical care overseas often face extreme difficulties. When consulting with your insurer prior to your trip, ascertain whether payment will be made to the overseas healthcare provider or whether you will be reimbursed later for expenses you incur. Some insurance policies also include coverage for psychiatric treatment and for disposition of remains in the event of death.

Useful information on medical emergencies abroad, including overseas insurance programs, is provided in the Department of State's Bureau of Consular Affairs brochure, "Medical Information for Americans Traveling Abroad ", available via the Bureau of Consular Affairs home page or auto fax: (202) 647-3000.

Other Health Information:

Mosquito-borne illnesses are an ongoing problem in Honduras. All persons traveling in Honduras, even for a brief visit, are at risk of contracting malaria. Take a prophylactic regimen best suited to your health profile. The country regularly suffers from outbreaks of dengue fever during the rainy season. Travelers should take precautions against being bitten by mosquitoes to reduce the chance of contracting such illnesses.

Severe air pollution, which can aggravate or lead to respiratory problems, often occurs throughout the country during the dry season due in large part to widespread forest fires and agricultural burning.

Individuals traveling to Honduras should ensure that all their routine vaccinations are up to date. Vaccination against Hepatitis A and Hepatitis B is strongly recommended. Travelers taking prescription medications should bring an adequate supply with them when coming to Honduras and ensure that they are properly labeled. Information on vaccinations and other health precautions, such as safe food and water precautions and insect bite protection, may be obtained from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's hotline for international travelers at 1-877-FYI-TRIP (1-877-394-8747); fax 1-888-CDC-FAXX (1-888-232-3299), or via the CDC's Internet site at http://www.cdc.gov/travel. For information about outbreaks of infectious diseases abroad consult the World Health Organization's website at http://www.who.int/en. Further health information for travelers is available at http://www.who.int/ith.

Traffic Safety and Road Conditions:

Honduran road conditions differ significantly from those in the United States. The information below is provided for general reference only, and it may not be totally accurate in a particular location or circumstances. Because of crime and poor road conditions, driving can be very dangerous, and travelers should carry a cellular phone in case of an emergency. Travelers should exercise extreme caution while driving on isolated stretches of road and passing on mountainous curves. Rockslides are common, especially in the rainy season (May through December). Traffic signs, even on major highways, are often inadequate, and streets in the major cities are often unmarked. Travelers should always drive with their doors locked and windows rolled up to avoid potential robberies at traffic lights and other places such as congested downtown streets.

Major cities are connected by an inconsistently maintained, two-lane system of paved roads, and many secondary roads in Honduras are unpaved. During the rainy season, even major highways are often closed due to rockslides and flooding during heavy rains.

Some of the most dangerous stretches for road travel include: Tegucigalpa to Choluteca, because of dangerous mountain curves; El Progreso to La Ceiba, because of animal crossings and the poor condition of bridges from flooding; and Limones to La Union, Olancho (route 41) via Salama and northward to Saba. Locals also refer to this stretch of road as the "Corridor of Death" because of frequent incidents of highway robbery.

Route 39 through northern Olancho Department between Gualaco and San Esteban is highly dangerous and should be avoided.

Route 43 in northwest Olancho Department from Talanga to Olanchito via Yoro route 23 will become a primary route to the north coast when the remaining portions of the highway of the highway are paved, as is expected to occur in 2005.

The only recommended route to the north coast from the south is CA-5 to route 21 to CA-13 via Tela to La Ceiba and Trujillo.

Honduran roads are poorly lit and marked. Vehicles are often driven at night without adequate illumination, and animals and people wander onto the roads at all hours. For these reasons, and because of the high incidence of crime, the U.S. Embassy strongly discourages car and bus travel after dark.

Hijackings of private and commercial vehicles from the United States to Honduras have occurred. While Honduras and the United States have signed and ratified a Stolen Vehicle Treaty, existing Honduran laws protect good faith buyers (even of stolen vehicles) so the recovery and return of these vehicles to their original owners is not guaranteed. Vehicle insurance may mitigate loss; please check with the National Insurance Crime Bureau at http://www.nicb.org, private insurance carriers, and the web site information on "Commercial Vehicle Hijackings" at http://honduras.usembassy.gov/english/mission/sections/RSO/comveh_highsec.htm for more information.

For additional general information about road safety, including links to foreign government sites, please see the Department of State, Bureau of Consular Affairs home page at http://travel.state.gov/travel/tips/safety/safety_1179.html. For specific information concerning Honduran driving permits, vehicle inspection, road tax, and mandatory insurance, please contact the Honduran National Tourist Organization offices in New York via the Internet at http://www.hondurastips.honduras.com/.

Aviation safety and oversight:

The U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has assessed the Government of Honduras as not being in compliance with ICAO international aviation safety standards for the oversight of Honduras's air carrier operations. For more information, travelers may visit the FAA's Internet web site at www.faa.gov/avr/iasa/index.cfm.

Severe air pollution often leads to the closing of some or all of Honduras's four international airports during the dry season. Some travelers have been compelled to travel by bus to neighboring countries in order to catch onward flights.

The one Honduran airline flying to the United States, AeroHonduras, leases its aircraft and crews from a U.S. company and is subject to U.S. regulation. For further information, travelers may contact the Department of Transportation within the United States at tel. 1-800-322-7873, or visit the FAA's Internet web site at: www.faa.gov/avr/iasa/.

Real Estate Investment:

U.S. citizens should exercise extreme caution before entering into any form of commitment to invest in property, particularly in coastal areas and the Bay Islands. Honduran laws and practices regarding real estate differ substantially from those in the United States, and there are many cases of fraudulent deeds and titles. In addition, the Honduran judicial system is weak and inefficient, often prolonging disputed cases for many years before resolution. Approximately 80% of the privately held land in the country is untitled. Americans have spent thousands of dollars in legal fees and years of frustration in trying to resolve property disputes, even in cases in which local attorneys and Honduran and U.S. real estate agents had given assurances to the investor. Violence has been used against Americans involved in disputed property cases. Potential investors should engage competent local legal representation before making any commitments. Investors should thoroughly check references and bona fides of attorneys and real estate agents.

Honduran law places certain restrictions on land ownership by foreigners in coastal and border areas. Squatters claim a number of properties owned by U.S. citizens. For further information on investing in property in Honduras, please review the State Department's Investment Climate Statement, part of the Country Commercial Guide at http://www.buyusa.gov/honduras/en/14.html. For information on contracting Honduran legal representation, please check with other investors. You may also refer to the list of attorneys available on the Embassy's homepage at http://honduras.usembassy.gov/. In all cases, please check references and bonafides.

Financial Market Investment:

Due to poor regulation and lack of guarantees, investment in the Honduran "Bolsa de Valores," or securities market, as well as banking institution bonds, fideicomisos (trusts), and certificates of deposit from uninsured financial institutions pose high risk to investors. Extreme caution should be exercised before and while undertaking such activities as American citizens have lost large sums of money through investments in such precarious markets. For further information on investing in Honduras, please review the State Department's Investment Climate Statement, part of the Country Commercial Guide at http://www.buyusa.gov/honduras/en/14.html.

Customs Regulations:

U.S. citizens, who intend to stay in Honduras for an extended period of time and who bring vehicles or household goods into the country, should consult Honduran customs officials prior to shipment. With the exception of "antique" cars, all vehicles imported into Honduras by foreigners must be less than seven (7) years old. For specific information regarding customs requirements, please contact the Embassy of Honduras in Washington, D.C. at: http://www.hondurasemb.org/ for more information.

Honduran customs authorities may enforce strict regulations concerning temporary importation into or export from Honduras of items such as antiquities, medications, and business equipment. For example, Honduran law prohibits the export of antiques and artifacts from pre-colonial civilizations. To protect the country's biodiversity, it is illegal to export certain birds, feathers, and other flora and fauna. For specific information regarding exportation requirements, please contact the Embassy of Honduras in Washington, D.C. at http://www.hondurasemb.org/.

The Government of Honduras is strictly enforcing the law that requires a Honduran permit for the importation of firearms into Honduras. Travelers must obtain a firearm importation permit from a Honduran Embassy, Consulate General or Consulate located in the U.S. prior to bringing firearms into the country. Please note that a U.S. governmentissued or airline-issued permit is not valid for importation of firearms into Honduras, and firearms that arrive without the requisite Honduran permit will be confiscated and the bearer will be prosecuted to the full extent of Honduran law.

Criminal Penalties:

While in a foreign country, a U.S. citizen is subject to that country's laws and regulations, which sometimes differ significantly from those in the United States and may not afford the protections available to the individual under U.S. law. Penalties for breaking the law can be more severe than in the United States for similar offenses. Persons violating Honduran laws, even unknowingly, may be expelled, arrested or imprisoned. Penalties for possession, use, or trafficking in illegal drugs in Honduras are severe, and convicted offenders can expect long jail sentences and heavy fines.

Under the U.S. PROTECT Act of April 2003, it is a crime, prosecutable in the United States, for a U.S. citizen or U.S. legal permanent resident to engage in illicit sexual conduct in a foreign country with a person under the age of 18, whether or not the U.S. citizen or U.S. legal permanent resident intended to engage in such illicit sexual conduct prior to going abroad. For purposes of the U.S. PROTECT Act, illicit sexual conduct includes any commercial sex act in a foreign country with a person under the age of 18. The law defines a commercial sex act as any sex act, on account of which anything of value is given to or received by a person under the age of 18.

Under the Protection of Children from Sexual Predators Act of 1998, it is a crime to use the mail or any facility of interstate or foreign commerce, including the Internet, to transmit information about a minor under the age of 16 for criminal sexual purposes that include, among other things, the production of child pornography. This same law makes it a crime to use any facility of interstate or foreign commerce, including the Internet, to transport obscene materials to minors under the age of 16.

Disaster Preparedness:

Honduras is prone to severe and damaging weather during the June 1st to November 30th hurricane season. U.S. citizens are urged to monitor news media and U.S. National Hurricane Center at: www.nhc.noaa.gov for information on possible storms. General information about natural disaster preparedness is available via the Internet from the U.S. Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) at: www.fema.gov.

Children's Issues:

International adoptions from Honduras are very limited. Current information on Honduran adoption procedures and the immigrant visa application process is available from the Consular Section of the U.S. Embassy. Prospective adoptive parents are urged to check with the Consular Section to be sure that all required documentation has been approved by the U.S. Bureau of Citizenship and Immigration Services in the Department of Homeland Security and their child's adoption is complete before traveling to Honduras to apply for their child's immigrant visa. Adoptive parents are also urged to carry with them complete adoption paperwork when traveling with their adopted child to, from, and within Honduras.

Honduras is a signatory to the Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction, but the U.S. Department of State has determined that it has failed to comply with its obligations under the Convention. No child has ever been returned to the United States from Honduras under the provisions of the Convention. For more information on international adoption of children and international parental child abduction, please refer to the Department of State's Internet site at http://travel.state.gov/family/family_1732.html or telephone 1-888-407-4747.

Registration/Embassy Location:

Americans living or traveling in Honduras are encouraged to register their presence through the State Department's travel registration website, https://travelregistration.state.gov/ and to obtain updated information on travel and security within Honduras. Americans without Internet access may register directly with the U.S. Embassy in Tegucigalpa. By registering, whether via the Internet or in person at the Embassy, American citizens make it easier for the Embassy to contact them in case of emergency.

The U.S. Embassy and Consulate are located at:
Avenida La Paz in Tegucigalpa, Honduras
Internet Web site: http://honduras.usembassy.gov/
Telephone: 011-504-236-9320 or 011-504-238-5114
For information on services for U.S. citizens, please ask for ext. 4400.
American Citizens Services Unit Fax: 011-504-238-4357

The Consular Agency in San Pedro Sula is located at:
Banco Atlantida Building–11th Floor
San Pedro Sula, Honduras
Telephone: 011-504-558-1580

The Consular Agent is available during limited hours to accept U.S. passport and U.S. Report of Birth applications for adjudication at the Embassy in Tegucigalpa, perform notarial services, and to assist U.S. citizens with emergencies. Please call for office hours. The Consular Agent does not provide visa information or services.

For more details about all U.S. Embassy and consular services in Honduras, please see the Embassy web site at: http://honduras.usembassy.gov/ or visit the Bureau of Consular Affairs web site at: http://travel.state.gov/.

International Adoption

January 2006

The information below has been edited from a report of the State Department Bureau of Consular Affairs, Office of Overseas Citizens Services. For more information, please read the International Adoption section of this book and review current reports online at www.travel.state.gov/family.

Disclaimer:

The information in this flyer relating to the legal requirements of specific foreign countries is based on public sources and our current understanding. Questions involving foreign and U.S. immigration laws and legal interpretation should be addressed respectively to qualified foreign or U.S. legal counsel.

General:

The Government of Honduras is strict in its application of adoption law. There are no private adoptions in Honduras. Adoptions in Honduras usually take from 6 months up to one year. Please be cautious in dealing with individuals who offer to facilitate or shortcut the adoption procedure; they cannot legally short-circuit the process. Adoption agencies are required to register with IHNFA. If they are not registered, IHNFA cannot assist the agencies in the adoption process.

Honduran Adoption Authority:

All adoptions must go through the Instituto Hondureño del Niño y la Familia, also known as "IHNFA", which is a social welfare agency charged by the Honduran government with overseeing local and international adoptions.

Honduran Adoption Procedures:

Advance Processing- A US citizen(s) who plans to adopt a foreign orphan but does not yet have a specific child in mind, must file an Application for Advance Processing of Orphan Petition (Form I-600A) with the stateside US Bureau of Citizenship and Immigration Services in the Department of Homeland Security (BCIS) office having jurisdiction over their place of residence as soon as a decision to adopt is made.

Eligibility for Advance Processing- An application for advance processing may be filed by a married, United States citizen of any age or his or her spouse of any age, or an unmarried United States citizen who is at least 24 years old at the time he or she files the advanced processing application, and at least 25 years old at the time he or she files the orphan petition. The spouse of the United States citizen may be a citizen or an alien. An alien spouse must be in lawful immigration status if residing in the United States.

Form Used for Advance Processing- Form I-600A, Application for Advance Processing of Orphan Petition: This form is salmon or peachcolored. The instructions to this form contain important information and should be read carefully. All necessary documents that must accompany the form are listed. Current filing fee is $525.00.

Decision - I-600A approved petitions are valid for eighteen (18) months from the date of approval. A Notice of Favorable Determination Concerning Application for Advance Processing of Orphan Petition (Form I-171H), is sent to the prospective adoptive parent(s). This decision, however, does not guarantee that the orphan petition(s) to be filed will be approved. An orphan petition may still be denied because the child does not qualify as an orphan or for other proper cause.

Steps To Complete An Adoption in Honduras:

1) File a petition to adopt a child at the IHNFA. The IHNFA will provide you or your attorney an Adoption Request Form, that must be presented together with the above listed translated and authenticated certified documents (you must provide two sets. Once your application is reviewed and all requirements are met, your request will be placed on their list of applicants until a child is assigned to you (this may take a year). You cannot choose a particular child. You may refuse to accept the child assigned to you, provided that you have an acceptable reason for doing so. However, if you refuse a second child assigned to you, adoption proceedings will be terminated. Once IHNFA assigns the child, the prospective adoptive parent(s) must come to Honduras to meet the child, and be psychologically and socially evaluated by the IHNFA social worker and staff psychologist. The results of these evaluations will be used in the preparation of a report approving or denying the adoption to the Family Court. At this point the adoptive child may be placed with a foster care family at your own expense. The IHNFA will place a child in your care only if you will remain in Honduras until the adoption has been completed.

2) File a petition to adopt a child at the Honduran Family Court. Once you have completed the IHNFA's procedure, the prospective parents must appear personally to file a petition to adopt at the Family Court. Once the Court has reviewed your petition and determined that you meet the legal requirements to adopt, they will request IHNFA to provide them with a formal report on your social, psychological and economic suitability to adopt. When the Court receives the IHNFA's report and proof of publications, they will take your case under advisement. If all is in order, a final adoption decree will be issued within about three weeks.

3) Notarize the Court's Final Adoption Decree. Your attorney must notarize the final adoption decree, and a Public Deed will be executed. You or your attorney must take the Court Final Adoption Decree, the Public Deed and proof of publication to the Civil Registrar's office to register your child and to obtain a new birth certificate showing your child's new name and listing you and your spouse (if applicable) as parents. An adoption certificate will also be issued.

Age and Civil Status Requirements:

The Honduran Family Code states that one member of the adoptive couple must be 25 years old, but no more than 50 years of age. Single persons who meet the age requirements may adopt. In the case of a married couple, both partners must petition for the adoption. The child to be adopted must be at least 15 years younger than the youngest member of the adopting couple. The initial adoption petition must be presented in person by the prospective adoptive parent(s). It cannot be done through an intermediary. In practical terms, this means that both members of an adoptive couple must come to Honduras. Foreigners who are not permanent legal residents of Honduras must obtain a written "follow up certification" from a US adoption agency which is licensed and duly registered with the Instituto Hondureño del Niño y la Familia (IHNFA). The certification must state that the Agency will check periodically on the wellbeing of the child until s/he reaches the age of fourteen, provide written reports to the IHNFA to ensure that the adoptive parents meet their obligations to the child.

Adoption Agencies and Attorneys:

You will need to hire a Honduran attorney since only an attorney may present the adoption petition to the Courts. Most adoption agencies in the United States that are registered with the IHNFA have contracts with designated attorneys in Honduras. However, in most cases, you can choose to work with a different attorney. The Embassy has a list of attorneys who are bilingual; however, the Embassy cannot recommend lawyers or assume responsibility for their professional performance. The Consulate maintains a notebook of letters from parents who have adopted in Honduras available for review that may be useful in selecting an attorney. Please review current reports online at travel.state.gov/family for a list of agencies.

Honduran Documentary Requirements:

  • BCIS approval to adopt a child (Form I-171H).
  • Family photographs
  • Copy of applicant(s) passport(s)
  • Applicant(s) birth certificate(s)
  • Applicants marriage certificate
  • Applicant(s) certificate(s) of good health from licensed physician including laboratory urine and stool exams and blood tests, including for AIDS.
  • Applicant(s) certificate(s) of good conduct from local police.
  • Applicant(s) verification of employment specifying position, salary, length of service and benefits.
  • Copy of adoption law in applicant(s) state of residence.
  • Two recent, color photographs of applicant(s) home front view and neighborhood.
  • Three letters of reference from recognized and respected members of applicant(s) local community (such as government, school or church officials).
  • Certified bank statements giving the status of applicant(s) account.
  • Certified copy of the title to any property the applicant(s) may own.
  • Home study prepared by an authorized and licensed social welfare agency located near the place where applicant(s) reside.
  • A "follow up certification" from the adoption agency, who will oversee applicant(s) adoption until the child reaches the age of 14.
  • Written certification from the nearest Honduran consulate that applicant(s) have met all state adoption requirements and that the adoption agency handling your case is licensed to practice in that state.

*All documents must be translated into Spanish. They must also be authenticated by a Honduran Consulate in the U.S. and then by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Ministry of Government and Justice in Honduras. Authentication usually requires at least three to four weeks and sometimes longer. The adoptive parents or legal representatives are responsible for taking the authenticated documents to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Ministry of Justice*

U.S. Immigration Requirements:

A Honduran child, even if adopted by an American citizen, must obtain an immigrant visa before he or she can enter the U.S. as a lawful permanent resident. Please see the International Adoption section of this book for more details and review current reports online at travel.state.gov/family.

Honduran Embassy and consulates in U.S.:

Embassy of Honduras
Consular Section
Washington, DC 20008
Tel: (202) 966-7702

Honduras also has Consulates in Los Angeles, California; San Francisco, California; Jacksonville, Florida; Miami, Florida; Chicago Illinois; Baton Rouge, Louisiana; New Orleans, Louisiana; Newton, Massachusetts; New York, New York; Houston, Texas.

Honduras also has honorary consuls in Burlingame, California; San Diego, California; Denver, Colorado; Coral Gables, Florida; Gainesville, Florida; Atlanta, Georgia; Baltimore, Maryland; Minneapolis, Minnesota; St. Louis, Missouri; Rochester, New York; Cleveland, Ohio; Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; Cayey, Puerto Rico; San Juan, Puerto Rico; Providence, Rhode Island; San Antonio, Texas; and Seattle, Washington. (Honorary Consuls may perform authentication's that are required to complete adoptions in Honduras).

U.S. Consulates in Honduras:

The Consular Section is located at:
US Consulate Honduras
Unit 2909
APO AA 34022
Phone: (504) 236-9320 X 2426
Fax: (011) (504) 237-1792
Hours: 8-5 PM

US Bureau of Citizenship and Immigration Services in the Department of Homeland Security
Unit 2901; APO AA 34022
Tel: (011) (504) 236-9320 X 2711/2716
Fax: (011) (504) 236-9107
Hours: 8 am-12 PM

Penalties for "Baby Buying":

Under Honduran law, all children given up for adoption must be unconditionally abandoned to the courts. The intent of this provision is to eliminate abuses connected with the former practice of abandoning children to attorneys. According to the new law, a parent, legal representative of a child, or any other person who sells, buys, receives, or promises payment or reward for a child to be given up for adoption will be penalized with three years and one day in prison.

Fees:

Legal fees normally run from $6,000 to $8,000 but sometimes can be several thousand dollars more. For your own protection, you should negotiate all fees with your attorney before beginning the adoption process and specify all services to be included in the fee e.g., attorney's expenses, translation services, court fees, authentication's, etc. US Citizens have suggested that clients not pay fees in full in advance since the attorney would then have no incentive to finish the adoption quickly. There is little recourse in the event of a dispute (please see the Embassy's Consular Information Sheet warnings on transactions and disputes). Children who are eligible for adoption are placed in the IHNFA's care until adoptive parents have been selected; at which time they may be transferred to a foster home.

Additional Information:

Prospective adoptive parents are strongly encouraged to consult BCIS publication M-249, The Immigration of Adopted and Prospective Adoptive Children, as well as the Department of State publication, International Adoptions.

Questions:

Specific questions regarding adoption in Honduras may be addressed to the Consular Section of the U.S. Embassy or Consulate in Honduras. You may also contact the Office of Children's Issues, SA-29, 2201 C Street, NW, U.S. Department of State, Washington, DC 20520-2818, telephone (202) 736-7000 with specific questions.

Honduras

views updated May 18 2018

HONDURAS

Compiled from the September 2004 Background Note and supplemented with additional information from the State Department and the editors of this volume. See the introduction to this set for explanatory notes.

Official Name:
Republic of Honduras


PROFILE

Geography

Area: 112,090 sq. km. (43,278 sq. mi.); about the size of Louisiana.

Cities: Capital—Tegucigalpa (1,150,000); San Pedro Sula (800,000-900,000).

Terrain: Mountainous.

Climate: Tropical to subtropical, depending on elevation.

People

Nationality: Noun and adjective—Honduran(s).

Population: (2004 est.) 6.8 million.

Growth rate: (2004 est.) 2.24%.

Ethnic groups: 90% mestizo (mixed Indian and European); others of European, Arab, African, or Asian ancestry; and indigenous Indians.

Religions: Roman Catholic, Protestant minority.

Language: Spanish.

Education: Years compulsory—6. Attendance—88% overall, 31% at junior high level. Literacy—76.2%.

Health: Infant mortality rate—29.64/1,000. Life expectancy—66.2 yrs.

Work force: Services—42.2%; natural resources/agriculture—35.9%; manufacturing—16.3%; construction/housing—5.6%.

Government

Type: Democratic constitutional republic.

Independence: September 15, 1821.

Constitution: 1982; amended 1999.

Branches: Executive—president, directly elected to 4-year term. Legislative—unicameral National Congress, elected for 4-year term. Judicial—Supreme Court of Justice (appointed by Congress and confirmed by the president); several lower courts.

Political parties: National Party, Liberal Party, Innovation and National Unity Party, Christian Democratic Party, and the Democratic Unification Party.

Suffrage: Universal and compulsory at age 18.

Administrative subdivisions: 18 departments.

Economy (2003)

GDP: $17.46 billion.

Growth rate: 2.5%.

Per capita GDP: $2,600.

Natural resources: Arable land, forests, minerals, and fisheries.

Agriculture: (11% of GDP) Products—coffee, bananas, shrimp and lobster, sugar, fruits, basic grains, and livestock.

Manufacturing: (18% of GDP) Types—textiles and apparel, cement, wood products, cigars, and foodstuffs.

Trade: Exports—$1.37 billion: apparel, coffee, shrimp, bananas, palm oil, gold, zinc/lead concentrates, soap/detergents, melons, lobster, pineapple, lumber, sugar, and tobacco. Major market—U.S. (69%). Imports—$3.11 billion: fabrics, yarn, machinery, chemicals, petroleum, vehicles, processed foods, metals, agricultural products, plastic articles, and paper articles. Major source—U.S. (53%).


PEOPLE

About 90% of the population is mestizo. There also are small minorities of European, African, Asian, Arab, and indigenous Indian descent. Most Hondurans are Roman Catholic, but Protestant churches are growing in number. While Spanish is the predominant language, some English is spoken along the northern coast and is prevalent on the Caribbean Bay Islands. Several indigenous Indian languages and Garífuna (a mixture of Afro-indigenous languages) are also spoken. The restored Mayan ruins near the Guatemalan border in Copan reflect the great Mayan culture that flourished there for hundreds of years until the early 9th century. Columbus landed at mainland Honduras (Trujillo) in 1502. He named the area "Honduras" (meaning "depths") for the deep water off the coast. Spaniard Hernan Cortes arrived in 1524. The Spanish founded several settlements along the coast, and Honduras formed part of the colonial era Captaincy General of Guatemala. The cities of Comayagua and Tegucigalpa developed as early mining centers.


HISTORY

Independence

Honduras, along with many other Central American provinces, gained independence from Spain in 1821. The country was then briefly annexed to the Mexican Empire. In 1823, Honduras joined the newly formed United Provinces of Central America. Social and economic differences between Honduras and its regional neighbors exacerbated harsh partisan strife among Central American leaders and brought on the federation's collapse in 1838. Gen. Francisco Morazan—a Honduran national hero—led unsuccessful efforts to maintain the federation, and restoring Central American unity remained the chief aim of Honduran foreign policy until after World War I.

Since independence, Honduras has been plagued with nearly 300 incidents of unrest, including internal rebellions, civil wars, and changes of government—more than half of which occurred during the 20th century. The country traditionally lacked both an economic infrastructure and social and political integration. Its agriculture-based economy was dominated in the 1900s by U.S. companies that established vast banana plantations along the north coast. Foreign capital, plantation life, and conservative politics held sway in Honduras from the late 19th century until the mid-20th century.

During the relatively stable years of the Great Depression, authoritarian Gen. Tiburcio Carias Andino controlled Honduras. His ties to dictators in neighboring countries and to U.S. banana companies helped him maintain power until 1948. By then, provincial military leaders had begun to gain control of the two major parties, the Nationalists and the Liberals.

From Military to Civilian Rule

In October 1955—after two authoritarian administrations and a 1954 general strike by banana workers on the north coast—young military reformists staged a palace coup that installed a provisional junta and paved the way for constituent assembly elections in 1957. This assembly appointed Dr. Ramon Villeda Morales as President and transformed itself into a national legislature with a 6 year term. The Liberal Party ruled during 1957-63. At the same time, the military took its first steps to become a professional institution independent of leadership from any one political party, and the first class of the newly created military academy graduated in 1960. In October 1963, conservative military officers preempted constitutional elections and deposed Villeda in a bloody coup. These officers exiled Liberal Party members and took control of the national police.

The armed forces, led by Gen. Lopez Arellano, governed until 1970. Popular discontent continued to rise after a 1969 border war with El Salvador. A civilian President—Ramon Cruz of the National Party—took power briefly in 1970 but proved unable to manage the government. In December 1972, Gen. Lopez staged another coup. Lopez adopted more progressive policies, including land reform, but his regime was brought down in the mid-1970s by corruption scandals.

Gen. Lopez's successors continued armed forces modernization programs, built army and security forces, and concentrated on Honduran Air Force superiority over its neighbors. The regimes of Gen. Melgar Castro (1975-78) and Gen. Paz Garcia (1978-83) largely built the current physical infrastructure and telecommunications system of Honduras. The country also enjoyed its most rapid economic growth during this period, due to greater international demand for its products and the availability of foreign commercial lending.

Following the overthrow of Anastasio Somoza in Nicaragua in 1979 and general instability in El Salvador at the time, the Honduran military accelerated plans to return the country to civilian rule. A constituent assembly was popularly elected in April 1980, and general elections were held in November 1981. A new constitution was approved in 1982, and the Liberal Party government of President Roberto Suazo Cordoba took office following free and fair elections.

Suazo relied on U.S. support to help during a severe economic recession which was the result of regional instability caused by the revolutionary Sandinista government in Nicaragua and the chaos of the brutal civil war in El Salvador. Close cooperation on political and military issues with the United States was complemented by ambitious social and economic development projects sponsored by the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID). Honduras became host to the largest Peace Corps mission in the world, and nongovernmental and international voluntary agencies proliferated.

As the November 1985 election approached, the Liberal Party had difficulty settling on a candidate, and interpreted election law as permitting multiple presidential candidates from one party. The Liberal Party claimed victory when its presidential candidates, who received 42% of the vote, collectively outpolled the National Party candidate, Rafael Leonardo Callejas. Jose Azcona Hoyo, the candidate receiving the most votes among the Liberals, assumed the presidency in January 1986. With the endorsement of the Honduran military, the Azcona administration ushered in the first peaceful transfer of power between civilian presidents in more than 30 years. Four years later, Rafael Callejas won the presidential election, taking office in January 1990. Callejas concentrated on economic reform, reducing the deficit,

and taking steps to deal with an overvalued exchange rate and major structural barriers to investment. He began the movement to place the military under civilian control and laid the groundwork for the creation of the public ministry (attorney general's office).

Despite his administration's economic reforms, the nation's fiscal deficit ballooned during Callejas' last year in office. Growing public dissatisfaction with the rising cost of living and with widespread government corruption led voters in 1993 to elect Liberal Party candidate Carlos Roberto Reina over National Party contender Oswaldo Ramos Soto, with Reina winning 56% of the vote.

President Reina, elected on a platform calling for a "moral revolution," actively prosecuted corruption and pursued those responsible for human rights abuses in the 1980s. He created a modern attorney general's office and an investigative police force and was successful in increasing civilian control over the armed forces and transferring the police from military to civilian authority.

Reina also restored national fiscal health by substantially increasing Central Bank net international reserves, reducing inflation, restoring economic growth, and, perhaps most importantly, holding down spending.

Carlos Roberto Flores Facusse took office on January 27, 1998, as Honduras' fifth democratically elected President since democratic institutions were restored in 1981. Like three of his four predecessors, Flores was a member of the Liberal Party. He was elected by a 10% margin over his main opponent, National Party nominee Nora de Melgar. Upon taking office on January 27, 1998, Flores inaugurated programs of reform and modernization of the Honduran government and economy, with emphasis on helping Honduras' poorest citizens while maintaining the country's fiscal health and improving international competitiveness.

In October 1998, Hurricane Mitch devastated Honduras, leaving more than 5,000 people dead and 1.5 million displaced. Damages totaled nearly $3 billion. The Honduran Government agreed to a new transparent process to manage relief funds, which included significant donor oversight. This open process greatly facilitated the relief and reconstruction effort. President Flores and his administration successfully managed more than $600 million in international assistance. Civil society's role in the government-coordinated reconstruction process was lauded internationally. President Flores also moved judicial and penal reforms forward. He established an anticorruption commission, supported passage of a new penal code based on the oral accusatorial system, and saw passage of a law that created an independent Supreme Court. Flores cemented the transition from military to civilian rule by eliminating the military's commander in chief position, and by signing a law that established a civilian Minister of Defense with formal authority over the military.

Ricardo Maduro Joest of the National Party was elected to the Honduran presidency on November 25, 2001, outpolling the Liberal candidate, Rafael Pineda Ponce, by 8 percentage points. He was inaugurated on January 27, 2002. The elections, characterized by international observer teams as free, fair, and peaceful, reflected the maturing of Honduras' democratic institutions. During his campaign, President Maduro promised to reduce crime, reinvigorate the economy, and fight corruption. Working to fulfill this promise, Maduro's first act as President was to deploy a joint police-military force to the streets to permit wider neighborhood patrols in the ongoing fight against the country's massive crime problem. While the initial result of this policy was overwhelmingly positive, the policy appears to have had only a minimally positive long-term effect on the country's crime rate. President Maduro has been a strong supporter of the global war on terrorism and joined the U.S.-led coalition in Iraq with a contribution of 370 troops. Under President Maduro's guidance, Honduras also participated in the successful Central America Free Trade Agreement talks and actively promoted greater Central American economic integration.


GOVERNMENT

The 1982 constitution provides for a strong executive, a unicameral National Congress, and a judiciary appointed by the National Congress. The president is directly elected to a 4-year term by popular vote. The Congress also serves a 4-year term; congressional seats are assigned the parties' candidates in proportion to the number of votes each party receives in the various departments. The judiciary includes a Supreme Court of Justice, courts of appeal, and several courts of original jurisdiction—such as labor, tax, and criminal courts. For administrative purposes, Honduras is divided into 18 departments, with municipal officials selected for 4-year terms.


POLITICAL CONDITIONS

Reinforced by the media and several political watchdog organizations, human rights and civil liberties are reasonably well protected. There are no known political prisoners in Honduras, and the privately owned media frequently exercises its right to criticize without fear of reprisals. Organized labor now represents approximately 8% of the work force and its economic and political influence has declined. Honduras held its sixth consecutive democratic elections in November 2001, to elect a new president, unicameral Congress, and mayors. For only the second time, voters were able to cast separate ballots for each office, and for the first time, voters denied the president elect's party an absolute majority in the Congress. The incidence of cross voting between presidential and congressional candidates was marked.

Political Parties

The two major parties—the Liberal Party and the National Party—run active campaigns throughout the country. Their ideologies are mostly centrist, with diverse factions in each centered on personalities. The three smaller registered parties—the Christian Democratic Party, the Innovation and National Unity Party, and the Democratic Unification Party—have increased their political muscle in the National Congress by doubling their representation in the 2001 elections. Despite significant progress in training and installing more skillful advisers at the top of each party ladder, electoral politics in Honduras remain traditionalist and paternalistic.

Principal Government Officials

Last Updated: 10/4/04

President: Maduro , Ricardo
First Vice Pres.: Williams , Vicente
Second Vice Pres.: De Lopez , Armida
Third Vice Pres.: Diaz, Alberto
Min. of Agriculture & Livestock: Jimenez , Mariano
Min. of Culture, Arts, & Sports:
Min. of Defense: Breve , Federico
Min. of Education: Martinez Lozano , Roberto
Min. of Finance: Chong Wong , William
Min. of Foreign Relations: Rosa Bautista , Leonidas
Min. of Industry & Commerce: Garcia , Norman
Min. of Interior & Justice: Hernandez Alcerro , Jorge Ramon
Min. of Labor: Leitzelar , German
Min. of Natural Resources & Environment: Panting , Patricia
Min. of the Presidency: Cosenza , Luis
Min. of Public Employees' Retirement & Pension (INJUPEMP): Lupiac , David Mendoza
Min. of Public Health: Lizardo , Elias
Min. of Public Works, Transportation, & Housing: Carranza , Jorge
Min. of Security: Alvarez , Oscar
Min. of Tourism: De Pierrefeu , Thiery
Min. Without Portfolio (health sector): Vargas , Carlos
Min. Without Portfolio (housing sector): Kafati , Johnny
Min. Without Portfolio (investment promotion sector): Atala , Camilo
Min. Without Portfolio (public service sector): Kafati , Eduardo
Min. Without Portfolio (strategic affairs and communication sector): Medina, Ramon
Pres., Central Bank: Mondragon de Villar , Maria Elena
Ambassador to the US: Canahuati , Mario Miguel
Permanent Representative to the UN, New York: Acosta Bonilla , Manuel

Honduras maintains an embassy in the United States at 3007 Tilden Street NW, Washington, DC 20008 (tel. 202-966-7702).


ECONOMY

Honduras is one of the poorest and least developed countries in Latin America. Industrial development has been limited, and historically the economy has been dependent on exports of coffee and bananas. In the past 15 years, however, the economy has been diversified, with the development of non-traditional exports such as cultivated shrimp, melons, and tourism, and the establishment of a growing maquila industry (primarily, assembly for re-export of textiles and apparel). Investment incentives aimed at attracting foreign capital in export industries have been introduced. Meanwhile the coffee industry has suffered from low world prices, and banana production has yet to reach pre-Hurricane Mitch levels. Coffee and bananas now account for less than 15% of Honduran export earnings. Honduras also has extensive forest, marine, and mineral resources, although widespread slash-and-burn agricultural methods continue to destroy Honduran forests.

Family remittances from Hondurans living abroad (mostly in the United States) rose 19% to $860 million in 2003, and are soon expected to pass the maquila sector as the country's largest source of foreign exchange.

The exchange rate as of July 2004 was 18.26 Honduran Lempira to the dollar, compared to 17.18 Lempira to the dollar a year earlier. The currency has been undergoing a steady and controlled devaluation of roughly 6% per year for the last several years. Inflation, as measured by the consumer price index, was 7.7% in 2003, identical to the rate of 2002 and considerably lower than the double-digit inflation rates of the 1990s. International reserves, which had fallen from $1.235 billion at the end of 2002 to $1.16 billion at end of 2003, rebounded to $1.248 million by April 2004.

Unemployment was officially estimated at around 27.5% in 2003. The economic slowdown in the United States in 2001 and 2002 caused a downturn in the growth of Honduras' maquila sector, but investment and employment revived in 2003. Employment in the sector is almost back to its 2000 peak of 125,000 workers.

In July 2000, Honduras reached its decision point under the Heavily Indebted Poor Countries (HIPC) initiative, qualifying the country for interim multilateral debt relief. However, fiscal problems soon derailed the government's International Monetary Fund (IMF) program and put the HIPC debt relief on hold. After the Honduran Government took several important measures to control government spending and improve its fiscal situation, the IMF approved a new 3-year Poverty Reduction and Growth Facility program in February 2004. This in turn made possible the signing of a debt relief agreement with Paris Club creditors in April 2004, and positions the country for the HIPC completion point as of February 2005.


NATIONAL SECURITY

With the cessation of the 1980s civil wars in El Salvador and Nicaragua, the Honduran armed forces refocused their orientation toward combating transnational threats such as narcoterrorism and organized crime syndicates. Honduras supports efforts at regional integration and deployed troops to Iraq in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom. However, the resolution of the civil wars in El Salvador and Nicaragua and across-the-board budget cuts made in all ministries greatly reduced funding for the Honduran armed forces, and the abolition of the draft created staffing gaps in the now all-volunteer armed forces. The military is now far below its authorized strength. In January 1999, the constitution was amended to abolish the position of military commander in chief of the armed forces, thus codifying civilian authority over the military. Former President Flores also named the first civilian Minister of Defense in the country's history.


FOREIGN RELATIONS

Honduras is a member of the United Nations, the World Trade Organization (WTO), the Organization of American States (OAS), the Central American Parliament (PARLACEN), the Central American Integration System (SICA), and the Central American Security Commission (CASC). During 1995-96, Honduras, a founding member of the United Nations, for the first time served as a nonpermanent member of the UN Security Council. Honduras is currently a member of the UN Human Rights Commission.

Honduras is a strong proponent of Central American cooperation and integration, and is working towards the implementation of a regional customs union by the end of 2004. The agreement would ease border controls and tariffs among Honduras, Guatemala, Nicaragua, and El Salvador.

In 1969, El Salvador and Honduras fought the brief "Soccer War" over disputed border areas and the emigration of some 300,000 Salvadorans to Honduras in search of land and employment. The catalyst was nationalistic feelings aroused by a series of soccer matches between the two countries, but the roots of the conflict lay in local disputes over land ownership and usage. The two countries formally signed a peace treaty on October 30, 1980, which put the border dispute before the International Court of Justice (ICJ). In September 1992, the Court awarded most of the disputed territory to Honduras. In January 1998, Honduras and El Salvador signed a border demarcation treaty to implement the terms of the ICJ decree although delays continue due to technical difficulties. Honduras and El Salvador maintain normal diplomatic and trade relations; however, they continue to disagree over the status of their maritime borders in the Gulf of Fonseca.

Honduras and Nicaragua had tense relations throughout 2000 and early 2001 due to a maritime boundary dispute off the Atlantic Coast. Relations between the two countries have since improved, although some animosity remains.


U.S.-HONDURAN RELATIONS

Overview

The United States and Honduras have close and friendly relations. Honduras is supportive of U.S. policy in the United Nations and other fora. As a nonpermanent member of the UN Security Council, Honduras played a very helpful role in 1996, most notably in advancing the process of selecting a new UN Secretary General during its October presidency of the Council. The United States also continued to be able to count on Honduras' strong support in the war on terrorism.

The United States favors stable, peaceful relations between Honduras and its Central American neighbors. During the 1980s, Honduras supported U.S. policy in Central America opposing a revolutionary Marxist government in Nicaragua and an active leftist insurgency in El Salvador. The Honduran Government also played a key role in negotiations that culminated in the 1990 Nicaraguan elections. Honduras continues to participate in the UN observer mission in the Western Sahara, contributed troops for the reconstruction of Iraq, and remains interested in participating in other UN peacekeeping missions.

The United States is Honduras' chief trading partner, supplying 53% of its imports and purchasing 69% of its exports in 2003. U.S.-Honduran trade is dominated by the Honduran maquila industry, which imports yarn and textiles from the United States and exports finished articles of clothing. Other leading Honduran exports to the United States include coffee, bananas, seafood (particularly shrimp), minerals (including zinc, lead, gold, and silver), and other fruits and vegetables. The United States encourages U.S. investment that contributes to Honduran development and bilateral trade.

U.S. direct investment in Honduras is valued at $601 million, about 44% of the total foreign direct investment (FDI) in the country of $1.37 billion. FDI flow into Honduras in 2003 totaled $176 million, with the United States leading the way with investments totaling $145 million, or 82% of the total FDI. The largest U.S. investments in Honduras are in the maquila sector, in which apparel and textile export revenues totaled $2.53 billion in 2003. There are also significant U.S. investments in fruit production—particularly bananas, melons, and pineapple—tourism, energy generation, shrimp culture, animal feed production, telecommunications, fuel distribution, cigar manufacturing, insurance, brewing, leasing, food processing, and furniture manufacturing. Many U.S. franchises, particularly in the restaurant sector, operate in Honduras.

From January to December of 2003, the United States negotiated a free trade agreement with Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, and Nicaragua. Further negotiations in 2004 brought the Dominican Republic into the agreement as well. The agreement was signed in May 2004, but must be ratified by the U.S. Congress and by those of the other participating countries before it enters into force. The agreement, known as the U.S.-Central America Free Trade Agreement or CAFTA, will eliminate tariffs and other barriers to trade in goods, services, agricultural products, and investments. Additionally, CAFTA is seen as a mechanism to solidify democracy, encourage greater regional integration, and provide safeguards for environmental protection and labor rights.

The United States maintains a small presence at a Honduran military base; the two countries conduct joint peacekeeping, counternarcotics, humanitarian, disaster relief, and civic action exercises. U.S. troops conduct and provide logistics support for a variety of bilateral and multilateral exercises—medical, engineering, peacekeeping, counternarcotics, and disaster relief—for the benefit of the Honduran people and their Central American neighbors. U.S. forces—regular, reserve, and National Guard—benefit greatly from the training and exercises.

As of early 2001, the U.S.-trained Honduran demining unit had cleared nine major minefields measuring about 333,000 square meters, and more than 2,200 mines had been destroyed. This project is on track to be completed in 2004, at which point Honduras will be declared mine free.

U.S. Policy Toward Honduras

U.S. policy toward Honduras is aimed at consolidating stable democracy with a justice system that protects human rights and promotes the rule of law. U.S. Government programs are aimed at promoting a healthy and more open economy capable of sustainable growth, improving the climate for business and investment while protecting U.S. citizen and corporate rights, and promoting the well-being of the Honduran people. The United States also works with Honduras to meet transnational challenges—including the fight against terrorism, narcotics trafficking, money laundering, illegal migration, and trafficking in persons—and encourages and supports Honduran efforts to protect the environment. The goals of strengthening democracy and promoting viable economic growth are especially important given the geographical proximity of Honduras to the United States. Approximately 800,000 to 1 million Hondurans reside in the United States; consequently, immigration issues are an important item on our bilateral agenda.

U.S.-Honduran ties are further strengthened by numerous private sector contacts, with an average of between 80,000 and 110,000 U.S. citizens visiting Honduras annually and about 11,000 Americans residing there. More than 150 American companies operate in Honduras.

Economic and Development Assistance

To help strengthen Honduras' democratic institutions and improve living conditions, the United States has provided substantial economic assistance. The United States has historically been the largest bilateral donor to Honduras. The USAID budget for Honduras is $45 million in fiscal year 2004. Over the years, U.S. foreign assistance has helped advance such objectives as fostering democratic institutions, increasing private sector employment and income, helping Honduras fund its arrears with international financial institutions, providing humanitarian aid, increasing agricultural production, and providing loans to microbusinesses.

October 1998's Hurricane Mitch—the worst natural disaster ever to strike the Western Hemisphere—left hundreds of thousands homeless, devastated the road network and other public infrastructure, and crippled certain key sectors of the economy. Estimates show that Hurricane Mitch caused $8.5 billion in damages to homes, hospitals, schools, roads, farms, and businesses throughout Central America, including more than $3 billion in Honduras alone.

In response, the United States provided more than $461 million in immediate disaster relief and humanitarian aid spread over the years 1998-2001. This supplemental assistance was designed to help repair water and sanitation systems; replace housing, schools, and roads; provide agricultural inputs; provide local government crisis management training; grant debt relief; and encourage environmental management expertise. Additional resources were utilized to maintain anti-crime and drug assistance programs. The vast majority of the U.S. reconstruction projects were scheduled to finish by December 31, 2001, with the exception of some water and sanitation and transparency projects that were extended for another 14 months. In 2001, the United States also provided food aid in response to a short drought and the depressed state of the agriculture sector. Subsequently, the United States provided $265,000 in disaster assistance after Tropical Storm Michelle inundated the north coast with floods.

New and existing U.S. economic programs—some with proposed enhancements that have taken on even greater importance since the hurricane—include the Caribbean Basin Economic Recovery Act, Overseas Private Investment Corporation financing for private investment and insurance against risks of war and expropriation, U.S. Trade Development Agency grant loans for pre-feasibility studies of projects with U.S. product and services export potential, and U.S. Export-Import Bank short and medium-term financing for U.S. exports to Honduran importers. All of these provide greater economic opportunity for U.S. and Honduran businessmen and women.

The Peace Corps has been active in Honduras since 1962, and currently the program is one of the largest in the world. In 2004, there were 223 Peace Corps Volunteers working in the poorest parts of Honduras.

The U.S. Government strongly supports the professionalization of the civilian police force as an important element in strengthening the rule of law in Honduras. The American Embassy in Tegucigalpa provides specialized training to police officers through the International Criminal Training Assistance Program.

Security Assistance

The role of the Honduran armed forces has changed significantly in recent years as many institutions formerly controlled by the military are now under civilian authority. The defense and police budgets have hovered at around $35 million during the past few years. Honduras receives modest U.S. security assistance funds and training.

In the absence of a large security assistance program, defense cooperation has taken the form of increased participation by the Honduran armed forces in military-to-military contact programs and bilateral and multilateral combined exercises oriented toward peacekeeping, disaster relief, humanitarian/civic assistance, and counternarcotics. The U.S. Joint Task Force Bravo (JTF-B), stationed at the Honduran Soto Cano Air Base, plays a vital role in supporting combined exercises in Honduras and in neighboring Central American countries. While JTF-Bravo has been involved in several multilateral exercises and numerous smaller humanitarian deployments, it played an absolutely critical role in helping the United States to respond to Hurricanes Mitch and Keith, and the earthquakes in El Salvador by saving lives, repairing critical infrastructure, and in meeting high priority health and sanitation needs. U.S. forces also delivered millions of dollars worth of privately donated goods to those in need.

U.S. Business Opportunities

U.S. Department of Commerce trade data show that bilateral trade between the two nations totaled $5.83 billion in 2002, the most recent year for which statistics are available. Exports of goods and services from the U.S. totaled $2.56 billion 2002, and Honduran exports to the U.S. totaled $3.26 billion. U.S. investors account for nearly two-thirds of the estimated stock of $1.3 billion in foreign direct investment in Honduras. More than 150 American companies operate in Honduras; U.S. franchises are present in increasing numbers.

Opportunities for U.S. business sales include textile machinery, construction equipment, automotive parts and accessories, telecommunications equipment, pollution control/water resources equipment, agricultural machinery, hotel and restaurant equipment, computers and software, franchising, and household consumer goods. Best prospects for agricultural products are corn, milled rice, wheat, soybean meal, and consumer-ready products.

U.S. citizens contemplating investment in real estate in Honduras should proceed with extreme caution, especially in the Bay Islands or coastal areas, because of frequently conflicting legislation, problems with land titles, and a weak judicial system. Investors or their attorneys should check property titles not only with the property registry office having jurisdiction in the area in which the property is located (being especially observant of marginal annotations on the deed and that the property is located within the area covered by the original title), but also with the National Agrarian Institute (INA) and the National Forestry Administration (COHDEFOR). Investors in land should be aware that even clear title is not a guarantee that a future dispute over land would be resolved equitably.

Principal U.S. Embassy Officials

TEGUCIGALPA (E) Address: Avenida La Paz, Tegucigalpa, Honduras; APO/FPO: American Embassy, APO AA 34022; Phone: (504) 236-9320; Fax: (504) 236-9037; Work-week: M–F, 8-5 local time; Website: www.usmission.hn

AMB:Larry Palmer
AMB OMS:Linda Lopez
DCM:Roger Pierce
DCM OMS:Peggy Laurance
CG:Ian Brownlee
POL:Francisco Palmieri
COM:Mitch Larsen (resident in Guatemala)
MGT:Jesse I. Coronado
AFSA:Derrick Olsen
AGR:Steve Huete (resident in Guatemala)
AID:Paul Tuebner
CLO:Sigret Sanes
DAO:Derek R. Dickey, USAF
DEA:John Mark Discenza
ECO:Patrick Dunn
EEO:Calvin T. Watlington
FMO:Calvin Watlington
GSO:Ana P. Baide
ICASS Chair:Chief Fred Kerzic
IMO:Mari Jain Womack
INS:Luis Figueroa (acting)
IPO:Monica Barreto
LAB:Derrick Olsen
LEGATT:David Wattley (resident in zPanama)
MLO:Mario Mastrandrea
PAO:Melissa Cooper
RSO:Bruce Lizzi
State ICASS:Francisco Palmieri
Last Updated: 1/21/2005

Contact Information

American Chamber of Commerce
Hotel Honduras Maya
Apartado Postal 1838
Tegucigalpa, Honduras
Tel: (504) 232-7043/232-6035; Fax: (504) 232-9959
Branch office in San Pedro Sula
Tel: (504) 557-6402/559-6412; Fax: (504) 557-6402

Caribbean/Latin American Action
1818 N Street, NW
Suite 310
Washington, DC 20036
Tel: 202-466-7464; Fax: 202-822-0075

U.S. Department of Commerce
International Trade Administration
Office of Latin America and the Caribbean
14th and Constitution Avenue, NW
Washington, DC 20230
Tel: 202-482-0057
800-USA-TRADE; Fax: 202-482-0464
Internet: http://www.ita.doc.gov

U.S. Agency for International Development
1300 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW
Washington, DC 20523-0001
Tel: 202-712-4810; Fax: 202-216-3524
Internet: www.usaid.gov


TRAVEL

Consular Information Sheet

March 10, 2004

Country Description: Honduras is a democracy with a developing economy. The national language is Spanish, although English is often spoken in the Bay Islands. The climate is generally pleasant and temperate, with dry and wet seasons. The terrain ranges from mountainous to coastal beaches and jungle lowlands. Hotels and restaurants are generally adequate in the capital city of Tegucigalpa, San Pedro Sula, Tela, La Ceiba, the Bay Islands and the Copan ruins. Currency exchange is readily available at banks and hotels in the major cities.

Entry/Exit Requirements: All U.S. citizens must have a valid U.S. passport to enter and depart Honduras. A visa is not required, but tourists must provide proof of return or onward travel.

Parents should not rely on birth certificates for travel of their children; rather, they should obtain U.S. passports for infants and minors born in the U.S. prior to travel. For U.S. citizen children born in the United States to Honduran parents, Honduran Immigration provides an "evidence of continuance" (Constancia de Permanencia) stamp placed in the U.S. passport that allows the child to enter, depart, and remain in Honduras. Visitors are given a permit to remain in Honduras for 30 days. Honduran immigration may grant up to two thirty-day extensions for a total of 90 days. Thereafter, tourists must leave the country prior to reentering.

On departure, visitors are required to pay an exit fee, either in dollars or in local currency, at the airline counter. The current fee for international departures is $25 per visit, and an additional $2 agricultural inspection fee has recently been added. This fee is subject to change.

In an effort to prevent international child abduction and trafficking in persons, many governments have initiated special procedures at entry/exit points regarding the travel of minors. These often include requiring documentary evidence of relationship and permission for the child's travel from the parent(s) or legal guardian not present. Having such documentation on hand, even if not required, may facilitate entry/exit. Minors who are dual U.S.-Honduran nationals or who are resident in Honduras require notarized consent from both parents if traveling alone or in someone else's custody, or from the absent parent if traveling with only one parent. In cases where one parent has sole custody, the custodial parent must submit the custody decree to Honduran immigration upon departure.

For more information concerning entry and exit requirements, travelers may contact the Embassy of Honduras at 3007 Tilden Street N.W., Washington, D.C. 20008, telephone: (202) 966-7702; or a Honduran consulate in Atlanta, Boston, Chicago, Houston, Jacksonville, Los Angeles, Miami, New Orleans, New York, Phoenix, and San Francisco. The Honduran Embassy's e-mail address is [email protected], and interested individuals may visit the Embassy's website for additional contact information through http://www.embassy.org/ or http://www.state.gov/. For tourist information or suggestions, please contact the Honduras Institute of Tourism at 1-800-410-9608 (in the United States), at 1-800-222-TOUR (8687) (within Honduras only) or visit their website http://www.hondurastips.honduras.com/. The Honduran Ministry of Tourism's website is http://www.letsgohonduras.com.

Dual Nationality: Dual nationality is only permissible for minors under the age of 21 and those Honduran born citizens who have become naturalized citizens of other countries. U.S.-born citizens who have become Honduran citizens by naturalization are not considered by the Government of Honduras to have dual nationality, which considers them to be solely Honduran. U.S. citizens do not lose their nationality if they become residents of Honduras. Dual nationals, in addition to being subject to all Honduran laws affecting U.S. citizens, may be subject to other laws that impose special obligations on Honduran citizens. For more information, please contact Honduran Immigration in Tegucigalpa (telephone 238-5613), San Pedro Sula (telephone 550-3728), Roatan (telephone 445-1226), La Ceiba (telephone 442-0638), or Puerto Cortes (telephone 665-0582). Please see the Bureau of Consular Affairs home page on the Internet at http://travel.state.gov for our Dual Nationality flyer.

Safety and Security: Political demonstrations occur sporadically. They can disrupt traffic, but they are generally announced in advance and are usually peaceful. Travelers should avoid areas where demonstrations are taking place, and they should keep informed by following the local news and consulting hotel personnel and tour guides.

There have been kidnapping attempts and threats against a few U.S. citizens. For more information, we strongly encourage travelers to visit the U.S. Embassy's website at www.usmission.hn/english/mission/security.htm and click on Personal Security Measures – Kidnap Briefing. There have also been incidents involving roadblocks and violence connected with land disputes that can delay travel, particularly in the north coast area near Trujillo.

The areas off both coasts of Honduras have been the subject of maritime border disputes between Honduras and its neighbors. The Honduran Navy patrols these areas, and all private vessels transiting Honduran territorial waters should be prepared to be hailed and possibly boarded by Honduran military personnel to verify documentation. The Honduran Navy uses private vessels as well as military vessels to patrol Honduran waters. In the event that any vessel is hailed in Honduran waters in the Caribbean by a non-military vessel or any suspicious vessel and directed to prepare for boarding, the vessel should immediately contact the U.S. Coast Guard Operations Center by radio or INMARSAT at 305-415-6800. Anyone needing more information can also contact the U.S Embassy and request the U.S. Military Group (USMILGP) Duty Officer.

While the Honduran side of the Honduras-Nicaragua border has been largely cleared of land mines, travelers should exercise caution in the vicinity of the border because some land mines, scattered by flooding during Hurricane Mitch in October 1998, may still exist in the area.

Crime: The security situation in Honduras requires a high degree of caution, and U.S. citizens are encouraged to follow local news reports (Please see link to sources at http://www.usmission.hn/.) and contact the Honduran Embassy in Washington, D.C. and the U.S. Embassy in Tegucigalpa for current conditions. Poverty, gangs, and low apprehension and conviction rates of criminals contribute to a high crime rate. Many men in Honduras carry firearms and machetes, and disputes are sometimes settled with violence. Both violent and petty crime is prevalent throughout the country. While crime affects everyone in Honduras, criminals have at times targeted persons, particularly those coming from airports (a cycle of armed robberies followed by brief increases in police patrols) and hotels, as well as wealthy-looking residents in San Pedro Sula, Tela, Trujillo, and Tegucigalpa. Street crime is a principal concern, with thefts, including purse snatching, pickpocketing, assaults, and armed robberies on the rise in urban areas. There has been an increase in street robberies by twomen teams on medium-sized motorcycles targeting pedestrians. There have been some incidents of sexual assault. Carjackings, kidnappings, muggings, and home invasions are not uncommon. The government has instituted a "zero tolerance" policy on crime. As part of this policy, the police patrol jointly with armed soldiers in major cities in an effort to reduce crime.

Thirty-five U.S. citizens have been murdered in Honduras since 1995, and most cases remain unresolved. There are problems with the judicial process, including an acute shortage of trained personnel, equipment, staff, financial resources, and reports of corruption. The Honduran law enforcement authorities' ability to prevent, respond, investigate, apprehend, file Interpol reports, and prosecute criminal incidents remains limited. Honduran police generally do not speak English. The government has recently established a special tourist police in the resort towns of Tela and La Ceiba and plans to expand this force to other popular tourist destinations.

The San Pedro Sula area has seen occasional armed robberies against tourist vans, minibuses and cars traveling from the airport to area hotels, infrequently targeting the road to Copan. Vehicles force the transport off the road, and then men with AK-47s rob the victims, occasionally assaulting the driver or passengers. Robberies in this area may be based on tips from sources at airport arrival areas associated with large amounts of luggage/supplies usually for groups – not average tourists; please exercise caution in discussing travel plans in public.

Copan, the Bay Islands and other tourist destinations have a lower crime rate than other parts of the country, but petty thefts and assaults do occur. Specifically, visitors to Copan and the Bay Islands have experienced some petty thefts and, on Roatan Island, robbers have targeted homes and longer-term leased residences. Hotels and pensions are considered safer. U.S. citizens visiting the islands should exercise particular caution around sparsely inhabited coastal areas and should avoid walking on isolated beaches, especially at night. While incidents of serious violent crime in these regions are infrequent, three U.S. citizens have been murdered in Roatan since 1998. However, all the victims in Roatan were either residing in Roatan and/or involved in real estate or commercial ventures. Coxen Hole should be avoided after dark.

Although not a primary tourist destination, the northern part of the Department of Olancho is known for lumber and narcotics smuggling and violence. Travelers in that area should use extra caution. See the description of highways/areas to be avoided for details.

Incidents of crime along roads in Honduras are common. There have been frequent incidents of highway robbery on a number of roads including Limones to La Union, Olancho (route 41) via Salama and northward to Esquipulas Del Norte. For more information, please see the section below on Travel Safety and Road Conditions.

Tourists and residents should avoid walking at night in most areas of Honduras, especially in the major cities. Night driving is also discouraged. Tourists, in particular, should not hike alone in backcountry areas, nor walk alone on beaches, historic ruins or trails. All bus travel should be during daylight hours and on first-class conveyances, not on economy buses. Please pick taxis carefully, and note the driver's name and license number. Instruct the driver not to pick up other passengers, agree on the fare before you depart, and have small bills available for payment, as taxi drivers often do not make change.

Please do not resist a robbery attempt. Most criminals have weapons, and most injuries and deaths have resulted when victims have resisted. Two foreign tourists were murdered in July 2002 while resisting an armed robbery on a public bus in which they were traveling. Do not hitchhike or go home with strangers, particularly from nightspots. Whenever possible, travel in groups of two or more persons. Use the same common sense while traveling in Honduras that you would in any high crime area of a major U.S. city. Do not wear excessive jewelry in downtown or rural areas. Do not carry large sums of money, display cash in general, ATM or credit cards you do not need, or other valuables.

There have been incidents of armed assaults against private sailing vessels by criminals posing as fishermen off the northeast coast of Honduras, particularly in the numerous small islands northeast of the coast of the Department of Gracias a Dios. Sailors should contact the Coast Guard and yacht facility managers in their areas of travel for current information.

The loss or theft abroad of a U.S. passport should be reported immediately to the local police and the nearest U.S. embassy or consulate. Groups should send passport, date of birth and emergency contact information to the American Citizens Services section of the U.S. Embassy in Tegucigalpa via fax, 011-504-238-4357, prior to travel. Individuals as well as groups should keep a copy of the passport data page and leave a copy at home with a friend or family member. U.S. citizens may refer to the Department of State's pamphlet, A Safe Trip Abroad, for ways to promote a trouble-free journey. The pamphlet is available by mail from the Superintendent of Documents, U.S. Government Printing Office, Washington, D.C. 20402, via the Internet at http://www.gpoaccess.gov, or via the Bureau of Consular Affairs home page at http://travel.state.gov/.

If you are the victim of a crime while overseas, in addition to reporting to the local police, please contact the U.S. Embassy in Tegucigalpa or the Consular Agency in San Pedro Sula for assistance. The Embassy staff can, for example, assist you in finding appropriate medical care, in contacting family members or friends, and in explaining how funds can be transferred. Although the investigation and prosecution of crime (with the exception of certain terrorist acts) is solely the responsibility of local authorities, consular officers can help you to understand the local criminal justice process and help you to find an attorney if needed.

Medical Facilities: Medical care in Honduras varies in quality. Although doctors are generally well trained, support staff and facilities are not up to U.S. standards. Facilities for advanced surgical procedures are not available. The islands of Roatan, Utila, and Guanaja do not have a general surgery hospital. There is a decompression chamber on Roatan for divers. Travelers carrying prescription medicine should ensure that the medication is clearly labeled.

Medical Insurance: The Department of State strongly urges Americans to consult with their medical insurance company prior to traveling abroad to confirm whether their policy applies overseas and if it will cover emergency expenses such as a medical evacuation. U.S. medical insurance plans seldom cover health costs incurred outside the United States unless supplemental coverage is purchased. Further, U.S. Medicare and Medicaid programs do not provide payment for medical services outside the United States. However, many travel agents and private companies offer insurance plans that will cover health care expenses incurred overseas, including emergency services such as medical evacuations.

When making a decision regarding health insurance, Americans should consider that many foreign doctors and hospitals require payment in cash prior to providing service and that a medical evacuation to the United States may cost well in excess of $50,000. Uninsured travelers who require medical care overseas often face extreme difficulties. When consulting with your insurer prior to your trip, please ascertain whether payment will be made to the overseas healthcare provider or if you will be reimbursed later for expenses that you incur. Some insurance policies also include coverage for psychiatric treatment and for disposition of remains in the event of death.

Useful information on medical emergencies abroad, including overseas insurance programs, is provided in the Department of State's Bureau of Consular Affairs brochure, Medical Information for Americans Traveling Abroad, available via the Bureau of Consular Affairs home page.

Specific Health Risks: Visitors to Honduras are at risk for gastrointestinal illnesses. Pay careful attention to the choice of food and beverages. Most well known restaurants are considered safe. Tap water is not potable and should be boiled or chemically treated to help prevent cholera and gastrointestinal disorders. Safe bottled water is widely available. Mosquito-borne illnesses are a recurring problem in Honduras. All persons traveling in Honduras, even for a brief visit, are at risk of contracting malaria year-round if they travel out-side of Tegucigalpa to low-lying areas. Take a prophylactic regimen best suited to your health profile. The country regularly suffers from outbreaks of dengue fever during the rainy season. Travelers should take precautions against being bitten by mosquitoes to reduce the chance of contracting such illnesses. Because rabies is endemic in Honduras, visitors should avoid contact with animals whose immunization status is unknown.

Individuals traveling to Honduras should ensure that all their routine vaccinations are up to date, and they may also consider getting a Hepatitis A and B vaccination. Rabies is a problem in Honduras, and the post-bite prophylaxis is not available. Immediate evacuation to the United States for treatment is the rule.

Other Health Information: Information on vaccinations and other health precautions, such as safe food and water precautions and insect bit protection, may be obtained from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's hotline for international travelers at 1-877-FYI-TRIP (1-877-394-8747); fax 1-888-CDC-FAXX (1-888-232-3299) or CDC's Internet site at http://www.cdc.gov/travel.

Travel Safety and Road Conditions: While in a foreign country, U.S. citizens may encounter road conditions that differ significantly from those in the United States. The information below concerning Honduras is provided for general reference only, and it may not be totally accurate in a particular location or circumstances.

Safety of Public Transportation: poor
Urban Road Conditions/Maintenance: Fair
Rural Road Conditions/Maintenance: Poor
Availability of Roadside Assistance: Poor

Because of crime and poor road conditions, driving can be very dangerous, and travelers may want to carry a cellular phone in case of an emergency. Travelers should exercise extreme caution while driving on isolated stretches of road and passing on mountainous curves. Rockslides are common, especially in the rainy season (June through December). Traffic signs, even on major highways, are often inadequate, and streets in the major cities are often unmarked. Travelers should drive with doors locked and windows rolled up.

Major highways have been rebuilt following the destruction caused by Hurricane Mitch in 1998, though many stretches are still under repair. Major cities are connected by an inconsistently maintained, two-lane system of paved roads, and many secondary roads in Honduras are unpaved. During the rainy season, even major highways are often closed due to rockslides and flooding. Hurricane Mitch washed out many bridges throughout the country, and temporary repairs are vulnerable to heavy rains.

Some of the most dangerous stretches for road travel include: Tegucigalpa to Choluteca, because of dangerous mountain curves; El Progreso to La Ceiba, because of animal crossings and the poor condition of bridges from flooding; and Limones to La Union, Olancho (route 41) via Salama and northward to Saba. This stretch of road is also referred to by locals as the "Corridor of Death" because of frequent incidents of highway robbery.

Route 39 through northern Olancho Department between Gualaco and San Esteban is highly dangerous and should be avoided.

Route 43 in northwest Olancho Department from Talanga to Olanchito via Yoro route 23 will become a primary route to the north coast when the remaining 60% of the highway is paved circa 1/05.

The only recommended route to the north coast from the south is CA-5 to route 21 to CA-13 via Tela to La Ceiba and Trujillo.

Honduran roads also suffer from a general lack of lighting and poorly marked highways. Vehicles are often driven at night without adequate illumination, and animals and people wander onto the roads at all hours. For these reasons, and because of the high incidence of crime, the U.S. Embassy strongly discourages car and bus travel after dark.

Hijackings of private and commercial vehicles from the United States to Honduras have occurred. Honduras and the United States have signed a stolen vehicle treaty; however, it has not yet entered into force. Moreover, since Honduran law protects good faith buyers, even of stolen vehicles, it is difficult to recover stolen vehicles. Vehicle insurance may mitigate loss; please check with the National Insurance Crime Bureau at http://www.nicb.org/, private insurance carriers, and our web site information on Commercial Vehicle Hijackings at http://www.usmission.hn/english/mission/security.htm for more information.

For additional general information about road safety, please see the Department of State, Bureau of Consular Affairs, home page at http://travel.state.gov/road_safety.html. For specific information concerning Honduran driving permits, vehicle inspection, road tax and mandatory insurance, please contact the Honduran National Tourist Organization offices in New York via the Internet at http://www.hondurastips.honduras.com.

Aviation Safety Oversight: The U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has assessed the Government of Honduras's civil aviation authority as Category 2—not in compliance with international aviation safety standards for the oversight of Honduran air carrier operations. There is currently one Honduran airline, Sol Air, flying to the United States. However, this airline actually leases its aircraft and crews from a U.S. company. For further information, travelers may contact the Department of Transportation within the United States at tel. 1-800-322-7873, or visit the FAA's Internet web site at http://www.intl.faa.gov.

Customs Regulations: Honduran customs authorities may enforce strict regulations concerning temporary importation into or export from Honduras of items such as firearms, antiquities, medications, and business equipment. For example, Honduran law prohibits the export of antiques and artifacts from pre-colonial civilizations. To protect the country's biodiversity, it is illegal to export certain birds, feathers and other flora and fauna.

U.S. citizens, who intend to stay in Honduras for an extended period of time and who bring vehicles or household goods into the country, should consult Honduran customs officials prior to shipment. For specific information regarding customs requirements, please contact the Embassy of Honduras in Washington, D.C. or the nearest Honduran consulate.

Criminal Penalties: While in a foreign country, a U.S. citizen is subject to that country's laws and regulations, which sometimes differ significantly from those in the United States and may not afford the protections available to the individual under U.S. law. Penalties for breaking the law can be more severe than in the United States for similar offenses. Persons violating Honduran laws, even unknowingly, may be expelled, arrested or imprisoned. Penalties for possession, use, or trafficking in illegal drugs in Honduras are strict, and convicted offenders can expect jail sentences and heavy fines. For more information, please check the U.S. Embassy's web site at http://www.usmission.hn for the handout on If You are Arrested in Honduras. Note – Under the new U.S. "Protect Act" effective April 2003 it is a crime prosecutable in the U.S. to travel to a foreign country to sexually exploit children via pornography, the Internet and other means.

Consular Access: U.S. citizens are encouraged to carry a copy of their U.S. passports with them at all times so that if questioned by local officials, proof of identity and U.S. citizenship are readily available. In accordance with the Vienna Convention, Honduran authorities must allow U.S. citizens to contact a U.S. Consular Officer, if arrested or detained in Honduras.

Special Circumstances: Real Estate Investment: U.S. citizens should be aware of the risks inherent in purchasing real estate in Honduras and should exercise extreme caution before entering into any form of commitment to invest in property, particularly in coastal areas and the Bay Islands. Honduran laws and practices regarding real estate differ substantially from those in the United States, and there are many cases of fraudulent deeds and titles. In addition, the Honduran judicial system is weak and inefficient, often prolonging disputed cases for many years before resolution. Approximately 80% of the privately-held land in the country is untitled. Americans have spent thousands of dollars in legal fees and years of frustration in trying to resolve property disputes, even in cases in which local attorneys and Honduran and U.S. real estate agents had given assurances to the investor. There have also been incidents in which violence has been used against Americans involved in disputed property cases. American citizens should investigate purchases thoroughly and take all legal measures to prevent and, if necessary, resolve property disputes. Potential investors should engage competent local legal representation before making any commitments. Investors should thoroughly check references and bona fides of attorneys and real estate agents.

The Honduran constitution contains provisions restricting or prohibiting land ownership by foreigners in coastal and border areas, notwithstanding subsequent passage by the Honduran congress of laws authorizing such ownership in certain areas and with particular restrictions. The enforcement of laws and procedures pertaining to property titles in Honduras is inconsistent. Squatters have also claimed a number of properties owned by U.S. citizens. Investors and their attorneys should thoroughly check property titles. For further information on investing in property in Honduras, please contact the U.S. Embassy's economic section. For information on contracting Honduran legal representation, please check with other investors. You may also refer to the list of attorneys available on the Embassy's homepage at http://www.usmission.hn/. In all cases, please check references and bona fides.

Financial Market Investment: Due to poor regulation and lack of guarantees, investment in the Honduran "Bolsa de Valores," or securities market, as well as banking institution bonds, fidecomisos (trusts), and certificates of deposit from uninsured financial institutions pose high risk to investors. Extreme caution should be exercised if contemplating such activities. American citizens have lost large sums of money, which cannot be recovered, through investments in such precarious markets.

Disaster Preparedness: Honduras is prone to flooding and landslides from heavy rains, especially during the rainy season, which generally occurs from June to December. Hurricane Mitch caused extensive damage and loss of life in October 1998. General information about natural disaster preparedness is available via the Internet from the U.S. Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) at http://www.fema.gov/.

Children's Issues: For information on international adoption of children and international parental child abduction, please refer to our Internet site at http://travel.state.gov/children's_issues.html or telephone the Overseas Citizens Services call center at 1-888-407-4747. The OCS call center can answer general inquiries regarding international adoptions and abductions and will forward calls to the appropriate country officer in the Bureau of Consular Affairs. This number is available from 8:00 a.m. to 8:00 p.m. Eastern Time, Monday through Friday (except U.S. federal holidays). Callers who are unable to use toll-free numbers, such as those calling from overseas, may obtain information and assistance during these hours by calling 1-317-472-2328.

Registration/Embassy Location: Americans living in or visiting Honduras are encouraged to register at the Consular Section of the U.S. Embassy in Tegucigalpa and to obtain updated information on travel and security within Honduras. Travelers can register in person, or fill out the form available on the Embassy website and fax it to the Embassy. Please include a copy of the data page of your passport and emergency contact information.

The U.S. Embassy and Consulate are located at:

Avenida La Paz in Tegucigalpa, Honduras;
Fax: 011-504-238-4357
Web site: http://www.usmission.hn/
Telephone: 011-504-236-9320 or 011-504-238-5114
For information on services for U.S. citizens, please ask for ext. 4400.

The Consular Agency in San Pedro Sula is located at:

Banco Atlantida Building—8th Floor
San Pedro Sula, Honduras
Telephone: 011-504-558-1580

The Consular Agent is available during limited hours to accept U.S. passport applications for adjudication at the Embassy in Tegucigalpa, perform notarial services and assist U.S. citizens with emergencies. Please call for office hours. The Consular Agent does not provide visa information or services.

For more details about all U.S. Embassy and consular services in Honduras, please see the Embassy web site at: http://www.usmission.hn or visit the Bureau of Consular Affairs web site at: http://travel.state.gov/.

International Adoption

January 2005

The information below has been edited from a report of the State Department Bureau of Consular Affairs, Office of Overseas Citizens Services. For more information, please read the International Adoption section of this book and review current reports online at www.travel.state.gov/family.

Disclaimer: The information in this circular relating to the legal requirements of specific foreign countries is provided for general information only. Questions involving interpretation of specific foreign laws should be addressed to foreign legal counsel.

General: The Government of Honduras is strict in its application of adoption law. There are no private adoptions in Honduras. Adoptions in Honduras usually take from 6 months up to one year. Please be cautious in dealing with individuals who offer to facilitate or shortcut the adoption procedure; they cannot legally short-circuit the process. Adoption agencies are required to register with IHNFA. If they are not registered, IHNFA cannot assist the agencies in the adoption process.

Honduran Adoption Authority: All adoptions must go through the Instituto Hondureño del Niño y la Familia, also known as "IHNFA", which is a social welfare agency charged by the Honduran government with overseeing local and international adoptions.

Steps to Complete an Adoption In Honduras:
1) File a petition to adopt a child at the IHNFA. Once your application is reviewed and all requirements are met, your request will be placed on their list of applicants until a child is assigned to you (this may take a year). You cannot choose a particular child. You may refuse to accept the child assigned to you, provided that you have an acceptable reason for doing so. However, if you refuse a second child assigned to you, adoption proceedings will be terminated.

2) File a petition to adopt a child at the Honduran Family Court. Once the Court has reviewed your petition and determined that you meet the legal requirements to adopt, they will request IHNFA to provide them with a formal report on your social, psychological and economic suitability to adopt. You should insist that your attorney follow up with the Court to ensure that this order is sent promptly.

3) Notarize the Court's Final Adoption Decree.

Please review current reports online at www.travel.state.gov/family for more detailed information.

Age and Civil Status Requirements: The Honduran Family Code states that one member of the adoptive couple must be 25 years old, but no more than 50 years of age. Single persons who meet the age requirements may adopt. In the case of a married couple, both partners must petition for the adoption. The child to be adopted must be at least 15 years younger than the youngest member of the adopting couple. The initial adoption petition must be presented in person by the prospective adoptive parent(s). It cannot be done through an intermediary. In practical terms, this means that both members of an adoptive couple must come to Honduras. Foreigners who are not permanent legal residents of Honduras must obtain a written "follow up certification" from a US adoption agency which is licensed and duly registered with the Instituto Hondureño del Niño y la Familia (IHNFA). The certification must state that the Agency will check periodically on the wellbeing of the child until s/he reaches the age of fourteen, provide written reports to the IHNFA to ensure that the adoptive parents meet their obligations to the child. Honduran children become eligible for adoption in one of two ways:

a) Abandoned children, whose parents are unknown, cannot be found, or who have refused to care for their offspring.

b) Child relinquished for adoption occurs when a parent(s) voluntarily gives up his/her child for adoption. If both parents of the child are living, then Honduran law does not permit them to give up their child for adoption.

Adoption Agencies and Attorneys: You will need to hire a Honduran attorney since only an attorney may present the adoption petition to the Courts. Most adoption agencies in the United States that are registered with the IHNFA have contracts with designated attorneys in Honduras. However, in most cases, you can choose to work with a different attorney. The Embassy has a list of attorneys who are bilingual; however, the Embassy cannot recommend lawyers or assume responsibility for their professional performance. The Consulate maintains a notebook of letters from parents who have adopted in Honduras available for review that may be useful in selecting an attorney.

Honduran Documentary Requirements:

  • BCIS approval to adopt a child (Form I-171H).
  • Family photographs
  • Copy of applicant(s) passport(s)
  • Applicant(s) birth certificate(s)
  • Applicants marriage certificate
  • Applicant(s) certificate(s) of good health from licensed physician including laboratory urine and stool exams and blood tests, including for AIDS.
  • Applicant(s) certificate(s) of good conduct from local police.
  • Applicant(s) verification of employment specifying position, salary, length of service and benefits.
  • Copy of adoption law in applicant(s) state of residence.
  • Two recent, color photographs of applicant(s) home front view and neighborhood.
  • Three letters of reference from recognized and respected members of applicant(s) local community (such as government, school or church officials).
  • Certified bank statements giving the status of applicant(s) account.
  • Certified copy of the title to any property the applicant(s) may own.
  • Home study prepared by an authorized and licensed social welfare agency located near the place where applicant(s) reside.

A "follow up certification" from the adoption agency, who will oversee applicant(s) adoption until the child reaches the age of 14.

Written certification from the nearest Honduran consulate that applicant(s) have met all state adoption requirements and that the adoption agency handling your case is licensed to practice in that state.

*All documents must be translated into Spanish. They must also be authenticated by a Honduran Consulate in the U.S. and then by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Ministry of Government and Justice in Honduras.

U.S. Immigration Requirements: A Honduran child, even if adopted by an American citizen, must obtain an immigrant visa before he or she can enter the U.S. as a lawful permanent resident. Please see the International Adoption section of this book for more details and review current reports online at travel.state.gov/family

Honduran Embassy and Consulates in US:

Embassy of Honduras
Consular Section
Washington, DC 20008
Tel: (202) 966-7702

Honduras also has Consulates in Los Angeles, California; San Francisco, California; Jacksonville, Florida; Miami, Florida; Chicago Illinois; Baton Rouge, Louisiana; New Orleans, Louisiana; Newton, Massachusetts; New York, New York; Houston, Texas.

Honduras also has honorary consuls in Burlingame, California; San Diego, California; Denver, Colorado; Coral Gables, Florida; Gainesville, Florida; Atlanta, Georgia; Baltimore, Maryland; Minneapolis, Minnesota; St. Louis, Missouri; Rochester, New York; Cleveland, Ohio; Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; Cayey, Puerto Rico; San Juan, Puerto Rico; Providence, Rhode Island; San Antonio, Texas; and Seattle, Washington. (Honorary Consuls may perform authentication's that are required to complete adoptions in Honduras).

U.S. Consulates in Honduras:

US Consulate Honduras
Unit 2909
APO AA 34022
Phone: (504) 236-9320 X 2426; Fax: (011) (504) 237-1792
Hours: 8-5 PM

US Bureau of Citizenship and Immigration Services in the Department of Homeland Security
Unit 2901
APO AA 34022
Tel: (011) (504) 236-9320 X 2711/2716; Fax: (011) (504) 236-9107
Hours: 8 am—12 PM

Penalties for "Baby Buying": Under Honduran law, all children given up for adoption must be unconditionally abandoned to the courts. The intent of this provision is to eliminate abuses connected with the former practice of abandoning children to attorneys.

According to the new law, a parent, legal representative of a child, or any other person who sells, buys, receives, or promises payment or reward for a child to be given up for adoption will be penalized with three years and one day in prison.

Fees: Legal fees normally run from $6,000 to $8,000 but sometimes can be several thousand dollars more. For your own protection, you should negotiate all fees with your attorney before beginning the adoption process and specify all services to be included in the fee e.g., attorney's expenses, translation services, court fees, authentication's, etc. US Citizens have suggested that clients not pay fees in full in advance since the attorney would then have no incentive to finish the adoption quickly.

There is little recourse in the event of a dispute (please see the Embassy's Consular Information Sheet warnings on transactions and disputes). Children who are eligible for adoption are placed in the IHNFA's care until adoptive parents have been selected; at which time they may be transferred to a foster home.

Questions: Specific questions regarding adoption in Honduras may be addressed to the Consular Section of the U.S. Embassy or Consulate in Honduras. You may also contact the Office of Children's Issues, SA-29, 2201 C Street, NW, U.S. Department of State, Washington, DC 20520-2818, telephone (202) 736-7000 with specific questions.

Honduras

views updated May 14 2018

Honduras

PROFILE
PEOPLE
HISTORY
GOVERNMENT
POLITICAL CONDITIONS
ECONOMY
NATIONAL SECURITY
FOREIGN RELATIONS
U.S.-HONDURAN RELATIONS
TRAVEL

Compiled from the June 2007 Background Note and supplemented with additional information from the State Department and the editors of this volume. See the introduction to this set for explanatory notes.

Official Name:

Republic of Honduras

PROFILE

Geography

Area: 112,090 sq. km. (43,278 sq. mi.); slightly larger than Virginia.

Cities: Capital—Tegucigalpa (1,150,000); San Pedro Sula (800,000-900,000).

Terrain: Mountainous.

Climate: Tropical to subtropical, depending on elevation.

People

Nationality: Noun and adjective—Honduran(s).

Population: (2006 est.) 7.3 million.

Growth rate: (2006 est.) 2.16%.

Ethnic groups: 90% mestizo (mixed Indian and European); others of European, Arab, African, or Asian ancestry; and indigenous Indians.

Religions: Roman Catholic, Protestant minority.

Languages: Spanish.

Education: (2003) Years compulsory—6. Attendance—88% overall, 31% at junior high level. Literacy—76.2%.

Health: Infant mortality rate—29.64/1,000. Life expectancy—66.2 yrs.

Work force: Services—42.2%; natural resources/agriculture—35.9%; manufacturing—16.3%; construction/ housing—5.6%.

Government

Type: Democratic constitutional republic.

Independence: September 15, 1821.

Constitution: 1982; amended 1999.

Government branches: Executive—president, directly elected to 4-year term. Legislative—unicameral National Congress, elected for 4-year term. Judicial—Supreme Court of Justice (appointed for a 7-year term by Congress and confirmed by the president); several lower courts.

Political parties: National Party, Liberal Party, Innovation and National Unity Party, Christian Democratic Party, and the Democratic Unification Party.

Suffrage: Universal and compulsory at age 18.

Political subdivisions: 18 departments.

Economy (2006 est.)

GDP: $22.3 billion (PPP) or $9.3 billion (official exchange rate).

Growth rate: 5.5%.

Per capita GDP: $2,900 (PPP).

Per capita income: $ 894.00

Natural resources: Arable land, forests, minerals, and fisheries.

Agriculture: (14.1% of GDP) Products—coffee, bananas, shrimp and lobster, sugar, fruits, basic grains, and livestock.

Manufacturing: (18% of GDP) Types—textiles and apparel, cement, wood products, cigars, and foodstuffs. Services: (53.2% of GDP).

Trade: Exports (goods)—$1.95 billion: apparel, coffee, shrimp, bananas, palm oil, gold, zinc/lead concentrates, soap/detergents, melons, lobster, pineapple, lumber, sugar, and tobacco. Major market—U.S. (54.4%). Imports (goods)—$5.00 billion: fabrics, yarn, machinery, chemicals, petroleum, vehicles, processed foods, metals, agricultural products, plastic articles, and paper articles. Major source—U.S. (37.5%).

PEOPLE

About 90% of the population is mestizo. There also are small minorities of European, African, Asian, Arab, and indigenous Indian descent. Most Hondurans are Roman Catholic, but Protestant churches are growing in number. While Spanish is the predominant language, some English is spoken along the northern coast and is prevalent on the Caribbean Bay Islands. Several indigenous Indian languages and Garifuna (a mixture of Afro-indigenous languages) are also spoken. The restored Mayan ruins near the Guatemalan border in Copan reflect the great Mayan culture that flourished there for hundreds of years until the early 9th century. Columbus landed at mainland Honduras (Trujillo) in 1502, and named the area “Honduras” (meaning “depths”) for the deep water off the coast. Spaniard Hernan Cortes arrived in 1524.

HISTORY

Independence

Honduras and other Central American provinces gained independence from Spain in 1821. The country was then briefly annexed to the Mexican Empire. In 1823, Honduras joined the newly formed United Provinces of Central America federation, which collapsed in 1838. Gen. Francisco Morazan—a Honduran national hero—led unsuccessful efforts to maintain the federation. Honduras’ agriculture-based economy was dominated in the 1900s by U.S. companies that established vast banana plantations along the north coast. Foreign capital, plantation life, and conservative politics held sway in Honduras from the late 19th century until the mid-20th century.

Military Rule

Authoritarian Gen. Tiburcio Carias Andino controlled Honduras during the Great Depression, until 1948. In 1955—after two authoritarian administrations and a strike by banana workers—young military reformists staged a coup that installed a provisional junta and paved the way for constituent assembly elections in 1957. This assembly appointed Ramon Villeda Morales as President and transformed itself into a national legislature with a 6-year term. The Liberal Party ruled during 1957-63. In 1963, conservative military officers preempted constitutional elections and deposed Villeda in a bloody coup. These officers exiled Liberal Party members and took control of the national police. The armed forces, led by Gen. Lopez Arellano, governed until 1970. Popular discontent continued to rise after a 1969 border war with El Salvador, known as “the Soccer War.” A civilian President—Ramon Cruz of the National Party—took power briefly in 1970 but proved unable to manage the government. In 1972, Gen. Lopez staged another coup. Lopez adopted more progressive policies, including land reform, but his regime was brought down in the mid-1970s by corruption scandals. The regimes of Gen. Melgar Castro (1975-78) and Gen. Paz Garcia (1978-82) largely built the current physical infrastructure and telecommunications system of Honduras. The country also enjoyed its most rapid economic growth during this period, due to greater international demand for its products and the availability of foreign commercial lending.

Seven Consecutive Democratic Elections

Following the overthrow of Anastasio Somoza in Nicaragua in 1979 and general instability in El Salvador at the time, Hondurans elected a constituent assembly in 1980 and voted in general elections in 1981. A new constitution was approved in 1982, and the Liberal Party government of President Roberto Suazo Cordoba took office. Suazo relied on U.S. support during a severe economic recession, including ambitious social and economic development projects sponsored by the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID). Honduras became host to the largest Peace Corps mission in the world, and nongovernmental and international voluntary agencies proliferated.

As the 1985 election approached, the Liberal Party interpreted election law as permitting multiple presidential candidates from one party. The Liberal Party claimed victory when its presidential candidates, who received 42% of the vote, collectively outpolled the National Party candidate, Rafael Leonardo Callejas. Jose Azcona Hoyo, the candidate receiving the most votes among the Liberals, assumed the presidency in 1986. With the endorsement of the Honduraran military, the Azcona administration ushered in the first peaceful transfer of power between civilian presidents in more than 30 years. Four years later, Nationalist Rafael Callejas won the presidential election, taking office in 1990. The nation's fiscal deficit ballooned during Callejas’ last year in office. Growing public dissatisfaction with the rising cost of living and with widespread government corruption led voters in 1993 to elect Liberal Party candidate Carlos Roberto Reina with 56% of the vote. President Reina, elected on a platform calling for a “moral revolution,” actively prosecuted corruption and pursued those responsible for human rights abuses in the 1980s. He created a modern attorney general's office and an investigative police force, increased civilian control over the armed forces, transferred the police from military to civilian authority, and restored national fiscal health.

After winning the 1997 election by a 10% margin, Liberal Carlos Roberto Flores Facusse took office in 1998. Flores inaugurated programs of reform and modernization of the Honduran government and economy, with emphasis on helping Honduras’ poorest citizens while maintaining the country's fiscal health and improving international competitiveness. In October 1998, Hurricane Mitch devastated Honduras, leaving more than 5,000 people dead and 1.5 million displaced. Damages totaled nearly $3 billion. President Flores and his administration successfully managed more than $600 million in international assistance. Flores also moved judicial and penal reforms forward, establishing an anticorruption commission, and supporting passage of a new penal code based on the oral accusatorial system and a law that created an independent Supreme Court. Flores also established a civilian Minister of Defense.

Ricardo Maduro Joest of the National Party won the 2001 presidential elections, and was inaugurated in 2002. During his campaign, President Maduro promised to reduce crime, reinvigorate the economy, and fight corruption. Maduro's first act as President was to deploy a joint police-military force to the streets to permit wider neighborhood patrols in the ongoing fight against the country's

massive crime and gang problem. Maduro was a strong supporter of the global war on terrorism and joined the U.S.-led coalition in Iraq with an 11-month contribution of 370 troops. Under President Maduro's guidance, Honduras also negotiated and ratified the U.S.-Central America Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA), received debt relief, became the first Latin American country to sign a Millennium Challenge Account compact with the U.S., and actively promoted greater Central American integration.

Jose Manuel “Mel” Zelaya Rosales of the Liberal Party won the November 27, 2005 presidential elections with less than a 4% margin of victory, the smallest margin ever in Honduran electoral history. Zelaya's campaign theme was “citizen power,” and he has vowed to increase transparency and combat narcotrafficking, while maintaining macroeconomic stability. The Liberal Party won 62 of the 128 congressional seats, just short of an absolute majority. Zelaya was inaugurated on January 27, 2006.

GOVERNMENT

The 1982 constitution provides for a strong executive, a unicameral National Congress, and a judiciary appointed by the National Congress. The president is directly elected to a 4-year term by popular vote. The Congress also serves a 4-year term; congressional seats are assigned the parties’ candidates in proportion to the number of votes each party receives in the various departments. The judiciary includes a Supreme Court of Justice (one president and 14 magistrates chosen by Congress for a seven-year term), courts of appeal, and several courts of original jurisdiction—such as labor, tax, and criminal courts. For administrative purposes, Honduras is divided into 18 departments, with municipal officials selected for 4-year terms.

POLITICAL CONDITIONS

Reinforced by the media and several political watchdog organizations, concerted efforts to protect human rights and civil liberties continued. Organized labor now represents approximately 8% of the work force and its economic and political influence has declined. Honduras held its seventh consecutive democratic elections in 2005 to elect a new president, unicameral Congress, and mayors. For the first time, as a result of the newly reformed Electoral Law, voters were able to vote for individual members of Congress, with photos of each candidate on the ballot, rather than party lists. For the electoral period 2006-2010, 31 women were elected to Congress; 27 of them chose women as their alternates for a total of 58 women in the legislature, an unprecedented number in the political history of the country.

Political Parties

The two major parties are the slightly left-of-center Liberal Party and the slightly right of center National Party. The three much smaller registered parties—the Christian Democratic Party, the Innovation and National Unity Party, and the Democratic Unification Party—hold a few seats each in the Congress, but have never come close to winning the presidency.

Principal Government Officials

Last Updated: 2/1/2008

Pres.: Manuel ZELAYA Rosales

Vice Pres.: Elvin Ernesto SANTOS Ordonez

Min. of Agriculture & Livestock: Hector HERNANDEZ

Min. of Culture, Arts, & Sports: Rodolfo PASTOR

Min. of Defense: Aristides MEJIA

Min. of Education: Rafael PINEDA PONCE

Min. of Finance: Rebeca SANTOS Rivera

Min. of Foreign Relations: Milton JIMENEZ Puerto

Min. of Industry & Commerce: Elizabeth AZCONA Bobock

Min. of Govt. & Justice: Jorge Arturo REINA

Min. of Labor: Rixi MONCADA Godoy

Min. of Natural Resources & Environment: Mayra MEJIA del Cid

Min. of the Presidency: Yani ROSENTHAL

Min. of Public Employees’ Retirement & Pension (INJUPEMP): Lucio IZAGUIRRE

Min. of Public Health: Orison VELASQUEZ

Min. of Public Works, Transportation, & Housing: Jose Rosario BONANO

Min. of Public Security: Alvaro Antonio ROMERO Salgado

Min. of Science & Technology: Miriam MEJIA

Min. of Tourism: Ricardo MARTINEZ

Min. Without Portfolio (Housing Sector): Hector BRICENO

Pres., Central Bank: Gabriella NUNEZ de Reyes

Ambassador to the US: Roberto FLORES BERMUDEZ

Permanent Representative to the UN, New York: Ivan ROMERO-MARTINEZ

Honduras maintains an embassy in the United States at 3007 Tilden Street NW, Washington, DC 20008 (tel. 202-966-7702).

ECONOMY

Honduras is one of the poorest and least developed countries in Latin America, with nearly two-thirds of Hondurans living in poverty. Although historically dependent on exports of coffee and bananas, the economy has diversified over the past 20 years with the development of non-traditional exports such as oriental vegetables, cultivated shrimp, melons, and tourism, and the establishment of a growing maquila industry (primarily assembly of apparel for re-export). The maquila industry employs approximately 130,000 Hondurans. Honduras also has extensive forest, marine, and mineral resources, although widespread slash-and-burn agricultural methods and illegal logging continue to destroy Honduran forests. Family remittances from Hondurans living abroad (mostly in the United States) have risen significantly, to an estimated $2.3 billion in 2006, which represents 15% of the country's foreign exchange earnings and over 20% of its GDP.

The exchange rate through the first quarter of 2007 was 18.89 Honduran Lempira to the dollar, a slight devaluation from the 2005 rate of 18.92. Inflation, as measured by the consumer price index, was estimated at approximately 6.0% in 2006 and was projected to remain at that rate in 2007. International reserves totaled $2.6 billion in 2006, up from an estimated $2.23 billion in 2005. Unemployment was estimated at around 28% in 2005. In 2005, Honduras reached completion point under the Heavily Indebted Poor Countries (HIPC) initiative, qualifying the country for multilateral debt relief.

NATIONAL SECURITY

With the cessation of the 1980s civil wars in El Salvador and Nicaragua, the Honduran armed forces refocused their orientation toward combating transnational threats such as narco-terrorism and organized crime. Honduras supports efforts at regional integration and deployed troops to Iraq in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom. In 1999, the constitution was amended to abolish the position of military commander in chief of the armed forces, thus codifying civilian authority over the military. Former President Flores also named the first civilian Minister of Defense in the country's history.

FOREIGN RELATIONS

Honduras is a member of the United Nations, the World Trade Organization (WTO), the Organization of American States (OAS), the Central American Parliament (PARLACEN), the Central American Integration System (SICA), the Conference of Central American Armed Forces (CFAC), and the Central American Security Commission (CASC). During 1995-96, Honduras—a founding member of the United Nations—served as a nonpermanent member of the UN Security Council for the first time. Honduras is currently a member of the UN Human Rights Commission. Honduras is a party to all UN and OAS counterterrorism conventions and protocols.

Honduras is a strong proponent of Central American cooperation and integration, and continues to work towards the implementation of a regional customs union and Central American passport, which would ease border controls and tariffs among Honduras, Guatemala, Nicaragua, and El Salvador. In 1969, El Salvador and Honduras fought the brief “Soccer War” over disputed border areas. The two countries formally signed a peace treaty in 1980, which put the border dispute before the International Court of Justice (ICJ). In 1992, the Court awarded most of the disputed territory to Honduras, and in January 1998, Honduras and El Salvador signed a border demarcation treaty to implement the terms of the ICJ decree although delays continue due to technical difficulties. However, Honduras and El Salvador maintain normal diplomatic and trade relations. Honduras also has unresolved maritime border disputes with El Salvador, Nicaragua, Jamaica, and Cuba.

U.S.-HONDURAN RELATIONS

Overview

The United States and Honduras have close and friendly relations. Honduras is supportive of U.S. policy in the United Nations and other fora, as well of the war on terrorism. Honduras was among the first countries to sign an International Criminal Court (ICC) Article 98 Agreement with the U.S., and the Honduran port of Puerto Cortes is part of the U.S. Container Security Initiative (CSI).

The United States favors stable, peaceful relations between Honduras and its Central American neighbors. During the 1980s, Honduras supported U.S. policy opposing a revolutionary Marxist government in Nicaragua and an active leftist insurgency in El Salvador. The Honduran Government also played a key role in negotiations that culminated in the 1990 Nicaraguan elections. Honduras continues to participate in the UN observer mission in the Western Sahara, contributed 370 troops for stabilization in Iraq, and remains interested in participating in other UN peacekeeping missions.

The United States is Honduras’ chief trading partner, with two-way trade in goods increasing to over $7 billion in 2006. U.S.-Honduran trade is dominated by the Honduran maquila industry, which imports yarn and textiles from the United States and exports finished articles of clothing. Other leading Honduran exports to the United States include coffee, bananas, seafood (particularly shrimp), minerals (including zinc, lead, gold, and silver), and other fruits and vegetables.

U.S. investors account for nearly two-thirds of the foreign direct investment (FDI) in Honduras. The stock of U.S. direct investment in Honduras in 2005 was $402 million, up from $339 million in 2004. The overall flow of FDI into Honduras in 2005 totaled $568 million, $196 million of which was spent in the maquila sector. The United States continued as the largest contributor of FDI. The most substantial U.S. investments in Honduras are in the maquila sector, fruit production (particularly bananas, melons, and pineapple), tourism, energy generation, shrimp aquaculture, animal feed production, telecommunications, fuel distribution, cigar manufacturing, insurance, brewing, leasing, food processing, and furniture manufacturing. Many U.S. franchises, particularly in the restaurant sector, operate in Honduras.

In 2004, the United States signed the U.S.-Central America Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA) with Honduras, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Guatemala, Costa Rica, and the Dominican Republic. The legislatures of all signatories except Costa Rica ratified CAFTA in 2005, and the agreement entered into force in the first half of 2006. CAFTA eliminates tariffs and other barriers to trade in goods, services, agricultural products, and investments. Additionally, CAFTA is expected to solidify democracy, encourage greater regional integration, and provide safeguards for environmental protection and labor rights.

In June 2005, Honduras became the first country in the hemisphere to sign a Millennium Challenge Account (MCA) compact with the US Government. Under the compact, the U.S. Millennium Challenge Corporation will invest $215 million over five years to help Honduras improve its road infrastructure, diversify its agriculture, and get its products to market.

The United States maintains a small presence at a Honduran military base; the two countries conduct joint peacekeeping, counternarcotics, humanitarian, disaster relief, and civic action exercises. U.S. troops conduct and provide logistics support for a variety of bilateral and multilateral exercises—medical, engineering, peacekeeping, counternarcotics, and disaster relief—for the benefit of the Honduran people and their Central American neighbors. U.S. forces—regular, reserve, and National Guard—benefit greatly from these exercises.

U.S. Policy Toward Honduras

U.S. policy toward Honduras is aimed at consolidating democracy, protecting human rights, and promoting the rule of law. U.S. Government programs are aimed at promoting a healthy and more open economy capable of sustainable growth, improving the climate for business and investment while protecting U.S. citizen and corporate rights, and promoting the well-being of the Honduran people. The United States also works with Honduras to meet transnational challenges—including the fight against terrorism, narcotics trafficking, money laundering, illegal migration, and trafficking in persons—and encourages and supports Honduran efforts to protect the environment. The goals of strengthening democracy and promoting viable economic growth are especially important given the geographical proximity of Honduras to the United States. Approximately 800,000 to 1 million Hondurans reside in the United States; consequently, immigration issues are an important item on our bilateral agenda.

U.S.- Honduran ties are further strengthened by numerous private sector contacts, with an average of between 80,000 and 110,000 U.S. citizens visiting Honduras annually and about 15,000 Americans residing there. More than 150 American companies operate in Honduras.

Economic and Development Assistance

In order to help strengthen Honduras’ democratic institutions and improve living conditions, the United States has provided substantial economic assistance. The United States has historically been the largest bilateral donor to Honduras. The USAID budget for Honduras is $37 million for fiscal year 2007. Over the years, U.S. foreign assistance has helped advance such objectives as fostering democratic institutions, increasing private sector employment and income, helping Honduras manage its arrears with international financial institutions, providing humanitarian aid, increasing agricultural production, and providing loans to microbusinesses.

1998's Hurricane Mitch left hundreds of thousands homeless, devastated the road network and other public infrastructure, and crippled certain key sectors of the economy. Estimates show that Hurricane Mitch caused $8.5 billion in damages to homes, hospitals, schools, roads, farms, and businesses throughout Central America, including more than $3 billion in Honduras alone. In response, the United States provided more than $461 million in immediate disaster relief and humanitarian aid spread over the years 1998-2001. This supplemental assistance was designed to help repair water and sanitation systems; replace housing, schools, and roads; provide agricultural inputs; provide local government crisis management training; grant debt relief; and encourage environmental management expertise. Additional resources were utilized to maintain anti-crime and drug assistance programs.

In 2001, the United States also provided food aid in response to a short drought and the depressed state of the agriculture sector. Subsequently, the United States provided $265,000 in disaster assistance after Tropical Storm Michelle inundated the north coast with floods. Most recently, the United States provided assistance for Honduras’ recovery from 2005's devastating storms, including Hurricane Beta and Tropical Storm Gamma.

The Peace Corps has been active in Honduras since 1962, and currently the program is one of the largest in the world. In 2005, there were 220 Peace Corps Volunteers working in the poorest parts of Honduras. The U.S. Government strongly supports the professionalization of the civilian police force as an important element in strengthening the rule of law in Honduras. The American Embassy in Tegucigalpa provides specialized training to police officers.

Security Assistance

The role of the Honduran armed forces has changed significantly in recent years as many institutions formerly controlled by the military are now under civilian authority. The annual defense and police budgets have hovered at around $35 million during the past few years. Honduras receives modest U.S. security assistance funds and training. In the absence of a large security assistance program, defense cooperation has taken the form of increased participation by the Honduran armed forces in military-to-military contact programs and bilateral and multilateral combined exercises oriented toward peacekeeping, disaster relief, humanitarian/civic assistance, and counter-narcotics. The U.S. Joint Task Force Bravo (JTF-B), stationed at the Honduran Soto Cano Air Base, plays a vital role in supporting combined exercises in Honduras and in neighboring Central American countries. JTF-Bravo plays a critical role in helping the United States respond to natural disasters in Central America by serving as a platform for rescue missions, repairing critical infrastructure, and in meeting high priority health and sanitation needs. JTF-Bravo forces have helped deliver millions of dollars worth of privately donated goods to those in need.

U.S. Business Opportunities

Bilateral trade between the two nations totaled $7.4 billion in 2006, up from $7 billion in 2005. Exports of goods and services from the U.S. increased from $3.24 billion in 2005 to $3.69 billion in 2006, while Honduran exports to the U.S. fell slightly from $3.75 billion in 2005 to $3.72 billion in 2006 More than 150 American companies operate in Honduras; U.S. franchises are present in increasing numbers.

Opportunities for U.S. business sales include textile machinery, construction equipment, automotive parts and accessories, telecommunications equipment, pollution control/water resources equipment, agricultural machinery, hotel and restaurant equipment, computers and software, franchising, and household consumer goods. The best prospects for agricultural products are corn, milled rice, wheat, soybean meal, and consumer-ready products.

U.S. citizens contemplating investment in real estate in Honduras should proceed with extreme caution, especially in the Bay Islands or coastal areas, because of frequently conflicting legislation, problems with land titles, and a weak judicial system. Investors or their attorneys should check property titles not only with the property registry office having jurisdiction in the area in which the property is located (being especially observant of marginal annotations on the deed and that the property is located within the area covered by the original title), but also with the National Agrarian Institute (INA) and the National Forestry Administration (COHDEFOR). Investors in land should be aware that even clear title is not a guarantee that a future dispute over land would be resolved equitably.

Principal U.S. Embassy Officials

Last Updated: 2/19/2008

TEGUCIGALPA (E) Avenida La Paz, Tegucigalpa, Honduras, APO/ FPO Unit 2900, Box 68, APO AA 34022, (504) 236-9320, Fax (504) 236-9037, Workweek: M-Th, 8-5:30; F 8-3 local time, Website: http://honduras.usembassy.gov/english/index_el.htm.

DCM OMS:Catherine Lawton
AMB OMS:Barbara A. Matchey
DHS/CIS:Joel Miramontes
DHS/ICE:Luis Carmona
ECO:Robert A. Armstrong
FM:Jefferey Burns
HRO:Judy E. Picardi
MGT:Randall C. Budden
AMB:Charles A. Ford
CG:Douglass R. Benning
DCM:James G. Williard
PAO:Chantal Dalton
COM:Michael L. McGee (Resident In San Salvador)
GSO:Raphael Semmes
RSO:Bruce Lizzi
AFSA:Beatriz Beroud
AGR:Robert K. Hoff (Resident In Guatemala)
AID:Randall Peterson (Acting)
CLO:Liza Bright & Miluska McInerney
DAO:Andrew W. Papp, Usaf
DEA:John Mark Discenza
EEO:Chantal S. Dalton
FMO:James Wickersham
ICASS:Chair Chantal Dalton
IMO:Marc A. Beroud
IPO:Jack Swope
ISO:W. Kay Angell
LAB:Frank Penirian
LEGATT:Leo J. Navarrete (Resident In San Salvador)
MLO:Ltc.Jose (Tony)Espinosa (Acting)
NAS:Jill M. Foster
POL:Andrea R. Brouillette-Rodriguez
State ICASS:Chantal Dalton

Other Contact Information

American Chamber of Commerce
Hotel Honduras Maya
Apartado Postal 1838
Tegucigalpa, Honduras
Tel: (504) 232-7043/232-6035
Fax: (504) 232-9959

Branch office in San Pedro Sula
Tel: (504) 557-6402/559-6412
Fax: (504) 557-6402

U.S. Department of Commerce
International Trade
Administration
Office of Latin America and the Caribbean

14th and Constitution Avenue, NW
Washington, DC 20230
Tel: 202-482-0057 800-USA-TRADE
Fax: 202-482-0464
Internet: http://trade.gov.

U.S. Agency for International
Development

1300 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW
Washington, DC 20523-0001
Tel: 202-712-4810
Fax: 202-216-3524
Internet: www.usaid.gov.

TRAVEL

Consular Information Sheet

October 12, 2007

Country Description: Honduras is a democracy with a developing economy. The national language is Spanish, although English is often spoken in the Bay Islands. The climate is generally pleasant and temperate, with dry and wet seasons. During the dry season from February into May, widespread forest fires and agricultural burning can lead to severely degraded air quality throughout the country leading to respiratory problems and airport closures. The terrain includes mountainous areas, coastal beaches and jungle lowlands. Facilities that would normally be used by tourists, including hotels and restaurants are generally adequate in the capital city of Tegucigalpa, San Pedro Sula, Tela, La Ceiba, the Bay Islands and near the Copan ruins. Large sections of the country, however, lack basic public services or even a governmental presence. Currency exchange is readily available at banks and hotels in the major cities.

Entry Requirements: A U.S. passport valid for at least three months from the date of entry is required to enter Honduras. Though not required by law, some travelers have reported difficulty departing Honduras using a passport with less than three months of validity beyond the date of departure. A visa is not required, but tourists must provide evidence of return or onward travel. Parents should not rely on birth certificates for their children's travel; rather, prior to travel they should obtain U.S. passports for infants and minors born in the U.S. U.S. citizens are encouraged to carry a photocopy of their U.S. passports with them at all times, so that if questioned by local officials proof of identity and U.S. citizenship are readily available.

For U.S. citizen children born in the U.S. to Honduran parents, Honduran Immigration provides an “evidence of continuance” (Constancia de Permanencia) stamp placed in the U.S. passport that allows the child to enter, depart, and remain in Honduras. Visitors are given a permit to remain in Honduras for up to 90 days. Thereafter, tourists must leave the country to qualify for a renewed visitor’ permit. Upon departure, visitors are required to pay an exit fee, either in U.S. dollars or in local currency. The current fee for international departures is USD $32.42. The fees are subject to change.

In an effort to prevent international child abduction, many governments have initiated special procedures at entry/exit points regarding the travel of minors. These often include requiring documentary evidence of relationship and permission for the child's travel from the parent(s) or legal guardian not present. Having such documentation on hand, even if not required, may facilitate entry/exit. Minors who are dual U.S.-Honduran nationals or who reside in Honduras require notarized consent from both parents if traveling alone or in someone else's custody, or from the absent parent if traveling with only one parent. In cases where one parent has sole custody, the custodial parent must submit the custody decree to Honduran immigration upon departure.

In June 2006, Honduras entered a “Central America-4 (CA-4) Border Control Agreement” with Guatemala, El Salvador, and Nicaragua. Under the terms of the agreement, citizens of the four countries may travel freely across land borders from one of the countries to any of the others without completing entry and exit formalities at Immigration checkpoints. U.S. citizens and other eligible foreign nationals, who legally enter any of the four countries, may similarly travel among the four without obtaining additional visas or tourist entry permits for the other three countries. Immigration officials at the first port of entry determine the length of stay, up to a maximum period of 90 days. Foreign tourists who wish to remain in the four country region beyond the period initially granted for their visit are required to request a one-time extension of stay from local Immigration authorities in the country where the traveler is physically present, or travel outside the CA-4 countries and reapply for admission to the region. Foreigners “expelled” from any of the four countries are excluded from the entire “CA-4” region. In isolated cases, the lack of clarity in the implementing details of the CA-4 Border Control Agreement has caused temporary inconvenience to some travelers and has resulted in others being fined more than one hundred dollars or detained in custody for 72 hours or longer.

For more information concerning entry and exit requirements, travelers may contact the Embassy of Honduras at 3007 Tilden Street N.W., Washington, D.C. 20008, telephone (202) 966-7702, or a Honduran consulate in Atlanta, Boston, Chicago, Houston, Jacksonville, Los Angeles, Miami, New Orleans, New York, Phoenix, San Francisco, San Juan or Tampa. The Honduran Embassy's email address is [email protected]. Interested individuals may visit the Honduran Embassy's web site for additional contact information through www.hondurasemb.org. For tourist information or suggestions, please contact the Honduras Institute of Tourism at 1-800-410-9608 (in the United States) or at 1-800-222-TOUR (8687) (within Honduras only) or visit their web site at http://www.hondurastips.honduras.com.

Dual Nationality: Honduran law permits dual nationality only for minors under the age of 21 and those Honduran-born citizens who have become naturalized citizens of other countries. U.S. citizens who become Honduran citizens by naturalization are not considered to have dual nationality under Honduran law. However, becoming a Honduran citizen will not cause U.S. Citizens to lose their U.S. citizenship and all the accompanying rights and privileges. Dual nationals, in addition to being subject to all Honduran laws affecting U.S. citizens, may be subject to other laws that impose special obligations on Honduran citizens. For more information, please contact Honduran Immigration in Tegucigalpa (telephone 504-238-5613), San Pedro Sula (telephone 504-550-3728), Roatan (telephone 504-445-1226), La Ceiba (telephone 504-442-0638), or Puerto Cortes (telephone 504-665-0582).

Safety and Security: Political demonstrations sometimes disrupt traffic, but they are generally announced in advance and are usually peaceful. Travelers should avoid areas where demonstrations are taking place, and they should stay informed by following the local news and consulting hotel personnel and tour guides. Demonstrators frequently block public roads to press for concessions from the Government of Honduras. These demonstrations may last several hours and the Government rarely seeks to disperse the demonstrators. U.S. citizens should never try to pass such roadblocks. While the Honduran side of the Honduras-Nicaragua border has been largely cleared of land mines, travelers should exercise caution there. For more information, we strongly encourage travelers to visit the U.S. Embassy's web site at http://honduras.usembassy.gov. For the latest security information, Americans traveling abroad should regularly monitor the Department's Internet web site where the current Travel Warnings and Travel Alerts, including the Worldwide Caution Travel Alert, can be found. Up-to-date information on safety and security can also be obtained by calling 1-888-407-4747 toll free in the U.S., or for callers outside the U.S. and Canada, a regular toll-line at 1-202-501-4444.

Crime: Crime is endemic in Honduras and requires a high degree of caution by U.S. visitors and resident alike. U.S. citizens have been the victims of a wide range of crimes, including murder, kidnapping, rape, assault, and property crimes. Fifty-seven U.S. citizens have been murdered in Honduras since 1995, with a significant recent increase. Only eighteen cases have been resolved. Kidnapping of U.S. citizens has occurred in Honduras, including two incidents in 2006. Poverty, gangs, and low apprehension and conviction rates of criminals contribute to a high crime rate, including horrific acts of mass murder.

U.S. citizens are encouraged to follow local news reports and seek additional information in the resources listed above. Criminals and pickpockets also target visitors as they enter and depart airports and hotels, so visitors should consider carrying their passports and valuables in a concealed pouch. Two-man teams on medium-sized motorcycles often target pedestrians for robbery. There have also been reports of armed robbers traveling in private cars targeting pedestrians on isolated streets. The Honduran government conducts occasional joint police /military patrols in major cities in an effort to reduce crime. Problems with the judicial process include corruption and an acute shortage of trained personnel, equipment, staff, and financial resources. The Honduran law enforcement authorities’ ability to prevent, respond to, and investigate criminal incidents and prosecute criminals remains limited. Honduran police generally do not speak English.

The government has established a special tourist police in the resort town of Tela and other popular tourist destinations, including Tegucigalpa, San Pedro Sula, La Ceiba, and Roatan, but the number deployed is small and coverage is limited. The San Pedro Sula area has seen occasional armed robberies against tourist vans, minibuses, and cars traveling from the airport to area hotels, even sometimes targeting the road to Copan. Armed men have forced vehicles transporting tourists off the road and robbed the victims, occasionally assaulting the driver or passengers. Over the past four years, several U.S. citizens have been murdered in San Pedro Sula and La Ceiba shortly after arriving in the country. Assaults in these areas may be based on tips from sources at airport arrival areas, so visitors are strongly urged to exercise caution in discussing travel plans in public.

Copan, the Bay Islands, and other tourist destinations have a lower crime rate than other parts of the country, but thefts, break-ins, assaults, and murders do occur. During a wave of home invasion robberies in Roatan in late 2005, assailants shot two foreign residents, killing one U.S. citizen. Exercise particular caution walking on isolated beaches, especially at night. Seven U.S. citizens have been murdered in Roatan since 1998, most recently in late 2005. Coxen Hole should be avoided after dark.

The Government of Honduras has a very limited presence in Northern Olancho, Colon and Gracias a Dios Departments, which are well known for lumber and narcotics smuggling and violence. Travelers in those areas should use extra caution.

Incidents of crime, including carjacking and kidnapping, along roads in Honduras are common. There have been frequent incidents of highway robbery on a number of roads including Limones to La Union, Olancho (route 41) via Salama and northward to Esquipulas Del Norte.

Travelers should always drive with their doors locked and windows rolled up to avoid potential robberies at traffic lights and other places, such as congested downtown streets. Avoid driving at night. All bus travel should be during daylight hours and on first-class conveyances, not on economy buses. Please choose taxis carefully, and note the driver's name and license number. Instruct the driver not to pick up other passengers, agree on the fare before you depart, and have small bills available for payment, as taxi drivers often do not make change.

Do not resist a robbery attempt. Most criminals have weapons, and most injuries and deaths have resulted when victims have resisted. Two foreign tourists were murdered in July 2002 while resisting an armed robbery on a public bus in which they were traveling. In 2004, an American citizen was murdered while attempting to flee an armed robbery in progress and another American was shot while resisting a carjacking. Two American citizens were murdered while resisting armed robberies in 2005.

Do not hitchhike or go home with strangers, particularly from nightspots. Whenever possible, travel in groups of two or more persons. Use the same common sense while traveling in Honduras that you would in any high crime area in the U.S.: do not wear excessive jewelry; do not carry large sums of money, or display cash, ATM/credit cards, or other valuables you do not need.

Avoid walking at night in most areas of Honduras. Do not hike alone in backcountry areas, or walk alone on beaches, historic ruins, or trails.

Individuals and groups should register their travel plans with the State Department via the Internet at the Department's secure travel registration web site. Travelers may also register by sending passport, date of birth, and emergency contact information to the American Citizens Services Unit of the U.S. Embassy in Tegucigalpa via fax at 011-504-238-4357, or e-mail at usahonduras@ state.gov prior to travel. Individuals as well as groups should always keep in their possession a photocopy of their U.S. passport data page; carry an additional copy in their suitcase; and leave a copy at home with a friend or family member.

Information for Victims of Crime: If you are the victim of a crime while in Honduras, contact local authorities immediately, either directly or through thenational police emergency number: *199. In addition to reporting to the local police, please contact the U.S. Embassy in Tegucigalpa or the Consular Agency in San Pedro Sula for assistance. The theft of a U.S. passport should be reported immediately.The Embassy and Consular Agency staff can provide you with information about medical care, contacting family members or friends and explaining how funds could be transferred. Although the investigation and prosecution of most crimes is solely the responsibility of local authorities, Consular staff can provide you with a list of attorneys if needed.

Medical Facilities and Health Information: Medical care in Honduras varies greatly in quality and availability. Outside Tegucigalpa and San Pedro Sula, medical care is inadequate to address complex situations. Support staff facilities and necessary equipment and supplies are not up to U.S. standards anywhere in Honduras. Facilities for advanced surgical procedures are not available. Wide areas of the country, including the popular tourist areas of the Bay Islands, do not have a general surgery hospital. Ambulance services are limited in major cities and almost non-existent elsewhere. Emergency services may be contacted either directly through their local numbers, or through the national medical emergency number, *112.

Scuba diving is popular in the Bay Islands, but the limited medical facilities there pose a special risk in the event of an emergency. There is a decompression chamber on Roatan and Utila for divers, but no advanced medical care on either island for diving related accidents.

Medical Insurance: The Department of State strongly urges Americans to consult with their medical insurance company prior to traveling abroad to confirm whether their policy applies overseas and whether it will cover emergency expenses such as a medical evacuation. U.S. medical insurance plans seldom cover health costs incurred outside the U.S. unless supplemental coverage is purchased. Furthermore, U.S. Medicare and Medicaid programs do not provide payment for medical services outside the U.S. However, many travel agents and private companies offer insurance plans that will cover health care expenses incurred overseas including emergency services such as medical evacuations. It is important to ensure that you have adequate medical evacuation coverage prior to your trip to Honduras.

When making a decision regarding health insurance, Americans should consider that many foreign doctors and hospitals require payment in cash prior to providing service and that a medical evacuation to the U.S. may cost tens of thousands of dollars. Uninsured travelers who require medical care overseas often face extreme difficulties. When consulting with your insurer prior to your trip, ascertain whether payment will be made to the overseas healthcare provider or whether you will be reimbursed later for expenses you incur. Some insurance policies also include coverage for psychiatric treatment and for disposition of remains in the event of death.

Useful information on medical emergencies abroad, including overseas insurance programs, is provided in the Department of State's Bureau of Consular Affairs brochure, Medical Information for Americans Traveling Abroad, available via the Bureau of Consular Affairs home page.

Other Health Information: Mosquito-borne illnesses are an ongoing problem in Honduras. All persons traveling in Honduras, even for a brief visit, are at risk of contracting malaria. Take a prophylactic regimen best suited to your health profile. The country regularly suffers from outbreaks of dengue fever. Unlike traditional mosquito-borne illnesses, there is no medicinal prophylactic or curative regimen for dengue fever. Travelers should take precautions against being bitten by mosquitoes to reduce the chance of contracting such illnesses, such as avoiding standing water even in the home, wearing long sleeves and pants in both day and night, and applying insect repellent regularly.

Severe air pollution, which can aggravate or lead to respiratory problems, is common throughout the country during the dry season due in large part to widespread forest fires and agricultural burning. Travelers with respiratory or cardiac conditions and those who are elderly or extremely young are at greatest risk for complications from air pollution, which may includecoughing,difficulty breathing, wheezing, or chest pain. Acute respiratory infections are also widespread; more than100,000 cases are reported annually.

Individuals traveling to Honduras should ensure that all their routine vaccinations are up to date. Vaccination against Hepatitis A, Hepatitis B, and yellow fever is strongly recommended. Travelers taking prescription medications should bring an adequate supply with them when coming to Honduras and ensure that they are properly labeled.

Honduras also has the highest adult HIV/AIDS prevalence rate in the region. Over 63,000 people in Honduras have HIV/AIDS.

Honduras lacks a substantial infrastructure for maintaining water purity. Travelers are strongly encouraged to never drink tap water in Honduras. Bottles and bags of purified water are widely available.

Information on vaccinations and other health precautions, such as safe food and water precautions and insect bite protection, may be obtained from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's hotline for international travelers at 1-877-FYI-TRIP (1-877-394-8747); fax 1-888-CDC-FAXX (1-888-232-3299), or via the CDC's Internet site at http://wwwn.cdc.gov/travel.

For information about outbreaks of infectious diseases abroad consult the World Health Organization's web site at http://www.who.int/en. Further health information for travelers is available at http://www.who.int/ith.

Traffic Safety and Road Conditions: While in a foreign country, U.S. citizens may encounter road conditions that differ significantly from those in the United States. The information below concerning Honduras is provided for general reference only, and may not be totally accurate in a particular location or circumstance. Because of crime and poor road conditions, driving can be very dangerous, and travelers should carry a cellular phone in case of an emergency.

Travelers should exercise extreme caution while driving on isolated stretches of road and passing on mountainous curves. Rockslides are common, especially in the rainy season (May through December). Traffic signs, even on major highways, are often inadequate, and streets in the major cities are often unmarked. Travelers should always drive with their doors locked and windows rolled up to avoid potential robberies at traffic lights and other places such as congested downtown streets.

Honduran roads are poorly lit and marked. Vehicles are often driven at night without adequate illumination, and animals and people wander onto the roads at all hours. For these reasons, and because of the high incidence of crime, the U.S. Embassy strongly discourages car and bus travel after dark.

Major cities are connected by an inconsistently maintained, two-lane system of paved roads, and many secondary roads in Honduras are unpaved. During the rainy season, even major highways are often closed due to rockslides and flooding during heavy rains. In the event of an accident, contact the Honduran Transit Authority (“Transito”) immediately. They may be contacted either directly through their local numbers, or through their national emergency number, *189.Honduran law requires that none of the vehicles involved be moved until Transit Agents arrive, not even to clear a traffic obstruction, unless you are in serious physical danger.

Some of the most dangerous stretches for road travel include: Tegucigalpa to Choluteca, because of dangerous mountain curves; El Progreso to La Ceiba, because of animal crossings and the poor condition of bridges from flooding; Route 39 through northern Olancho Department between Gualaco and San Esteban; and Limones to La Union, Olancho (route 41) via Salama and northward to Saba. Locals also refer to this latter stretch of road as the “Corridor of Death” because of frequent incidents of highway robbery. The Embassy has received reports of robberies on the road from Tegucigalpa to Danlí. The only recommended route to the north coast from the south is CA-5 to route 21 to CA-13 via Tela to La Ceiba and Trujillo. Hijackings of private and commercial vehicles from the U.S. to Honduras have occurred. While Honduras and the U.S. have signed and ratified a Stolen Vehicle Treaty, existing Honduran laws protect good faith buyers (even of stolen vehicles) so the recovery and return of these vehicles to their original owners is not guaranteed. Vehicle insurance may mitigate loss; please check with the National Insurance Crime Bureau at http://www.nicb.org, private insurance carriers, and our Embassy web site information on Commercial Vehicle Hijackings at http://honduras.usembassy.gov/english/mission/sections/RSO/comveh_highsec.htm for more information. For specific information concerning Honduran driving permits, vehicle inspection, road tax, and mandatory insurance, please contact the Honduran National Tourist Organization offices in New York via the Internet at www.hondurastips.honduras.com.

Marine Safety and Oversight: The areas off both coasts of Honduras are the subject of maritime border disputes between Honduras and its neighbors. The Honduran Navy patrols these areas, and all private vessels transiting Honduran territorial waters should be prepared to be hailed and possibly boarded by Honduran military personnel to verify documentation. While the Honduran Navy previously used private vessels as patrol vessels, this is no longer the case. In the event that any vessel is hailed in Honduran waters in the Caribbean by a non-military vessel or any suspicious vessel and directed to prepare for boarding, the vessel should immediately contact the U.S. Coast Guard Operations Center by radio or INMARSAT at 305-415-6800. Anyone needing more information can also contact the U.S. Embassy during working hours and request to speak with the U.S. Military Group (USMILGP) office. There have been incidents of armed assaults against private sailing vessels by criminals posing as fishermen off the northeast coast of Honduras, particularly in the numerous small islands northeast of the Department of Gracias a Dios. Sailors should contact the Coast Guard and yacht facility managers in their areas of travel for current information.

Aviation Safety Oversight: The U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has assessed the Government of Honduras’ Civil Aviation Authority as not being in compliance with International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) aviation safety standards for the oversight of Honduras’ air carrier operations. For more information, travelers may visit the FAA's Internet web site at http//:www.faa.gov.

Severe air pollution often leads to the closing of some or all of Honduras's four international airports during the dry season. Some travelers have been compelled to travel by bus to neighboring countries in order to catch onward flights.

For further information, travelers may contact the Department of Transportation within the United States at tel. 1-800-322-7873, or visit the FAA's Internet web site at: www.faa.gov/avr/iasa.

Real Estate Investment: U.S. citizens should exercise extreme caution before entering into any form of commitment to invest in real property, particularly in coastal areas and the Bay Islands. Honduran laws and practices regarding real estate differ substantially from those in the United States, and fraudulent deeds and titles are common; U.S. citizens considering investing or buying real estate in Honduras should be aware that rights to such property do not enjoy the same level of protection as in the United States. There is no title insurance in Honduras, and approximately 80 percent of privately held land is untitled. In addition, there are complaints that the Honduran judicial system often prolongs disputed cases for many years before resolution. Americans have spent thousands of dollars in legal fees and years of frustration trying to resolve property disputes, even in cases in which local attorneys and Honduran and U.S. real estate agents had given assurances to the investor. Violence has been used against Americans involved in disputed property cases. Potential investors should engage competent local legal representation before making any commitments. Investors should thoroughly check references of attorneys and real estate agents.

Honduran law places certain restrictions on land ownership by foreigners in coastal and border areas. Squatters claim a number of properties owned by U.S. citizens. U.S. Government officials may not act as agents, attorneys, or in a fiduciary capacity. U.S. citizens who own property abroad and who thereby have assumed responsibilities concurrent with ownership of property in a foreign country should take steps on their own initiative to safeguard their interests and to employ private legal counsel when the need arises. For further information on investing in property in Honduras, please review the State Department's Investment Climate Statement, part of the Country Commercial Guide at http://www.buyusa.gov/honduras/en/14.html. For information on contracting Honduran legal representation, please check with other investors. You may also refer to the list of attorneys available on the Embassy's home page at http://honduras.usembassy.gov/attorneylistjul07.pdf.

Financial Market Investment: Due to poor regulation and lack of guarantees, investment in the Honduran “Bolsa de Valores,” or securities market, as well as banking institution bonds, “fideicomisos” (trusts), and certificates of deposit from uninsured financial institutions pose high risk to investors. Extreme caution should be exercised before and while undertaking such activities, as American citizens have lost large sums of money through investments in such precarious markets. For further information on investing in Honduras, please review the State Department's Investment Climate Statement, part of the Country Commercial Guide at http://www.buyusa.gov/honduras/en/14.html.

Corruption: Many U.S. firms and citizens operating in Honduras have found corruption to be a serious problem and a constraint to successful investment. While some U.S. firms have satisfactorily resolved cases through the courts, the majority have difficulty navigating the legal system. There are complaints that the Honduran judicial system caters to favoritism, external pressure and bribes. Corruption appears to be most pervasive in government procurement, government permits, and in the buying and selling of real estate (land titling).

Customs Regulations: U.S. citizens who intend to stay in Honduras for an extended period of time and who bring vehicles or household goods into the country should consult Honduran customs officials prior to shipment. With the exception of “antique” cars, all vehicles imported into Honduras by foreigners must be less than ten (10) years old. For specific information regarding customs requirements, please contact the Embassy of Honduras in Washington, DC at: http://www.hondurasemb.org for more information.

Honduran customs authorities may enforce strict regulations concerning temporary import and export of items such as antiquities, medications, and business equipment. For example, Honduran law prohibits the export of antiques and artifacts from pre-colonial civilizations. To protect the country's biodiversity, it is illegal to export certain birds, feathers, and other flora and fauna. For specific information regarding exportation requirements, please contact the Embassy of Honduras in Washington, DC at http://www.hondurasemb.org.

The Government of Honduras is strictly enforcing the law that requires a Honduran permit for the importation of firearms into Honduras. Travelers must obtain a firearm importation permit from a Honduran Embassy, Consulate General or Consulate located in the U.S. prior to bringing firearms into the country. Please note that a U.S. government-issued or airline-issued permit is not valid for importation of firearms into Honduras. Firearms that arrive without the requisite Honduran permit will be confiscated and the bearer will be prosecuted to the full extent of Honduran law.

Criminal Penalties: While in a foreign country, a U.S. citizen is subject to that country's laws and regulations, which sometimes differ significantly from those in the U.S. and may not afford the protections available under U.S. law. Penalties for breaking the law can be more severe than in the U.S. for similar offenses. Persons violating Honduran laws, even unknowingly, may be fined, expelled, arrested or imprisoned. Penalties for possession, use, or trafficking in illegal drugs in Honduras are severe, and convicted offenders can expect long jail sentences and heavy fines. Assisting or participating in the distribution of illegal drugs is also a crime prosecutable in the U.S., and may lead to fines, property seizure, or imprisonment. Anyone offering you illegal drugs should be considered extremely dangerous—there is no “safe” source of illegal drugs.

“Sexual tourists” travel alone or in groups to Honduras for the purpose of purchasing sexual favors from minors. This activity violates Honduran law, and American citizens are imprisoned in Honduras for sexual offenses involving minors. In addition, U.S. citizens and residents charged with these crimes are subject to prosecution upon their return to the U.S., regardless of the outcome of the judicial proceedings overseas. Moreover, the prevalence of HIV/AIDS in sex workers in Honduras is estimated to be in excess of 10%.Using or disseminating child pornography in a foreign country is also a crime prosecutable in the United States.

Children's Issues: International adoptions from Honduras are very complex. Current information on Honduran adoption procedures and the immigrant visa application process is available from the Consular Section of the U.S. Embassy. Prospective adoptive parents are urged to check with the Consular Section to ensure that all required documentation has been approved by the U.S. Bureau of Citizenship and Immigration Services of the Department of Homeland Security and to confirm that their child's adoption is complete before traveling to Honduras to apply for their child's immigrant visa. Adoptive parents are also urged to carry with them complete adoption paperwork when traveling with their adopted child to, from, and within Honduras.

Honduras is a signatory to the Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction, but the U.S. Department of State has determined that Honduras has failed to comply with its obligations under the Convention. No child has ever been returned to the United States from Honduras under the provisions of the Convention.

For information on international adoption of children and international parental child abduction, please refer to the Office of Children's Issues web pages on intercountry adoption and international parental child abduction at http://travel.state.gov/family, or telephone Overseas Citizens Services at 1-888-407-4747.

Registration and Embassy Locations: Americans living or traveling in Honduras are encouraged to register their presence through the State Department's travel registration web site, and to obtain updated information on travel and security within Honduras. Americans without Internet access may register directly with the U.S. Embassy in Tegucigalpa. By registering, whether via the Internet or in person at the Embassy, American citizens make it easier for the Embassy to contact them in case of emergency.

U.S. Embassy and Consulate location: Avenida La Paz in Tegucigalpa, Honduras
Internet site:
http://honduras.usembassy.gov
Telephone: 011-504-236-9320 or
011-504-238-5114

For information on services for U.S. citizens, please ask for ext. 4400. American Citizens Services Unit Fax: 011-504-238-4357

Consular Agency in San Pedro Sula location:
Banco Atlantida Building—11th Floor
San Pedro Sula, Honduras
Telephone: 011-504-558-1580

The Consular Agent is available during limited hours to perform notarial services, assist U.S. citizens with emergencies, and accept U.S. passport and U.S. Report of Birth applications for adjudication at the Embassy in Tegucigalpa. Please call for office hours. The Consular Agent does not provide visa information or services.

For more details about all U.S. Embassy and consular services in Honduras, please see the Embassy web site at http://hondurasusembassy.gov/ or visit the Bureau of Consular Affairs web site at http://travel.state.gov.

International Adoption

January 2007

The information in this section has been edited from a report of the State Department Bureau of Consular Affairs, Office of Overseas Citizens Services.

For more information, please read the International Adoption section of this book and review current reports online at http://travel.state.gov/family.

Disclaimer: The information in this flyer relating to the legal requirements of specific foreign countries is based on public sources and current understanding. Questions involving foreign and U.S. immigration laws and legal interpretation should be addressed respectively to qualified foreign or U.S. legal counsel.

Please Note: The adoption process in Honduras is currently in flux. Policies regarding eligibility requirements for adoptive parents, residency requirements, and time frame are under review by the Honduran Family Court (IHNFA).

Patterns of Immigration: Please review current reports online at http://travel.state.gov/family.

Adoption Authority: Instituto Hondureño de la Niñez y la Familia (IHNFA) for children under 14 years old. Honduran Family Court for children 14 and older.

Instituto Hondureño de la
Niñez y la Familia (IHNFA)
Honduras, Centro America
Tegucigalpa, Col. Humuya,
Calle la salud,
Apartado Postal 3234
Phone: (504) 23.57.754,
(504) 23.57.755, (504) 23.57.756
Fax: (504) 23.53.598
Website: http://www.ihnfa.hn/

Adoption Agencies and Attorneys: All adoption agencies must be accredited. IHNFA has the information about registration and accreditation to operate. The U.S. Embassy in Tegucigalpa maintains a listing of attorneys in Honduras on their website at: http://honduras.usembassy.gov/attorneyltfeb06.pdf.

Adoption Fees: Between U.S. $3,000 and U.S. $10,000 for attorney fees.

Adoption Procedures: If a child is under 14 years old, a petition (available at the IHNFA) must be submitted with the IHNFA. If a child is 14— 18 years old, a petition may be submitted to the Honduran Family Court by an attorney.

Required Documents: These are currently under review by IHNFA. Please contact IHNFA for more specific information.

Embassy of Honduras
3007 Tilden Street N.W.
Washington, D.C. 20008
Telephone: (202) 966-7702.
E-mail: [email protected]
Website: http://www.hondurasemb.org

Honduran Consulates are located in Atlanta, Boston, Chicago, Houston, Jacksonville, Los Angeles, Miami, New Orleans, New York, Phoenix, San Francisco, San Juan, and Tampa.

U.S. Immigration Requirements: Prospective adoptive parents are strongly encouraged to consult USCIS publication M-249, The Immigration of Adopted and Prospective Adoptive Children, as well as the Department of State publication, International Adoptions. Please see the International Adoption section of this book for more details and review current reports online at http://travel.state.gov/family.

U.S. Embassy Avenida La Paz Tegucigalpa, Honduras.

Americans may contact the American Citizen Services Unit of the Consular Section at: Telephone: (504) 238-5114 ext. 4400; Website: http://honduras.usembassy.gov.

Additional Information: Specific questions about adoption in Honduras may be addressed to the U.S. Embassy in Tegucigalpa. General questions regarding intercountry adoption may be addressed to the Office of Children's Issues, U.S. Department of State, CA/OCS/CI, SA-29, 4th Floor, 2201 C Street, NW, Washington, D.C. 20520-4818, toll-free Tel: 1-888-407-4747.

Honduras

views updated May 23 2018

HONDURAS

Compiled from the May 2003 Background Note and supplemented with additional information from the State Department and the editors of this volume. See the introduction to this set for explanatory notes.




Official Name:
Republic of Honduras




PROFILE
PEOPLE AND HISTORY
aGOVERNMENT
POLITICAL CONDITIONS
NATIONAL SECURITY
ECONOMY
FOREIGN RELATIONS
U.S.-HONDURAN RELATIONS
TRAVEL


PROFILE


Geography

Area: 112,100 sq. km. (43,270 sq. mi.); about the size of Louisiana.

Cities: Capital—Tegucigalpa (850,000); San Pedro Sula (500,000); metropolitan area of each city over 1 million.

Terrain: Mountainous.

Climate: Tropical to subtropical, depending on elevation.


People

Nationality: Noun and adjective—Honduran(s).

Population: (2001 est.) 6.5 million.

Growth rate: (2001 est.) 2.6%.

Ethnic groups: 90% mestizo (mixed Indian and European); others of European, Arab, African, or Asian ancestry; and indigenous Indians.

Religions: Roman Catholic, Protestant minority.

Language: Spanish.

Education: Years compulsory—6. Attendance—70% overall, but less than 16% at junior high level. Literacy—78.5%.

Health: Infant mortality rate—42/1,000. Life expectancy—68 yrs.

Work force: Services—45.7%; natural resources/agriculture—33.8%; manufacturing—15.3%; construction/housing—5.2%.

Government

Type: Democratic constitutional republic.

Independence: September 15, 1821.

Constitution: 1982.

Branches: Executive—president, directly elected to 4-year term. Legislative—unicameral National Congress, elected for 4-year term. Judicial—Supreme Court of Justice (appointed by Congress and confi rmed by the president); several lower courts.

Political parties: National Party, Liberal Party, Innovation and National Unity Party, Christian Democratic Party, and the Democratic Unification Party.

Suffrage: Universal adult.

Administrative subdivisions: 18 departments


Economy (2002)

GDP: $6.6 billion.

Growth rate: 2.0%.

Per capita GDP: $925.

Natural resources: Arable land, forests, minerals, and fisheries.

Agriculture: (12% of GDP) Products—coffee, bananas, shrimp and lobster, sugar, fruits, basic grains, and livestock.

Manufacturing: (18% of GDP) Types—textiles and apparel, cement, wood products, cigars, and foodstuffs.

Trade: Exports—$1.3 billion: coffee, shrimp, bananas, zinc/lead concentrates, soap/detergents, melons, lobster, pineapple, lumber, and tobacco. Major market—U.S. (49%). Imports—$3.0 billion: machinery, chemicals, petroleum, vehicles, processed foods, metals, agricultural products, plastic articles, and paper articles. Major source—U.S. (46%).




PEOPLE AND HISTORY

About 90% of the population is mestizo. There also are small minorities of European, African, Asian, Arab, and indigenous Indian descent. Most Hondurans are Roman Catholic, but Protestant churches are growing in number. Spanish is the predominant language, although some English is spoken along the northern coast and is prevalent on the Caribbean Bay Islands. Several indigenous Indian languages and Garifuna (a black Caribe/African language) also are spoken. The restored Mayan ruins near the Guatemalan border in Copan reflect the great Mayan culture that flourished there for hundreds of years until the early 9th century. Columbus landed at mainland Honduras (Trujillo) in 1502. He named the area "Honduras" (meaning "depths") for the deep water off the coast. Spaniard Hernan Cortes arrived in 1524. The Spanish founded several settlements along the coast, and Honduras formed part of the colonial era Captaincy General of Guatemala. The cities of Comayagua and Tegucigalpa developed as early mining centers.


Independence

Honduras, along with the other Central American provinces, gained independence from Spain in 1821; the country then briefly was annexed to the Mexican Empire. In 1823, Honduras joined the newly formed United Provinces of Central America. Social and economic differences between Honduras and its regional neighbors exacerbated harsh partisan strife among Central American leaders and brought on the federation's collapse in 1838. Gen. Francisco Morazan—a Honduran national hero—led unsuccessful efforts to maintain the federation, and restoring Central American unity remained the chief aim of Honduran foreign policy until after World War I.


Since independence, Honduras has been plagued with nearly 300 internal rebellions, civil wars, and changes of government—more than half occurring during the 20th century. The country traditionally lacked both an economic infrastructure and social and political integration. Its agriculturally based economy came to be dominated in the 1900s by U.S. companies that established vast banana plantations along the north coast. Foreign capital, plantation life, and conservative politics held sway in Honduras from the late 19th until the mid-20th century. During the relatively stable years of the Great Depression, authoritarian Gen. Tiburcio Carias Andino controlled Honduras. His ties to dictators in neighboring countries and to U.S. banana companies helped him maintain power until 1948. By then, provincial military leaders had begun to gain control of the two major parties, the Nationalists and the Liberals.


From Military to Civilian Rule

In October 1955—after two authoritarian administrations and a general strike by banana workers on the north coast in 1954—young military reformists staged a palace coup that installed a provisional junta and paved the way for constituent assembly elections in 1957. This assembly appointed Dr. Ramon Villeda Morales as president and transformed itself into a national legislature with a 6-year term. The Liberal Party ruled during 1957-63. At the same time, the military took its first steps to become a professional institution independent of leadership from any one political party, and the newly created military academy graduated its first class in 1960. In October 1963, conservative military officers preempted constitutional elections and deposed Villeda in a bloody coup. These officers exiled Liberal Party members and took control of the national police. The armed forces, led by Gen. Lopez Arellano, governed until 1970. Popular discontent continued to rise after a 1969 border war with El Salvador. A civilian president—Ramon Cruz of the National Party—took power briefly in 1970 but proved unable to manage the government. In December 1972, Gen. Lopez staged another coup. Lopez adopted more progressive policies, including land reform, but his regime was brought down in the mid-1970s by corruption scandals.

Gen. Lopez' successors continued armed forces modernization programs, building army and security forces, and concentrating on Honduran Air Force superiority over its neighbors. The regimes of Gen. Melgar Castro (1975-78) and Gen. Paz Garcia (1978-83) largely built the current physical infrastructure and telecommunications system of Honduras. The country also enjoyed its most rapid economic growth during this period, due to greater international demand for its products and the availability of foreign commercial lending.


Following the overthrow of Anastasio Somoza in Nicaragua in 1979 and general instability in El Salvador at the time, the Honduran military accelerated plans to return the country to civilian rule. A constituent assembly was popularly elected in April 1980, and general elections were held in November 1981. A new constitution was approved in 1982, and the Liberal Party government of President Roberto Suazo Cordoba took office following free and fair elections power.

Suazo relied on U.S. support to help with a severe economic recession and with the threat posed by the revolutionary Sandinista government in Nicaragua amid a brutal civil war in El Salvador. Close cooperation on political and military issues with the United States was complemented by ambitious social and economic development projects sponsored by the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID). Honduras became host to the largest Peace Corps mission in the world, and nongovernmental and international voluntary agencies proliferated.


As the November 1985 election approached, the Liberal Party had difficulty settling on a candidate, and interpreted election law as permitting multiple presidential candidates from one party. The Liberal Party claimed victory when its presidential candidates, who received 42% of the vote, collectively outpolled the National Party candidate, Rafael Leonardo Callejas. Jose Azcona Hoyo, the candidate receiving the most votes among the Liberals, assumed the presidency in January 1986. With the endorsement of the Honduran military, the Azcona administration ushered in the first peaceful transfer of power between civilian presidents in more than 30 years. Four years later, Rafael Callejas won the presidential election, taking office in January 1990. Callejas concentrated on economic reform, reducing the deficit, and taking steps to deal with an overvalued exchange rate and major structural barriers to investment. He began the movement to place the military under civilian control and laid the groundwork for the creation of the public ministry (attorney general's office).


Despite his administration's economic reforms, the nation's fiscal deficit ballooned during Callejas' last year in office. Growing public dissatisfaction with the rising cost of living and with widespread government


corruption led voters in 1993 to elect Liberal Party candidate Carlos Roberto Reina over National Party contender Oswaldo Ramos Soto, with Reina winning 56% of the vote.


President Reina, elected on a platform calling for a "moral revolution," actively prosecuted corruption and pursued those responsible for human rights abuses in the 1980s. He created a modern attorney general's office and an investigative police force and was successful in increasing civilian control over the armed forces and transferring the police from military to civilian authority.


Reina also restored national fiscal health by substantially increasing Central Bank net international reserves, reducing inflation, restoring economic growth, and, perhaps most importantly, holding down spending.


Carlos Roberto Flores Facusse took office on January 27, 1998, as Honduras' fifth democratically elected president since democratic institutions were restored in 1981. Like three of his four predecessors, Flores was a member of the Liberal Party. He was elected by a 10% margin over his main opponent, National Party nominee Nora de Melgar. Upon taking office on January 27, 1998, Flores inaugurated programs of reform and modernization of the Honduran Government and economy, with emphasis on helping Honduras' poorest citizens while maintaining the country's fiscal health and improving international competitiveness.

In October 1998, Hurricane Mitch devastated Honduras, leaving more than 5,000 people dead and 1.5 million displaced. Damages totaled nearly $3 billion. The Honduran Government agreed to a new transparent process to manage relief funds, which included significant donor oversight. This open process greatly facilitated the relief and reconstruction effort. President Flores and his administration have successfully managed more than $600 million in international assistance. Civil society's role in the government-coordinated reconstruction process has been lauded internationally. President Flores also forwarded judicial and penal reforms. He established an anti corruption commission, supported passage of a new penal code based on the oral accusatorial system, and saw passage of a law that creates an independent Supreme Court. Flores cemented the transition from military to civilian rule by eliminating the commander in chief position, and by signing a law that establishes civilian control formally over the military.


Ricardo Maduro Joest of the National Party was elected to the Honduran presidency on November 25, 2001, outpolling the Liberal candidate, Rafael Pineda Ponce, by 8%. He was inaugurated on January 27, 2002. The elections, characterized by international observer teams as free, fair, and peaceful, reflected the maturing of Honduras' democratic institutions. During his campaign, President-elect Maduro promised to reduce crime, reinvigorate the economy, and fight corruption. Working to fulfill this promise, Maduro's first act as President was to deploy more than 5,000 soldiers to the streets to support the police in the ongoing fight against the country's massive crime problem. While the initial reaction to this policy was overwhelmingly positive, the soldiers' presence appears to have had only a minimally positive effect on the country's crime rate. The recent suspension of Nicaragua's 35% tariff on Honduran goods is a positive step for Central American economic integration and is seen as a victory for the Maduro administration.




GOVERNMENT

The 1982 constitution provides for a strong executive, a unicameral National Congress, and a judiciary appointed by the National Congress. The president is directly elected to a 4-year term by popular vote. The congress also serves a 4-year term; congressional seats are assigned the parties' candidates in proportion to the number of votes each party receives in the various departments. The judiciary includes a Supreme Court of Justice, courts of appeal, and several courts of original jurisdiction—such as labor, tax, and criminal courts. For administrative purposes, Honduras is divided into 18 departments, with municipal officials selected for 4-year terms.




POLITICAL CONDITIONS

Reinforced by the media and several political watchdog organizations, human rights and civil liberties are reasonably well protected. There are no known political prisoners in Honduras, and the privately owned media frequently exercises its right to criticize without fear of reprisals. Organized labor now represents less than 15% of the work force and its economic and political influence has declined. Honduras held its sixth consecutive democratic elections in November 2001, to elect a new president, unicameral Congress, and mayors. For only the second time, voters were able to cast separate ballots for each office, and for the first time, denied the president-elect party's absolute majority in the Congress. The incidence of cross voting between presidential and congressional candidates was marked.


Political Parties

The two major parties—the Liberal Party and the National Party—run active campaigns throughout the country. Their ideologies are mostly centrist, with diverse factions in each centered on personalities. The three smaller registered parties—the Christian Democratic Party, the Innovation and National Unity Party, and the Democratic Unification Party—have increased their political muscle in the National Congress by doubling their representation. Despite significant progress in training and installing more skillful advisers at the top of each party ladder, electoral politics in Honduras remain traditionalist and paternalistic.


Principal Government Officials
Last Updated: 1/14/04


President: Maduro, Ricardo

First Vice Pres.:Williams, Vicente

Second Vice Pres.:De Lopez, Armida

Third Vice Pres.:Diaz, Alberto

Min. of Agriculture & Livestock: Jimenez, Mariano

Min. of Culture, Arts, & Sports:

Min. of Defense: Breve, Federico

Min. of Education: Avila, Carlos

Min. of Finance: Alvarado, Arturo

Min. of Foreign Relations: Rosa Bautista, Leonidas

Min. of Industry & Commerce: Garcia, Norman

Min. of Interior & Justice: Hernandez Alcerro, Jorge Ramon

Min. of Labor: Leitzelar, German

Min. of Natural Resources & Environment: Panting, Patricia

Min. of the Presidency: Cosenza, Luis

Min. of Public Employees' Retirement & Pension (INJUPEMP): Lupiac, David Mendoza

Min. of Public Health: Lizardo, Elias

Min. of Public Works, Transportation, & Housing: Carranza, Jorge

Min. of Security: Alvarez, Oscar

Min. of Tourism: De Pierrefeu, Thiery

Min. Without Portfolio (health sector): Vargas, Carlos

Min. Without Portfolio (housing sector): Kafati, Johnny

Min. Without Portfolio (investment promotion sector): Atala, Camilo

Min. Without Portfolio (public service sector): Kafati, Eduardo

Min. Without Portfolio (strategic affairs and communication sector): Medina, Ramon

Pres., Central Bank: Mondragon de Villar, Maria Elena

Ambassador to the US: Canahuati, Mario Miguel

Permanent Representative to the UN, New York: Acosta Bonilla, Manuel



Honduras maintains an embassy in the United States at 3007 Tilden Street NW, Washington, DC 20008 (tel. 202-966-7702).




NATIONAL SECURITY

Events during the 1980s in El Salvador and Nicaragua led Honduras—with U.S. assistance—to expand its armed forces, laying particular emphasis on its airforce, which came to include a squadron of U.S.-provided F-5s. The resolution of the civil wars in El Salvador and Nicaragua and across-the-board budget cuts made in all ministries greatly reduced funding for the Honduran Armed Forces. The abolition of the draft created staffing gaps in the now all-volunteer armed forces. The military now is far below its authorized strength. In January 1999, the constitution was amended to abolish the position of military commander in chief of the armed forces, thus codifying civilian authority over the military. Former President Flores also named the first civilian minister of defense in the country's history.


ECONOMY

Honduras is one of the poorest and least developed countries in Latin America. The economy was traditionally based on agriculture, which accounted for 12% of GDP in 2001 and employed more than 40% of the work force. Hit by plummeting world prices, coffee accounted for only 12% of all Honduran exports in 2001, down from almost 25% in 2000. Coffee revenues in 2001 were down to $161 million from $340 million in 2000. The coffee industry was further hurt in 2002 by cold weather and torrential rains that caused the harvest to decrease to 2.1 million sacks for 2002-03. Bananas, formerly the country's second-largest export until being virtually wiped out by 1998's Hurricane Mitch, recovered in 2001 to 60% of pre-Mitch levels and generated $197 million in export revenues. Cultivated shrimp are another important export generating $125 million in 2001. Honduras has extensive forest, marine, and mineral resources, although widespread slash-and-burn agricultural methods continue to destroy Honduran forests. The gross family remittances from Hondurans living abroad (mostly in the United States) rose 27% to $700 million in 2002. The currency (lempira) in 2002 was exchanged to the U.S. dollar at 16.92, which showed a nominal depreciation of 6.3% for the year.


Unemployment is estimated at around 4.2% in 2001, though under-employment is much higher. The Honduran economy grew 2.0% in 2002, which was lower than economic growth rates of 2.7% in 2001 and 4.7% in 2000. The Honduran maquiladora (garment assembly) sector, the third-largest in the world, continued its strong performance in the first month of 2003 with the announcement of 8,000 new jobs. The industry provides employment to more than 110,000 workers and generated more than $600 million in foreign exchange for Honduras in 2001. The economic slowdown in the United States caused Honduras' maquila sector growth to stagnate in 2001 and employment in the sector to declined from 125,000 in 2000 to 110,000 in 2001.

Inflation, as measured by the consumer price index, was 8.1% in 2002, down slightly from the 8.8% recorded in 2001. The country's international reserve position continued to be strong in 2002, at slightly over $1.5 billion.


Honduras received significant debt relief in the aftermath of Hurricane Mitch in late 1998, including the suspension of bilateral debt-service payments and bilateral debt reduction by the Paris Club—including the United States—worth more than $400 million. In July 2000, Honduras reached its decision point under the Heavily Indebted Poor Countries initiative (HIPC), qualifying the country for interim multilateral debt relief. In 2001, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank approved Honduras' Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper (PRSP), making Honduras eligible for $900 million in debt relief in present value terms, upon its completion point. Since that time, fiscal problems have derailed the government's IMF program and put the HIPC debt relief on hold. Honduras is currently negotiating with the IMF on the terms of a new 3-year Poverty Reduction and Growth Facility program.




FOREIGN RELATIONS

Honduras is a member of the United Nations, the World Trade Organization (WTO), the Organization of American States (OAS), the Central American Parliament (PARLACEN), the Central American Integration System (SICA), and the Central American Security Commission (CASC). During 1995-96, Honduras, a founding member of the United Nations, for the first time served as a nonpermanent member of the UN Security Council.


Honduras is a strong proponent of Central American cooperation and integration, and has joined in an agreement easing border controls and tariffs among Honduras, Guatemala, Nicaragua, and El Salvador. Honduras held the 6-month SICA presidency during the second half of 2001, and worked hard to advance regional cooperation with the United States on issues related to sustainable development. President Flores also was instrumental in galvanizing regional support for counterterrorism measures following the September 11 attacks.

In 1969, El Salvador and Honduras fought the brief "Soccer War" over disputed border areas and the emigration of some 300,000 Salvadorans to Honduras in search of land and employment. The catalyst was nationalistic feelings aroused by a series of soccer matches between the two countries, but the roots of the conflict lay in local disputes over land ownership and usage. The two countries formally signed a peace treaty on October 30, 1980, which put the border dispute before the International Court of Justice (ICJ). In September 1992, the Court awarded most of the disputed territory to Honduras. In January 1998, Honduras and El Salvador signed a border demarcation treaty to implement the terms of the ICJ decree although delays continue due to technical difficulties. Honduras and El Salvador maintain normal diplomatic and trade relations, however, they continue to have strained relations over the status of their maritime borders in the Gulf of Fonseca.


Honduras and Nicaragua had tense relations throughout 2000 and early 2001 due to a maritime boundary dispute off the Atlantic Coast. Nicaragua imposed a 35% tariff against Honduras due to the dispute, and the Central American Court of Justice ruled the tariff illegal in 2001. Despite this ruling, Nicaragua continued to impose the tariff until March 2003, when it was suspended under threat of a Honduran retaliatory tariff on Nicaraguan goods.


U.S.-HONDURAN RELATIONS


Overview

The United States and Honduras have close and friendly relations. Honduras is supportive of U.S. policy in the United Nations and other fora. As a nonpermanent member of the UN Security Council, Honduras played a very helpful role in 1996, most notably in advancing the process of selecting a new UN Secretary General during its October presidency of the Council. The United States also continued to be able to count on Honduras' strong support in the war on terrorism.


The United States favors stable, peaceful relations between Honduras and its Central American neighbors. During the 1980s, Honduras supported U.S. policy in Central America opposing a revolutionary Marxist government in Nicaragua and an active leftist insurgency in El Salvador. The Honduran Government also played a key role in negotiations that culminated in the 1990 Nicaraguan elections. Honduras contributed troops for the UN peacekeeping mission in Haiti and continues to participate in the UN observer mission in the Western Sahara.


The United States is Honduras' chief trading partner, supplying 46% of its imports and purchasing 49% of its exports in 2001. Leading Honduran exports to the United States include coffee, bananas, seafood (particularly shrimp), minerals (including zinc, lead, gold, and silver), and other fruits and vegetables. The United States encourages U.S. investment that contributes to Honduran development and bilateral trade.


U.S. direct investment in Honduras is an estimated $840 million, about two-thirds of the total foreign direct investment (FDI) in the country of $1.3 billion. FDI flow into Honduras in 2001 totaled $186 million with the United States leading the way with investments totaling $84 million or 45% of the total FDI. The largest U.S. investments in Honduras are in the maquila (garment assembly) sector, in which apparel and textile export revenues totaled $2.34 billion in 2001. There also are significant U.S. investments in fruit production—particularly bananas, melons, and pineapple—tourism, energy generation, shrimp culture, animal feed production, telecommunications, fuel distribution, cigar manufacturing, insurance, brewing, leasing, food processing, and furniture manufacturing. U.S. maquilas are responsible for the majority of the approximately 110,000 jobs in that sector. Many U.S. franchises, particularly in the restaurant sector, operate in Honduras.

On January 8, 2003, the United States launched negotiations for a free trade agreement with Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, and Nicaragua. The negotiations are scheduled to be completed by December 2003. The U.S.-Central America Free Trade Agreement (U.S.-CAFTA) will eliminate tariffs and other barriers to trade in goods, services, agricultural products, and investments. Additionally, U.S.-CAFTA is seen as a mechanism to solidify democracy, encourage greater regional integration, and provide safeguards for environmental protection and labor rights. The main interest for Honduras in a free trade agreement is increased access to the U.S. market for textiles and apparel goods. U.S.-CAFTA also will serve as a stepping stone to the scheduled conclusion of the Free Trade Agreement of the Americas in 2005.


The United States maintains a small presence at a Honduran military base; the two countries conduct joint counternarcotics, humanitarian, disaster relief, and civic action exercises. U.S. troops conduct and provide logistics support for a variety of exercises—medical, engineering, peacekeeping, counternarcotics, and disaster relief—for the benefit of the Honduran people and their Central American neighbors. U.S. forces—regular, reserve, and National Guard—benefit greatly from the training and exercises.

U.S. troops, in collaboration with counterparts from Brazil and Colombia, have since 1994 assisted Honduran soldiers in clearing land mines from the country's border with Nicaragua. As of early 2001, the U.S.-trained Honduran demining unit had cleared nine major minefields measuring about 333,000 square meters, and more than 2,200 mines had been destroyed.


U.S. Policy Toward Honduras

U.S. policy toward Honduras is aimed at consolidating stable democracy with a justice system that protects human rights and promotes the rule of law. U.S. Government programs are aimed at promoting a healthy and more open economy capable of sustainable growth, improving the climate for business and investment while protecting U.S. citizen and corporate rights, and promoting the well-being of the Honduran people. The United States also works with Honduras to meet transnational challenges, including the fight against terrorism, narcotics trafficking, money laundering, illegal migration, and encourages and supports Honduran efforts to protect the environment. The goals of strengthening democracy and promoting viable economic growth are especially important given the geographical proximity of Honduras to the United States. Some 400,000 Hondurans reside in the United States; consequently, immigration issues are an important item on our bilateral agenda.


U.S.-Honduran ties are further strengthened by numerous private sector contacts, with an average of 110,000 U.S. citizens visiting Honduras annually and about 10,500 Americans residing there. More than 150 American companies operate in Honduras.


Economic and Development Assistance

To help strengthen Honduras' democratic institutions and improve living conditions, the United States has provided substantial economic assistance. The United States has historically been the largest bilateral donor to Honduras. USAID obligations to Honduras totaled $28.6 million for development assistance and $5.2 million for foodstuffs in 2002. Over the years, U.S. foreign assistance has helped advance such objectives as fostering democratic institutions, increasing private sector employment and income, helping Honduras fund its arrears with international financial institutions, providing humanitarian aid, increasing agricultural production, and providing loans to microbusinesses.


October 1998's Hurricane Mitch—the worst natural disaster ever to strike the Western Hemisphere—left hundreds of thousands homeless, devastated the road network and other public infrastructure, and crippled certain key sectors of the economy. Estimates show that Hurricane Mitch caused $8.5 billion in damages to homes, hospitals, schools, roads, farms, and businesses throughout Central America, including more than $3 billion in Honduras alone.


In response, the United States provided more than $461 million in immediate disaster relief and humanitarian aid spread over the years 1998-2001. This supplemental assistance was designed to help repair water and sanitation systems; replace housing, schools, and roads; provide agricultural inputs; provide local government crisis management training; grant debt relief; and encourage environmental management expertise. Additional resources were utilized to maintain anti-crime and drug assistance programs. The vast majority of the U.S. reconstruction projects are scheduled to finish by December 31, 2001, with the exception of some water and sanitation and transparency projects that have been extended for another 14 months. In 2001, the United States also provided food aid in response to a short drought and the depressed state of the agriculture sector. Subsequently, the United States provided $265,000 in disaster assistance after Tropical Storm Michelle inundated the north coast with floods.

New and existing U.S. economic programs—some with proposed enhancements that have taken on even greater importance since the hurricane—include the Caribbean Basin Economic Recovery Act, Overseas Private Investment Corporation financing for private investment and insurance against risks of war and expropriation, U.S. Trade Development Agency grant loans for prefeasibility studies of projects with U.S. product and services export potential, and U.S. Export-Import Bank short- and medium-term financing for U.S. exports to Honduran importers. All of these provide greater economic opportunity for U.S. and Honduran businessmen and women.


The Peace Corps has been active in Honduras since 1962, and, currently, the program is one of the largest in the world. In 2001, there were 200 Peace Corps Volunteers working in the poorest parts of Honduras.


The U.S. Government strongly supports the professionalization of the civilian police force as an important element in strengthening the rule of law in Honduras. The American embassy in Tegucigalpa provides specialized training to police officers through the International Criminal Training Assistance Program.


Security Assistance

The role of the Honduran armed forces has changed significantly in recent years as many institutions formerly controlled by the military are now under civilian authority. The defense and police budgets have hovered at around $35 million during the past few years. Formal U.S. security assistance has declined from over $500 million provided between 1982 and 1993 to $500,000 annually in International Military Education and Training (IMET) courses. Some residual credits are still available from previous military aid but will be exhausted within the next few years.


In the absence of a large security assistance program, defense cooperation has taken the form of increased participation by the Honduran Armed Forces in military-to-military contact programs and bilateral and multilateral combined exercises oriented toward peacekeeping, disaster relief, humanitarian/civic assistance, and counternarcotics. The U.S. Joint Task Force Bravo (JTF-B) stationed at the Honduran Soto Cano Air Base plays a vital role in supporting combined exercises in Honduras and in neighboring Central American countries. While JTF-Bravo has been involved in several multilateral exercises and numerous smaller humanitarian deployments, it played an absolutely critical role in helping the United States to respond to Hurricanes Mitch and Keith, and the earthquakes in El Salvador by saving lives, repairing critical infrastructure, and in meeting high priority health and sanitation needs. U.S. forces also delivered millions of dollars worth of privately donated goods to those in need.


U.S. Business Opportunities

U.S. Department of Commerce trade data show that bilateral trade between the two nations reached $2.03 billion in 2001. American businesses exported $1.4 billion in goods and services to Honduras in 2001. U.S. investors account for nearly two-thirds of the estimated $1.3 billion foreign direct investment in Honduras. More than 150 American companies operate there; U.S. franchises are present in increasing numbers.


Opportunities for U.S. business sales include textile machinery, construction equipment, automotive parts and accessories, telecommunications equipment, pollution control/water resources equipment, agricultural machinery, hotel and restaurant equipment, computers and software, franchising, and household consumer goods. Best prospects for agricultural products are corn, milled rice, wheat, soybean meal, and consumer-ready products.


U.S. citizens contemplating investment in real estate in Honduras should proceed with extreme caution, especially in the Bay Islands or coastal areas, because of frequently conflicting legislation, problems with land titles, and a weak judicial system. Investors or their attorneys should check property titles not only with the property registry office having jurisdiction in the area in which the property is located (being especially observant of marginal annotations on the deed and that the property is located within the area covered by the original title), but also with the National Agrarian Institute (INA) and the National Forestry Administration (COHDEFOR). Investors in land should be aware that even clear title is not a guarantee that a future dispute over land would be resolved equitably.


Principal U.S. Embassy Officials

Tegucigalpa (E), Avenida La Paz, Apartado Postal No. 3453 APO AA 34022; SWB: [504] 238-5114 or 236-9320, after-hours Tel. 236-9325; Fax Number 236-9037; COM Fax 238-2888; Public Diplomacy Fax 236-9309; AID Fax 236-7776; CON Fax 237-1792. Website: www.usmission.hn

AMB:Larry L. Palmer
AMB OMS:Linda Lopez
DCM:Roger D. Pierce
DCM OMS:Carol Garcia
MGT:Scott R. Heckman
AGR:Frank Coolidge (res. Guatemala City)
AID:Paul Tuebner
CLO:Debra James
COE:MAJ Paul Ashcroft
CON:John M. Jones
DAO:COL Stephen Brown, USAF
DEA:Thomas Berger
DHS:Luis Figueroa, Acting
ECO:Robin Matthewman
FCS:Dan Thompson (res. Guatemala City)
FMO:Calvin Watlington
GSO:Ana Baide
GSO/FM:Caroll Webb
HRO:Antoinette Corbin-Taylor
HU:Candace Moore
IMO:Timothy J. Cook
IPO:Eric A. Valdez
ISO:Jack Moore
ITO:Carol A. Harris
JTF-B:COL Raymond Thomas
MILGP:COL Randall James, USAF
ORA:Stewart A. Simpson
PAO:Melissa Cooper
PC:Ronald Ruybal
POL:Francisco Palmieri
POL/LAB:Derrick Olsen
RSO:John B. McKennan
TAT:Edgar Abreu


Last Modified: Monday, December 15, 2003


Contact Information

American Chamber of Commerce

Hotel Honduras Maya
Apartado Postal 1838
Tegucigalpa, Honduras
Tel: (504) 232-7043/232-6035
Fax: (504) 232-9959
Branch office in San Pedro Sula
Tel: (504) 558-0164/66
Fax: (504) 552-2401


Caribbean/Latin American Action
1818 N Street, NW
Suite 310 Washington, D.C. 20036
Tel: 202-466-7464
Fax: 202-822-0075
Internet: http://www.claa.org


U.S. Department of Commerce

International Trade Administration Office of Latin America and the Caribbean
14th and Constitution Avenue, NW
Washington, D.C. 20230
Tel: 202-482-0057
800-USA-TRADE
Fax: 202-482-0464
Internet: http://www.ita.doc.gov


U.S. Agency for International Development
1300 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW
Washington, D.C. 20523-0001
Tel: 202-712-4810
Fax: 202-216-3524
Hurricane Relief Website: http://hurricane.info.usaid.gov




TRAVEL


Consular Information Sheet
February 3, 2004


Country Description: Honduras is a democracy with a developing economy. The national language is Spanish, although English is often spoken in the Bay Islands. The climate is generally pleasant and temperate, with dry and wet seasons. The terrain ranges from mountainous to coastal beaches and jungle lowlands. Hotels and restaurants are generally adequate in the capital city of Tegucigalpa, San Pedro Sula, Tela, La Ceiba, the Bay Islands and the Copan ruins. Currency exchange is readily available at banks and hotels in the major cities.

Entry and Exit Requirements: All U.S. citizens must have a valid U.S. passport to enter and depart Honduras. A visa is not required, but tourists must provide proof of return or onward travel.


Parents should not rely on birth certificates for travel of their children; rather, they should obtain U.S. passports for infants and minors born in the U.S. prior to travel. For U.S. citizen children born in the United States to Honduran parents, Honduran Immigration provides an "evidence of continuance" (Constancia de Permanencia) stamp placed in the U.S. passport that allows the child to enter, depart, and remain in Honduras. Visitors are given a permit to remain in Honduras for 30 days. Honduran immigration may grant up to two thirty-day extensions for a total of 90 days. Thereafter, tourists must leave the country prior to reentering.


On departure, visitors are required to pay an exit fee, either in dollars or in local currency, at the airline counter. The current fee for international departures is $25 per visit, and an additional $2 agricultural inspection fee has recently been added. This fee is subject to change.


In an effort to prevent international child abduction, many governments have initiated special procedures at entry/exit points regarding the travel of minors. These often include requiring documentary evidence of relationship and permission for the child's travel from the parent(s) or legal guardian not present. Having such documentation on hand, even if not required, may facilitate entry/exit. Minors who are dual U.S.- Honduran nationals or who are resident in Honduras require notarized consent from both parents if traveling alone or in someone else's custody, or from the absent parent if traveling with only one parent. In cases where one parent has sole custody, the custodial parent must submit the custody decree to Honduran immigration upon departure.


For more information concerning entry and exit requirements, travelers may contact the Embassy of Honduras at 3007 Tilden Street N.W., Washington, D.C. 20008, telephone: (202) 966-7702; or a Honduran consulate in Atlanta, Boston, Chicago, Houston, Jacksonville, Los Angeles, Miami, New Orleans, New York, Phoenix, San Francisco, San Juan or Tampa. The Honduran Embassy's e-mail address is [email protected], and interested individuals may visit the Embassy's website for additional contact information through http://www.embassy.org/ or http://www.state.gov/. For tourist information or suggestions, please contact the Honduras Institute of Tourism at 1-800-410-9608 (in the United States), at 1-800-222-TOUR (8687) (within Honduras only) or visit their website http://www.hondurastips.honduras.com/.


Dual Nationality: Dual nationality is only permissible for minors under the age of 21 and those Honduranborn citizens who have become naturalized citizens of other countries. U.S.- born citizens who have become Honduran citizens by naturalization are not considered by the Government of Honduras to have dual nationality, which considers them to be solely Honduran. U.S. citizens do not lose their nationality if they become residents of Honduras. Dual nationals, in addition to being subject to all Honduran laws affecting U.S. citizens, may be subject to other laws that impose special obligations on Honduran citizens. For more information, please contact Honduran Immigration in Tegucigalpa (telephone 238-5613), San Pedro Sula (telephone 550-3728), Roatan (telephone 445-1226), La Ceiba (telephone 442-0638), or Puerto Cortes (telephone 665-0582). Please see the Bureau of Consular Affairs home page on the Internet at http://travel.state.gov for our Dual Nationality flyer.

Safety and Security: Political demonstrations occur sporadically. They can disrupt traffic, but they are generally announced in advance and are usually peaceful. Travelers should avoid areas where demonstrations are taking place, and they should keep informed by following the local news and consulting hotel personnel and tour guides.


There have been kidnapping attempts and threats against a few U.S. citizens. For more information, we strongly encourage travelers to visit the U.S. Embassy's website at www.usmission.hn/english/mission/security.htm and click on Personal Security Measures–Kidnap Briefing. There have also been incidents involving roadblocks and violence connected with land disputes that can delay travel, particularly in the north coast area near Trujillo.


The areas off both coasts of Honduras have been the subject of maritime border disputes between Honduras and its neighbors. The Honduran Navy patrols these areas, and all private vessels transiting Honduran territorial waters should be prepared to be hailed and possibly boarded by Honduran military personnel to verify documentation. While the Honduran previously used private vessels as patrol vessels, this is no longer the case. In the event that any vessel is hailed in Honduran waters in the Caribbean by a non-military vessel or any suspicious vessel and directed to prepare for boarding, the vessel should immediately contact the U.S. Coast Guard Operations Center by radio or INMARSAT at 305-415-6800. Anyone needing more information can also contact the U.S Embassy and request the U.S. Military Group (USMILGP) Duty Officer.


While the Honduran side of the Honduras-Nicaragua border has been largely cleared of land mines, travelers should exercise caution in the vicinity of the border because some land mines, scattered by flooding during Hurricane Mitch in October 1998, may still exist in the area.

Crime: The security situation in Honduras requires a high degree of caution, and U.S. citizens are encouraged to follow local news reports (Please see link to sources at http://www.usmission.hn/.) and contact the Honduran Embassy in Washington, D.C. and the U.S. Embassy in Tegucigalpa for current conditions. Poverty, gangs, and low apprehension and conviction rates of criminals contribute to a high crime rate. Many men in Honduras carry firearms and machetes, and disputes are sometimes settled with violence. Both violent and petty crime is prevalent throughout the country. While crime affects everyone in Honduras, criminals have at times targeted persons, particularly those coming from airports (a cycle of armed robberies followed by brief increases in police patrols) and hotels, as well as wealthy-looking residents in San Pedro Sula, Tela, Trujillo, and Tegucigalpa. Street crime is a principal concern, with thefts, including purse snatching, pickpocketing, assaults, and armed robberies on the rise in urban areas. There has been an increase in street robberies by two-men teams on medium-sized motorcycles targeting pedestrians. There have been some incidents of sexual assault. Carjackings, kidnappings, muggings, and home invasions are not uncommon. The government has instituted a "zero tolerance" policy on crime. As part of this policy, the police patrol jointly with armed soldiers in major cities in an effort to reduce crime.


Thirty-five U.S. citizens have been murdered in Honduras since 1995, and most cases remain unresolved. There are problems with the judicial process, including an acute shortage of trained personnel, equipment, staff, financial resources, and reports of corruption. The Honduran law enforcement authorities' ability to prevent, respond, investigate, apprehend, file Interpol reports, and prosecute criminal incidents remains limited. Honduran police generally do not speak English. The government has recently established a special tourist police in the resort town of Tela and plans to expand this force to other popular tourist destinations.


The San Pedro Sula area has seen occasional armed robberies against tourist vans, minibuses and cars traveling from the airport to area hotels, infrequently targeting the road to Copan. Vehicles force the transport off the road, and then men with AK-47s rob the victims, occasionally assaulting the driver or passengers. Robberies in this area may be based on tips from sources at airport arrival areas associated with large amounts of luggage/supplies usually for groups – not average tourists; please exercise caution in discussing travel plans in public.


Copan, the Bay Islands and other tourist destinations have a lower crime rate than other parts of the country, but petty thefts and assaults do occur. Specifically, visitors to Copan and the Bay Islands have experienced some petty thefts and, on Roatan Island, robbers have targeted homes and longer-term leased residences. Hotels and pensions are considered safer. U.S. citizens visiting the islands should exercise particular caution around sparsely inhabited coastal areas and should avoid walking on isolated beaches, especially at night. While incidents of serious violent crime in these regions are infrequent, three U.S. citizens have been murdered in Roatan since 1998. However, all the victims in Roatan were either residing in Roatan and/or involved in real estate or commercial ventures. Coxen Hole should be avoided after dark.


Although not a primary tourist destination, the northern part of the Department of Olancho is known for lumber and narcotics smuggling and violence. Travelers in that area should use extra caution. See the description of highways/areas to be avoided for details.


Incidents of crime along roads in Honduras are common. There have been frequent incidents of highway robbery on a number of roads including Limones to La Union, Olancho (route 41) via Salama and northward to Esquipul as Del Norte. For more information, please see the section below on Travel Safety and Road Conditions.

Tourists and residents should avoid walking at night in most areas of Honduras, especially in the major cities. Night driving is also discouraged. Tourists, in particular, should not hike alone in backcountry areas, nor walk alone on beaches, historic ruins or trails. All bus travel should be during daylight hours and on first-class conveyances, not on economy buses. Please pick taxis carefully, and note the driver's name and license number. Instruct the driver not to pick up other passengers, agree on the fare before you depart, and have small bills available for payment, as taxi drivers often do not make change.


Please do not resist a robbery attempt. Most criminals have weapons, and most injuries and deaths have resulted when victims have resisted. Two foreign tourists were murdered in July 2002 while resisting an armed robbery on a public bus in which they were traveling. Do not hitchhike or go home with strangers, particularly from nightspots. Whenever possible, travel in groups of two or more persons. Use the same common sense while traveling in Honduras that you would in any high crime area of a major U.S. city. Do not wear excessive jewelry in downtown or rural areas. Do not carry large sums of money, display cash in general, ATM or credit cards you do not need, or other valuables.


There have been incidents of armed assaults against private sailing vessels by criminals posing as fishermen off the northeast coast of Honduras, particularly in the numerous small islands northeast of the coast of the Department of Gracias a Dios. Sailors should contact the Coast Guard and yacht facility managers in their areas of travel for current information.


The loss or theft abroad of a U.S. passport should be reported immediately to the local police and the nearest U.S. embassy or consulate. Groups should send passport, date of birth and emergency contact information to the American Citizens Services section of the U.S. Embassy in Tegucigalpa via fax, 011-504-238-4357, prior to travel. Individuals as well as groups should keep a copy of the passport data page and leave a copy at home with a friend or family member. U.S. citizens may refer to the Department of State's pamphlet, A Safe Trip Abroad, for ways to promote a trouble-free journey. The pamphlet is available by mail from the Superintendent of Documents, U.S. Government Printing Office, Washington, D.C. 20402, via the Internet at http://www.gpoaccess.gov, or via the Bureau of Consular Affairs home page at http://travel.state.gov/.

If you are the victim of a crime while overseas, in addition to reporting to the local police, please contact the U.S. Embassy in Tegucigalpa or the Consular Agency in San Pedro Sula for assistance. The Embassy staff can, for example, assist you in finding appropriate medical care, in contacting family members or friends, and in explaining how funds can be transferred. Although the investigation and prosecution of crime (with the exception of certain terrorist acts) is solely the responsibility of local authorities, consular officers can help you to understand the local criminal justice process and help you to find an attorney if needed.


Medical Facilities: Medical care in Honduras varies in quality. Although doctors are generally well trained, support staff and facilities are not up to U.S. standards. Facilities for advanced surgical procedures are not available. The islands of Roatan, Utila, and Guanaja do not have a general surgery hospital. There is a decompression chamber on Roatan for divers. Travelers carrying prescription medicine should ensure that the medication is clearly labeled.


Medical Insurance: The Department of State strongly urges Americans to consult with their medical insurance company prior to traveling abroad to confirm whether their policy applies overseas and if it will cover emergency expenses such as a medical evacuation. U.S. medical insurance plans seldom cover health costs incurred outside the United States unless supplemental coverage is purchased. Further, U.S. Medicare and Medicaid programs do not provide payment for medical services outside the United States. However, many travel agents and private companies offer insurance plans that will cover health care expenses incurred overseas, including emergency services such as medical evacuations.


When making a decision regarding health insurance, Americans should consider that many foreign doctors and hospitals require payment in cash prior to providing service and that a medical evacuation to the United States may cost well in excess of $50,000. Uninsured travelers who require medical care overseas often face extreme difficulties. When consulting with your insurer prior to your trip, please ascertain whether payment will be made to the overseas health care provider or if you will be reimbursed later for expenses that you incur. Some insurance policies also include coverage for psychiatric treatment and for disposition of remains in the event of death.


Useful information on medical emergencies abroad, including overseas insurance programs, is provided in the Department of State's Bureau of Consular Affairs brochure, Medical Information for Americans Traveling Abroad, available via the Bureau of Consular Affairs home page.


Specific Health Risks: Visitors to Honduras are at risk for gastrointestinal illnesses. Pay careful attention to the choice of food and beverages. Most well known restaurants are considered safe. Tap water is not potable and should be boiled or chemically treated to help prevent cholera and gastrointestinal disorders. Safe bottled water is widely available. Mosquito-borne illnesses are a recurring problem in Honduras. All persons traveling in Honduras, even for a brief visit, are at risk of contracting malaria year-round if they travel outside of Tegucigalpa to low-lying areas. Take a prophylactic regimen best suited to your health profile. The country regularly suffers from outbreaks of dengue fever during the rainy season. Travelers should take precautions against being bitten by mosquitoes to reduce the chance of contracting such illnesses. Because rabies is endemic in Honduras, visitors should avoid contact with animals whose immunization status is unknown.

Individuals traveling to Honduras should ensure that all their routine vaccinations are up to date, and they may also consider getting a Hepatitis A and B vaccination. Rabies is a problem in Honduras, and the post-bite prophylaxis is not available. Immediate evacuation to the United States for treatment is the rule.


Other Health Information: Information on vaccinations and other health precautions, such as safe food and water precautions and insect bit protection, may be obtained from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's hotline for international travelers at 1-877-FYI-TRIP (1-877-394-8747); fax 1-888-CDC-FAXX (1-888-232-3299) or CDC's Internet site at http://www.cdc.gov/travel.


Travel Safety and Road Conditions: While in a foreign country, U.S. citizens may encounter road conditions that differ significantly from those in the United States. The information below concerning Honduras is provided for general reference only, and it may not be totally accurate in a particular location or circumstances.


Safety of Public Transportation: Poor Urban Road Conditions/Maintenance: Fair

Rural Road Conditions/Maintenance: Poor

Availability of Roadside Assistance: Poor


Because of crime and poor road conditions, driving can be very dangerous, and travelers may want to carry a cellular phone in case of an emergency. Travelers should exercise extreme caution while driving on isolated stretches of road and passing on mountainous curves. Rockslides are common, especially in the rainy season (June through December). Traffic signs, even on major highways, are often inadequate, and streets in the major cities are often unmarked. Travelers should drive with doors locked and windows rolled up.

Major highways have been rebuilt following the destruction caused by Hurricane Mitch in 1998, though many stretches are still under repair. Major cities are connected by an inconsistently maintained, two-lane system of paved roads, and many secondary roads in Honduras are unpaved. During the rainy season, even major highways are often closed due to rockslides and flooding. Hurricane Mitch washed out many bridges throughout the country, and temporary repairs are vulnerable to heavy rains.


Some of the most dangerous stretches for road travel include: Tegucigalpa to Choluteca, because of dangerous mountain curves; El Progreso to La Ceiba, because of animal crossings and the poor condition of bridges from flooding; and Limones to La Union, Olancho (route 41) via Salama and northward to Saba. This stretch of road is also referred to by locals as the "Corridor of Death" because of frequent incidents of highway robbery.


Route 39 through northern Olancho Department between Gualaco and San Esteban is highly dangerous and should be avoided.


Route 43 in northwest Olancho Department from Talanga to Olanchito via Yoro route 23 will become a primary route to the north coast when the remaining 60% of the highway is paved circa 1/05.


The only recommended safe route to the north coast from the south is CA-5 to route 21 to CA-13 via Tela to La Ceiba and Trujillo.


Honduran roads also suffer from a general lack of lighting and poorly marked highways. Vehicles are often driven at night without adequate illumination, and animals and people wander onto the roads at all hours. For these reasons, and because of the high incidence of crime, the U.S. Embassy strongly discourages car and bus travel after dark.

Hijackings of private and commercial vehicles from the United States to Honduras have occurred. Honduras and the United States have signed a stolen vehicle treaty, which is pending ratification by each nation's legislature. Moreover, since Honduran law protects good faith buyers, even of stolen vehicles, it is difficult to recover stolen vehicles. Vehicle insurance may mitigate loss; please check with the National Insurance Crime Bureau at http://www.nicb.org/, private insurance carriers, and our website information on "Commercial Vehicle Hijackings" at http://www.usmission.hn/english/mission/security.htm for more information.


For additional general information about road safety, please see the Department of State, Bureau of Consular Affairs, home page at http://travel.state.gov/road_safety.html. For specific information concerning Honduran driving permits, vehicle inspection, road tax and mandatory insurance, please contact the Honduran National Tourist Organization offices in New York via the Internet at www.hondurastips.honduras.com.


Aviation Safety Oversight: The U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has assessed the Government of Honduras's civil aviation authority as Category 2 — not in compliance with international aviation safety standards for the oversight of Honduran air carrier operations. There is currently one Honduran airline, Sol Air, flying to the United States. However, this airline actually leases its aircraft and crews from a U.S. company. For further information, travelers may contact the Department of Transportation within the United States at tel. 1-800-322-7873, or visit the FAA's Internet website at http://www.intl.faa.gov.


The U.S. Department of Defense (DOD) separately assesses some foreign carriers for suitability as official providers of air services. In addition, the DOD does not permit its personnel to use air carriers from Category 2 countries for official business except for flights originating from or terminating in the United States. Local exceptions may apply. For information regarding the DOD policy on specific carriers, travelers may contact the DOD at tel. (618) 256-4801.

Customs Regulations: Honduran customs authorities may enforce strict regulations concerning temporary importation into or export from Honduras of items such as firearms, antiquities, medications, and business equipment. For example, Honduran law prohibits the export of antiques and artifacts from pre-colonial civilizations. To protect the country's biodiversity, it is illegal to export certain birds, feathers and other flora and fauna.


U.S. citizens, who intend to stay in Honduras for an extended period of time and who bring vehicles or household goods into the country, should consult Honduran customs officials prior to shipment.


For specific information regarding customs requirements, please contact the Embassy of Honduras in Washington, D.C. or the nearest Honduran consulate.


Criminal Penalties: While in a foreign country, a U.S. citizen is subject to that country's laws and regulations, which sometimes differ significantly from those in the United States and may not afford the protections available to the individual under U.S. law. Penalties for breaking the law can be more severe than in the United States for similar offenses. Persons violating Honduran laws, even unknowingly, may be expelled, arrested or imprisoned. Penalties for possession, use, or trafficking in illegal drugs in Honduras are strict, and convicted offenders can expect jail sentences and heavy fines. For more information, please check the U.S. Embassy's website at http://www.usmission.hn for the handout on "If You are Arrested in Honduras." Note – Under the new U.S. "Protect Act" effective April 2003 it is a crime prosecutable in the U.S. to travel to a foreign country to sexually exploit children via pornography, the Internet and other means.


Consular Access: U.S. citizens are encouraged to carry a copy of their U.S. passports with them at all times so that if questioned by local officials, proof of identity and U.S. citizenship are readily available. In accordance with the Vienna Convention, Honduran authorities must allow U.S. citizens to contact a U.S. Consular Officer, if arrested or detained in Honduras.

Special Circumstances: Real Estate Investment : U.S. citizens should be aware of the risks inherent in purchasing real estate in Honduras and should exercise extreme caution before entering into any form of commitment to invest in property, particularly in coastal areas and the Bay Islands. Honduran laws and practices regarding real estate differ substantially from those in the United States, and there are many cases of fraudulent deeds and titles. In addition, the Honduran judicial system is weak and inefficient, often prolonging disputed cases for many years before resolution. Approximately 80% of the privately-held land in the country is untitled. Americans have spent thousands of dollars in legal fees and years of frustration in trying to resolve property disputes, even in cases in which local attorneys and Honduran and U.S. real estate agents had given assurances to the investor. There have also been incidents in which violence has been used against Americans involved in disputed property cases. American citizens should investigate purchases thoroughly and take all legal measures to prevent and, if necessary, resolve property disputes. Potential investors should engage competent local legal representation before making any commitments. Investors should thoroughly check references and bonafides of attorneys and real estate agents.


The Honduran constitution contains provisions restricting or prohibiting land ownership by foreigners in coastal and border areas, notwithstanding subsequent passage by the Honduran congress of laws authorizing such ownership in certain areas and with particular restrictions. The enforcement of laws and procedures pertaining to property titles in Honduras is inconsistent. Squatters have also claimed a number of properties owned by U.S. citizens. Investors and their attorneys should thoroughly check property titles. For further information on investing in property in Honduras, please contact the U.S. Embassy's economic section. For information on contracting Honduran legal representation, please check with other investors. You may also refer to the list of attorneys available on the Embassy's home page at http://www.usmission.hn/. In all cases, please check references and bonafides.


Financial Market Investment: Due to poor regulation and lack of guarantees, investment in the Honduran "Bolsa de Valores," or securities market, as well as banking institution bonds, fidecomisos (trusts), and certificates of deposit from uninsured financial institutions pose high risk to investors. Extreme caution should be exercised if contemplating such activities. American citizens have lost large sums of money, which cannot be recovered, through investments in such precarious markets.


Disaster Preparedness: Honduras is prone to flooding and landslides from heavy rains, especially during the rainy season, which generally occurs from June to December. Hurricane Mitch caused extensive damage and loss of life in October 1998. General information about natural disaster preparedness is available via the Internet from the U.S. Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) at http://www.fema.gov/.

Children's Issues: For information on international adoption of children and international parental child abduction, please refer to our Internet site at http://travel.state.gov/children's_issues.html or telephone the Overseas Citizens Services call center at 1-888-407-4747. The OCS call center can answer general inquiries regarding international adoptions and abductions and will forward calls to the appropriate country officer in the Bureau of Consular Affairs. This number is available from 8:00 a.m. to 8:00 p.m. Eastern Time, Monday through Friday (except U.S. federal holidays). Callers who are unable to use toll-free numbers, such as those calling from overseas, may obtain information and assistance during these hours by calling 1-317-472-2328.


Registration/Embassy Location: Americans living in or visiting Honduras are encouraged to register at the Consular Section of the U.S. Embassy in Tegucigalpa and to obtain updated information on travel and security within Honduras. Travelers can register in person, or fill out the form available on the Embassy website and fax it to the Embassy. Please include a copy of the data page of your passport and emergency contact information.

The U.S. Embassy and Consulate are located at:


Avenida La Paz in Tegucigalpa, Honduras
Fax: 011-504-238-4357
Website: http://www.usmission.hn/
Telephone: 011-504-236-9320 or 011-504-238-5114


For information on services for U.S. citizens, please ask for ext. 4400.


The Consular Agency in San Pedro Sula is located at:


Banco Atlantida Building - 8th Floor
San Pedro Sula, Honduras
Telephone: 011-504-558-1580


The Consular Agent is available during limited hours to accept U.S. passport applications for adjudication at the Embassy in Tegucigalpa, perform notary services and assist U.S. citizens with emergencies. Please call for office hours. The Consular Agent does not provide visa information or services.

Honduras

views updated Jun 27 2018

Honduras

Compiled from the October 2006 Background Note and supplemented with additional information from the State Department and the editors of this volume. See the introduction to this set for explanatory notes.

Official Name:
Republic of Honduras

PROFILE

PEOPLE

HISTORY

GOVERNMENT

POLITICAL CONDITIONS

ECONOMY

NATIONAL SECURITY

FOREIGN RELATIONS

U.S.-HONDURAN RELATIONS

TRAVEL

PROFILE

Geography

Area: 112,090 sq. km. (43,278 sq. mi.); slightly larger than Virginia.

Cities: Capital—Tegucigalpa (1,150,000); San Pedro Sula (800,000-900,000).

Terrain: Mountainous.

Climate: Tropical to subtropical, depending on elevation.

People

Nationality: Noun and adjective—Honduran(s).

Population: (2006 est.) 7.3 million.

Growth rate: (2006 est.) 2.16%.

Ethnic groups: 90% mestizo (mixed Indian and European); others of European, Arab, African, or Asian ancestry; and indigenous Indians.

Religions: Roman Catholic, Protestant minority.

Language: Spanish.

Education: (2003) Years compulsory—6. Attendance—88% overall, 31% at junior high level. Literacy—76.2%.

Health: Infant mortality rate—29.64/1,000. Life expectancy—66.2 yrs.

Work force: Services—42.2%; natural resources/agriculture—35.9%; manufacturing—16.3%; construction/housing—5.6%.

Government

Type: Democratic constitutional republic.

Independence: September 15, 1821.

Constitution: 1982; amended 1999.

Government branches: Executive—president, directly elected to 4-year term. Legislative—unicameral National Congress, elected for 4-year term. Judicial—Supreme Court of Justice (appointed by Congress and confirmed by the president); several lower courts.

Political parties: National Party, Liberal Party, Innovation and National Unity Party, Christian Democratic Party, and the Democratic Unification Party.

Suffrage: Universal and compulsory at age 18.

Political subdivisions: 18 departments.

Economy (2006 est.)

GDP: $22.3 billion (PPP) or $9.3 billion (official exchange rate).

Growth rate: 5.5%.

Per capita GDP: $2,900 (PPP).

Per capita income: $894.00

Natural resources: Arable land, forests, minerals, and fisheries.

Agriculture: (14.1% of GDP) Products—coffee, bananas, shrimp and lobster, sugar, fruits, basic grains, and livestock.

Manufacturing: (18% of GDP) Types—textiles and apparel, cement, wood products, cigars, and foodstuffs.

Services: (53.2% of GDP)

Trade: Exports (goods)—$1.95 billion: apparel, coffee, shrimp, bananas, palm oil, gold, zinc/lead concentrates, soap/detergents, melons, lobster, pineapple, lumber, sugar, and tobacco. Major market—U.S. (54.4%). Imports (goods)—$5.00 billion: fabrics, yarn, machinery, chemicals, petroleum, vehicles, processed foods, metals, agricultural products, plastic articles, and paper articles. Major source—U.S. (37.5%).

PEOPLE

About 90% of the population is mestizo. There also are small minorities of European, African, Asian, Arab, and indigenous Indian descent. Most Hondurans are Roman Catholic, but Protestant churches are growing in number. While Spanish is the predominant language, some English is spoken along the northern coast and is prevalent on the Caribbean Bay Islands. Several indigenous Indian languages and Garífuna (a mixture of Afro-indigenous languages) are also spoken. The restored Mayan ruins near the Guatemalan border in Copan reflect the great Mayan culture that flourished there for hundreds of years until the early 9th century. Columbus landed at mainland Honduras (Trujillo) in 1502, and named the area “Honduras” (meaning “depths”) for the deep water off the coast. Spaniard Hernan Cortes arrived in 1524.

HISTORY

Independence

Honduras and other Central American provinces gained independence from Spain in 1821. The country was then briefly annexed to the Mexican Empire. In 1823, Honduras joined the newly formed United Provinces of Central America federation, which collapsed in 1838. Gen. Francisco Morazan—a Honduran national hero—led unsuccessful efforts to maintain the federation. Honduras’ agriculture-based economy was dominated in the 1900s by U.S. companies that established vast banana plantations along the north coast. Foreign capital, plantation life, and conservative politics held sway in Honduras from the late 19th century until the mid-20th century.

Military Rule

Authoritarian Gen. Tiburcio Carias Andino controlled Honduras during the Great Depression, until 1948. In 1955—after two authoritarian administrations and a strike by banana workers—young military reformists staged a coup that installed a provisional junta and paved the way for constituent assembly elections in 1957. This assembly appointed Ramon Villeda Morales as President and transformed itself into a national legislature with a 6-year term. The Liberal Party ruled during 1957-63. In 1963, conservative military officers preempted constitutional elections and deposed Villeda in a bloody coup. These officers exiled Liberal Party members and took control of the national police. The armed forces, led by Gen. Lopez Arellano, governed until 1970. Popular discontent continued to rise after a 1969 border war with El Salvador, known as “the Soccer War.” A civilian President—Ramon Cruz of the National Party—took power briefly in 1970 but proved unable to manage the government. In 1972, Gen. Lopez staged another coup. Lopez adopted more progressive policies, including land reform, but his regime was brought down in the mid-1970s by corruption scandals. The regimes of Gen. Melgar Castro (1975-78) and Gen. Paz Garcia (1978-83) largely built the current physical infrastructure and telecommunications system of Honduras. The country also enjoyed its most rapid economic growth during this period, due to greater international demand for its products and the availability of foreign commercial lending.

Seven Consecutive Democratic Elections

Following the overthrow of Anastasio Somoza in Nicaragua in 1979 and general instability in El Salvador at the time, Hondurans elected a constituent assembly in 1980 and voted in general elections in 1981. A new constitution was approved in 1982, and the Liberal Party government of President Roberto Suazo Cordoba took office. Suazo relied on U.S. support during a severe economic recession, including ambitious social and economic development projects sponsored by the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID). Honduras became host to the largest Peace Corps mission in the world, and nongovernmental and international voluntary agencies proliferated.

As the 1985 election approached, the Liberal Party interpreted election law as permitting multiple presidential candidates from one party. The Liberal Party claimed victory when its presidential candidates, who received 42 percent of the vote, collectively outpolled the National Party candidate, Rafael Leonardo Callejas. Jose Azcona Hoyo, the candidate receiving the most votes among the Liberals, assumed the presidency in 1986. With the endorsement of the Honduran military, the Azcona administration ushered in the first peaceful transfer of power between civilian presidents in more than 30 years.

Four years later, Nationalist Rafael Callejas won the presidential election, taking office in 1990. The nation’s fiscal deficit ballooned during Callejas’ last year in office. Growing public dissatisfaction with the rising cost of living and with widespread government corruption led voters in 1993 to elect Liberal Party candidate Carlos Roberto Reina with 56 percent of the vote. President Reina, elected on a platform calling for a “moral revolution,” actively prosecuted corruption and pursued those responsible for human rights abuses in the 1980s. He created a modern attorney general’s office and an investigative police force, increased civilian control over the armed forces, transferred the police from military to civilian authority, and restored national fiscal health.

After winning the 1997 election by a 10 percent margin, Liberal Carlos Roberto Flores Facusse took office in 1998. Flores inaugurated programs of reform and modernization of the Honduran government and economy, with emphasis on helping Honduras’ poorest citizens while maintaining the country’s fiscal health and improving international competitiveness. In October 1998, Hurricane Mitch devastated Honduras, leaving more than 5,000 people dead and 1.5 million displaced. Damages totaled nearly $3 billion. President Flores and his administration successfully managed more than $600 million in international assistance. Flores also moved judicial and penal reforms forward, establishing an anticorruption commission, and supporting passage of a new penal code based on the oral accusatorial system and a law that created an independent Supreme Court. Flores also established a civilian Minister of Defense.

Ricardo Maduro Joest of the National Party won the 2001 presidential elections, and was inaugurated in 2002. During his campaign, President Maduro promised to reduce crime, reinvigorate the economy, and fight corruption. Maduro’s first act as President was to deploy a joint police-military force to the streets to permit wider neighborhood patrols in the ongoing fight against the country’s

massive crime and gang problem. Maduro was a strong supporter of the global war on terrorism and joined the U.S.-led coalition in Iraq with an 11-month contribution of 370 troops. Under President Maduro’s guidance, Honduras also negotiated and ratified the U.S.-Central America Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA), received debt relief, became the first Latin American country to sign a Millennium Challenge Account compact with the U.S., and actively promoted greater Central American integration. Jose Manuel “Mel” Zelaya Rosales of the Liberal Party won the November 27, 2005 presidential elections with less that a four percent margin of victory, the smallest margin ever in Honduran electoral history. Zelaya’s campaign theme was “citizen power,” and he has vowed to increase transparency and combat narcotrafficking, while maintaining macroeconomic stability. The Liberal Party won 62 of the 128 congressional seats, just short of an absolute majority. Zelaya was inaugurated on January 27, 2006.

GOVERNMENT

The 1982 constitution provides for a strong executive, a unicameral National Congress, and a judiciary appointed by the National Congress. The president is directly elected to a 4-year term by popular vote. The Congress also serves a 4-year term; congressional seats are assigned the parties’ candidates in proportion to the number of votes each party receives in the various departments. The judiciary includes a Supreme Court of Justice, courts of appeal, and several courts of original jurisdiction—such as labor, tax, and criminal courts. For administrative purposes, Honduras is divided into 18 departments, with municipal officials selected for 4-year terms.

POLITICAL CONDITIONS

Reinforced by the media and several political watchdog organizations, human rights and civil liberties are reasonably well protected. Organized labor now represents approximately eight percent of the work force and its economic and political influence has declined. Honduras held its seventh consecutive democratic elections in 2005 to elect a new president, unicameral Congress, and mayors. For the first time, voters were able to vote for individual members of Congress rather than party lists.

Political Parties

The two major parties are the slightly left-of-center Liberal Party and the slightly-right-of-center National Party. The three much smaller registered parties—the Christian Democratic Party, the Innovation and National Unity Party, and the Democratic Unification Party—hold a few seats each in the Congress, but have never come close to winning the presidency.

Principal Government Officials

Last Updated: 7/31/2006

President: Manuel ZELAYA Rosales

Vice Pres.: Elvin Ernesto SANTOS Ordonez

Min. of Agriculture & Livestock: Hector HERNANDEZ

Min. of Culture, Arts, & Sports: Rodolfo PASTOR

Min. of Defense: Aristides MEJIA

Min. of Education: Rafael PINEDA PONCE

Min. of Finance: Rebeca SANTOS

Min. of Foreign Relations: Milton JIMENEZ Puerto

Min. of Industry & Commerce: Lizzi AZCONA

Min. of Government & Justice: Jorge Arturo REINA

Min. of Labor: Ricci MONCADA

Min. of Natural Resources & Environment: Mayra MEJIA del Cid

Min. of the Presidency: Yani ROSENTHAL

Min. of Public Employees’ Retirement & Pension (INJUPEMP): Lucio IZAGUIRRE

Min. of Public Health: Orison VELASQUEZ

Min. of Public Works, Transportation, & Housing: Jose Rosario BONANO

Min. of Public Security: Alvaro Antonio ROMERO Salgado

Min. of Science & Technology: Miriam MEJIA

Min. of Tourism: Ricardo MARTINEZ

Min. Without Portfolio (housing sector): Hector BRICENO

Pres., Central Bank: Gabriella NUNEZ de Reyes

Ambassador to the US: Norman GARCIA Paz

Permanent Representative to the UN, New York: Ivan ROMERO-MARTINEZ

Honduras maintains an embassy in the United States at 3007 Tilden Street NW, Washington, DC 20008 (tel. 202-966-7702).

ECONOMY

Honduras is one of the poorest and least developed countries in Latin America, with nearly two-thirds of Hondurans living in poverty. Although historically dependent on exports of coffee and bananas, the economy has diversified over the past 20 years with the development of non-traditional exports such as cultivated shrimp, melons, and tourism, and the establishment of a growing maquila industry (primarily assembly for re-export of textiles and apparel). The maquila industry employs approximately 130,000 Hondurans. Honduras also has extensive forest, marine, and mineral resources, although widespread slash-and-burn agricultural methods and illegal logging continue to destroy Honduran forests. Family remittances from Hondurans living abroad (mostly in the United States) will rise to an estimated $2.4 billion in 2006, or 15% of the country’s foreign exchange.

The 2006 exchange rate was 18.89Honduran Lempira to the dollar, a slight devaluation from the 2005 rate of 18.92. Inflation, as measured by the consumer price index, was estimated at approximately 6.0% in 2006. International reserves, which were $1.16 billion at end of 2003, rebounded to an estimated $2.23 billion in 2005. Unemployment was estimated at around 28% in 2005.

In 2005, Honduras reached completion point under the Heavily Indebted Poor Countries (HIPC) initiative, qualifying the country for multilateral debt relief.

NATIONAL SECURITY

With the cessation of the 1980s civil wars in El Salvador and Nicaragua, the Honduran armed forces refocused their orientation toward combating transnational threats such as narco-terrorism and organized crime. Honduras supports efforts at regional integration and deployed troops to Iraq in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom. In 1999, the constitution was amended to abolish the position of military commander in chief of the armed forces, thus codifying civilian authority over the military. Former President Flores also named the first civilian Minister of Defense in the country’s history.

FOREIGN RELATIONS

Honduras is a member of the United Nations, the World Trade Organization (WTO), the Organization of American States (OAS), the Central American Parliament (PARLACEN), the Central American Integration System (SICA), the Conference of Central American Armed Forces (CFAC), and the Central American Security Commission (CASC). During 1995-96, Honduras—a founding member of the United Nations—served as a nonpermanent member of the UN Security Council for the first time. Honduras is currently a member of the UN Human Rights Commission. Honduras is a party to all UN and OAS counterterrorism conventions and protocols.

Honduras is a strong proponent of Central American cooperation and integration, and continues to work towards the implementation of a regional customs union and Central American passport, which would ease border controls and tariffs among Honduras, Guatemala, Nicaragua, and El Salvador.

In 1969, El Salvador and Honduras fought the brief “Soccer War” over disputed border areas. The two countries formally signed a peace treaty in 1980, which put the border dispute before the International Court of Justice (ICJ). In 1992, the Court awarded most of the disputed territory to Honduras, and in January 1998, Honduras and El Salvador signed a border demarcation treaty to implement the terms of the ICJ decree although delays continue due to technical difficulties. However, Honduras and El Salvador maintain normal diplomatic and trade relations. Honduras also has unresolved maritime border disputes with El Salvador, Nicaragua, Jamaica, and Cuba.

U.S.-HONDURAN RELATIONS

Overview

The United States and Honduras have close and friendly relations. Honduras is supportive of U.S. policy in the United Nations and other fora, as well of the war on terrorism. Honduras was among the first countries to sign an International Criminal Court (ICC) Article 98 Agreement with the U.S., and the Honduran port of Puerto Cortes is part of the U.S. Container Security Initiative (CSI).

The United States favors stable, peaceful relations between Honduras and its Central American neighbors. During the 1980s, Honduras supported U.S. policy opposing a revolutionary Marxist government in Nicaragua and an active leftist insurgency in El Salvador. The Honduran Government also played a key role in negotiations that culminated in the 1990 Nicaraguan elections. Honduras continues to participate in the UN observer mission in the Western Sahara, contributed 370 troops for the reconstruction of Iraq, and remains interested in participating in other UN peacekeeping missions.

The United States is Honduras’ chief trading partner, with two-way trade in goods increasing to over $7 billion in 2006. U.S.-Honduran trade is dominated by the Honduran maquila industry, which imports yarn and textiles from the United States and exports finished articles of clothing. Other leading Honduran exports to the United States include coffee, bananas, seafood (particularly shrimp), minerals (including zinc, lead, gold, and silver), and other fruits and vegetables.

The stock of U.S. direct investment in Honduras in 2004 was $339 million, up from $262 million in 2003. The overall flow of Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) into Honduras in 2004 surpassed $200 million, with the United States leading the way. The largest U.S. investments in Honduras are in the maquila sector, fruit production (particularly bananas, melons, and pineapple), tourism, energy generation, shrimp aquaculture, animal feed production, telecommunications, fuel distribution, cigar manufacturing, insurance, brewing, leasing, food processing, and furniture manufacturing. Many U.S. franchises, particularly in the restaurant sector, operate in Honduras.

In 2004, the United States signed the U.S.-Central America Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA) with Honduras, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Guatemala, Costa Rica, and the Dominican Republic. The legislatures of all signatories but Costa Rica ratified CAFTA in 2005, and the agreement entered into force in the first half of 2006. CAFTA eliminates tariffs and other barriers to trade in goods, services, agricultural products, and investments. Additionally, CAFTA is expected to solidify democracy, encourage greater regional integration, and provide safeguards for environmental protection and labor rights.

In June 2005, Honduras became the first country in the hemisphere to sign a Millennium Challenge Account (MCA) compact with the U.S. Government. Under the compact, the U.S. Millennium Challenge Corporation will invest $215 million over five years to help Honduras improve its road infrastructure, diversify its agriculture, and get its products to market.

The United States maintains a small presence at a Honduran military base; the two countries conduct joint peacekeeping, counternarcotics, humanitarian, disaster relief, and civic action exercises. U.S. troops conduct and provide logistics support for a variety of bilateral and multilateral exercises—medical, engineering, peacekeeping, counternarcotics, and disaster relief—for the benefit of the Honduran people and their Central American neighbors. U.S. forces—regular, reserve, and National Guard—benefit greatly from these exercises.

U.S. Policy Toward Honduras

U.S. policy toward Honduras is aimed at consolidating democracy with a justice system that protects human rights and promotes the rule of law. U.S. Government programs are aimed at promoting a healthy and more open economy capable of sustainable growth, improving the climate for business and investment while protecting U.S. citizen and corporate rights, and promoting the well-being of the Honduran people. The United States also works with Honduras to meet transnational challenges—including the fight against terrorism, narcotics trafficking, money laundering, illegal migration, and trafficking in persons—and encourages and supports Honduran efforts to protect the environment. The goals of strengthening democracy and promoting viable economic growth are especially important given the geographical proximity of Honduras to the United States. Approximately 800,000 to 1 million Hondurans reside in the United States; consequently, immigration issues are an important item on our bilateral agenda.

U.S.-Honduran ties are further strengthened by numerous private sector contacts, with an average of between 80,000 and 110,000 U.S. citizens visiting Honduras annually and about 15,000 Americans residing there. More than 150 American companies operate in Honduras.

Economic and Development Assistance

To help strengthen Honduras’ democratic institutions and improve living conditions, the United States has provided substantial economic assistance. The United States has historically been the largest bilateral donor to Honduras. The USAID budget for Honduras is $37 million for fiscal year 2007. Over the years, U.S. foreign assistance has helped advance such objectives as fostering democratic institutions, increasing private sector employment and income, helping Honduras fund its arrears with international financial institutions, providing humanitarian aid, increasing agricultural production, and providing loans to micro-businesses.

1998’s Hurricane Mitch left hundreds of thousands homeless, devastated the road network and other public infrastructure, and crippled certain key sectors of the economy. Estimates show that Hurricane Mitch caused $8.5 billion in damages to homes, hospitals, schools, roads, farms, and businesses throughout Central America, including more than $3 billion in Honduras alone.

In response, the United States provided more than $461 million in immediate disaster relief and humanitarian aid spread over the years 1998-2001. This supplemental assistance was designed to help repair water and sanitation systems; replace housing, schools, and roads; provide agricultural inputs; provide local government crisis management training; grant debt relief; and encourage environmental management expertise. Additional resources were utilized to maintain anticrime and drug assistance programs.

In 2001, the United States also provided food aid in response to a short drought and the depressed state of the agriculture sector. Subsequently, the United States provided $265,000 in disaster assistance after Tropical Storm Michelle inundated the north coast with floods. Most recently, the United States provided assistance for Honduras’ recovery from 2005’s devastating storms, including Hurricane Beta and Tropical Storm Gamma.

The Peace Corps has been active in Honduras since 1962, and currently the program is one of the largest in the world. In 2005, there were 220 Peace Corps Volunteers working in the poorest parts of Honduras.

The U.S. Government strongly supports the professionalization of the civilian police force as an important element in strengthening the rule of law in Honduras. The American Embassy in Tegucigalpa provides specialized training to police officers.

Security Assistance

The role of the Honduran armed forces has changed significantly in recent years as many institutions formerly controlled by the military are now under civilian authority. The defense and police budgets have hovered at around $35 million during the past few years. Honduras receives modest U.S. security assistance funds and training.

In the absence of a large security assistance program, defense cooperation has taken the form of increased participation by the Honduran armed forces in military-to-military contact programs and bilateral and multilateral combined exercises oriented toward peacekeeping, disaster relief, humanitarian/civic assistance, and counternarcotics. The U.S. Joint Task Force Bravo (JTF-B), stationed at the Honduran Soto Cano Air Base, plays a vital role in supporting combined exercises in Honduras and in neighboring Central American countries. JTF-Bravo plays a critical role in helping the United States respond to natural disasters in Central America by serving as a platform for rescue missions, repairing critical infrastructure, and in meeting high priority health and sanitation needs. JTF-Bravo forces have helped deliver millions of dollars worth of privately donated goods to those in need.

U.S. Business Opportunities

Bilateral trade between the two nations totaled $7 billion in 2005. Exports of goods and services from the U.S. totaled $3.24 billion 2005, and Honduran exports to the U.S. totaled $3.75 billion. U.S. investors account for nearly two-thirds of the estimated stock of $1.3 billion in foreign direct investment in Honduras. More than 150 American companies operate in Honduras; U.S. franchises are present in increasing numbers. Opportunities for U.S. business sales include textile machinery, construction equipment, automotive parts and accessories, telecommunications equipment, pollution control/water resources equipment, agricultural machinery, hotel and restaurant equipment, computers and software, franchising, and household consumer goods. The best prospects for agricultural products are corn, milled rice, wheat, soybean meal, and consumer-ready products.

U.S. citizens contemplating investment in real estate in Honduras should proceed with extreme caution, especially in the Bay Islands or coastal areas, because of frequently conflicting legislation, problems with land titles, and a weak judicial system. Investors or their attorneys should check property titles not only with the property registry office having jurisdiction in the area in which the property is located (being especially observant of marginal annotations on the deed and that the property is located within the area covered by the original title), but also with the National Agrarian Institute (INA) and the National Forestry Administration (COHDEFOR). Investors in land should be aware that even clear title is not a guarantee that a future dispute over land would be resolved equitably.

Principal U.S. Embassy Officials

TEGUCIGALPA (E) Address: Avenida La Paz, Tegucigalpa, Honduras; APO/FPO: Unit 2900, Box 68, APO AA 34022; Phone: (504) 236-9320; Fax: (504) 236-9037; Workweek: M-F, 8–5 local time; Website: www.usmission.hn

AMB:Charles A. Ford
AMB OMS:Barbara A. Matchey
DCM:James Williard
CG:Ian Brownlee
POL:Frank Perinian
COM:Nancy Charles-Parker (resident in San Salvador)
MGT:Jesse I. Coronado
AFSA:Beatriz Beroud
AGR:Steve Huete (resident in Guatemala)
AID:Randall Peterson
CLO:Sigret Sanes
DAO:Derek R. Dickey, USAF
DEA:John Mark Discenza
ECO:Patrick Dunn
EEO:Mari Jain Womack
FMO:James Wickersham
GSO:Raphael Semmes
ICASS Chair:Chantal Dalton
IMO:Mari Jain Womack
INS:Joel Miramontes
IPO:Jack Swope
ISO:Marc Beroud
LAB:Charles Lodbell
LEGATT:David Wattley (resident in Panama)
MLO:Jeffrey Moragne
NAS:Frank Perinian
PAO:Chantal Dalton
RSO:Bruce Lizzi
State ICASS:Patrick Dunn

Last Updated: 1/26/2007

Other Contact Information

American Chamber of Commerce
Hotel Honduras Maya
Apartado Postal 1838
Tegucigalpa, Honduras
Tel: (504) 232-7043/232-6035
Fax: (504) 232-9959
Branch office in San Pedro Sula
Tel: (504) 557-6402/559-6412
Fax: (504) 557-6402

U.S. Department of Commerce International Trade Administration Office of Latin America and the Caribbean
14th and Constitution Avenue, NW
Washington, DC 20230
Tel: 202-482-0057
800-USA-TRADE
Fax: 202-482-0464
Internet: http://www.ita.doc.gov

U.S. Agency for International Development
1300 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW
Washington, DC 20523-0001
Tel: 202-712-4810
Fax: 202-216-3524
Internet: www.usaid.gov

TRAVEL

Consular Information Sheet : October 11, 2006

Country Description: Honduras is a democracy with a developing economy. The national language is Spanish, although English is often spoken in the Bay Islands. The climate is generally pleasant and temperate, with dry and wet seasons. During the dry season from February into May, widespread forest fires and agricultural burning can lead to severely degraded air quality throughout the country leading to respiratory problems and airport closures. The terrain ranges from mountainous to coastal beaches and jungle lowlands. Facilities that would normally be used by tourists, including hotels and restaurants are generally adequate in the capital city of Tegucigalpa, San Pedro Sula, Tela, La Ceiba, the Bay Islands and near the Copan ruins. Large sections of the country, however, lack basic public services or even a governmental presence. Currency exchange is readily available at banks and hotels in the major cities.

Entry/Exit Requirements: A U.S. passport valid for at least three months from the date of entry is required to enter Honduras. Though not required by law, some travelers have reported difficulty departing Honduras using a passport with less than three months of validity from the date of departure. A visa is not required, but tourists must provide evidence of return or onward travel. Parents should not rely on birth certificates for their children’s travel; rather, prior to travel they should obtain U.S. passports for infants and minors born in the U.S. U.S. citizens are encouraged to carry a photocopy of their U.S. passports with them at all times so that if questioned by local officials, proof of identity and U.S. citizenship are readily available.

For U.S. citizen children born in the U.S. to Honduran parents, Honduran Immigration provides an “evidence of continuance” (Constancia de Permanencia) stamp placed in the U.S. passport that allows the child to enter, depart, and remain in Honduras. Visitors are given a permit to remain in Honduras for 30 days. Honduran immigration may grant up to two thirty-day extensions for a total of 90 days. Thereafter, tourists must leave the country to qualify for a renewed visitor’s permit. Upon departure, visitors are required to pay an exit fee, either in U.S. dollars or in local currency. The current fee for international departures is USD $32.42. The fees are subject to change.

In an effort to prevent international child abduction, many governments have initiated special procedures at entry/exit points regarding the travel of minors. These often include requiring documentary evidence of relationship and permission for the child’s travel from the parent(s) or legal guardian not present. Having such documentation on hand, even if not required, may facilitate entry/exit. Minors who are dual U.S.-Honduran nationals or who reside in Honduras require notarized consent from both parents if traveling alone or in someone else’s custody, or from the absent parent if traveling with only one parent. In cases where one parent has sole custody, the custodial parent must submit the custody decree to Honduran immigration upon departure.

In June 2006, Honduras entered a “Central America-4 (CA-4) Border Control Agreement” with Guatemala, El Salvador, and Nicaragua. Under the terms of the agreement, citizens of the four countries may travel freely across land borders from one of the countries to any of the others without completing entry and exit formalities at Immigration checkpoints. U.S. citizens and other eligible foreign nationals, who legally enter any of the four countries, may similarly travel among the four without obtaining additional visas or tourist entry permits for the other three countries. Immigration officials at the first port of entry determine the length of stay, up to a maximum period of 90 days. Foreign tourists who wish to remain in the four country region beyond the period initially granted for their visit are required to request a one-time extension of stay from local Immigration authorities in the country where the traveler is physically present, or travel outside the CA-4 countries and reapply for admission to the region. Foreigners “expelled” from any of the four countries are excluded from the entire “CA-4” region. In isolated cases, the lack of clarity in the implementing details of the CA-4 Border Control Agreement has caused temporary inconvenience to some travelers and has resulted in others being fined more than one hundred dollars or detained in custody for 72 hours or longer.

For more information concerning entry and exit requirements, travelers may contact the Embassy of Honduras at 3007 Tilden Street N.W., Washington, D.C. 20008, telephone (202) 966-7702, or a Honduran consulate in Atlanta, Boston, Chicago, Houston, Jacksonville, Los Angeles, Miami, New Orleans, New York, Phoenix, San Francisco, San Juan or Tampa. The Honduran Embassy’s email address is [email protected]. Interested individuals may visit the Honduran Embassy’s website for additional contact information through http://www.hondurasemb.org/. For tourist information or suggestions, please contact the Honduras Institute of Tourism at 1-800-410-9608 (in the United States) or at 1-800-222-TOUR (8687) (within Honduras only) or visit their website http://www.hondurastips.honduras.com/.

Dual Nationality: Honduran law permits dual nationality only for minors under the age of 21 and those Honduran-born citizens who have become naturalized citizens of other countries. U.S. citizens who become Honduran citizens by naturalization are not considered to have dual nationality under Honduran law. Dual nationals, in addition to being subject to all Honduran laws affecting U.S. citizens, may be subject to other laws that impose special obligations on Honduran citizens. For more information, please contact Honduran Immigration in Tegucigalpa (telephone 504-238-5613), San Pedro Sula (telephone 504-550-3728), Roatan (telephone 504-445-1226), La Ceiba (telephone 504-442-0638), or Puerto Cortes (telephone 504-665-0582).

Safety and Security: Political demonstrations sometimes disrupt traffic, but they are generally announced in advance and are usually peaceful. Travelers should avoid areas where demonstrations are taking place, and they should stay informed by following the local news and consulting hotel personnel and tour guides. Demonstrators frequently block public roads, sometimes for many hours, in or to press for concessions from the Government of Honduras. The Government rarely seeks to disperse the demonstrators. U.S. citizens should never try to pass such roadblocks. While the Honduran side of the Honduras-Nicaragua border has been largely cleared of land mines, travelers should exercise caution there. For more information, we strongly encourage travelers to visit the U.S. Embassy’s web site at http://honduras.usembassy.gov/ and click on Crime and Security Matters. For the latest security information, Americans traveling abroad should regularly monitor the Department’s Internet web site where the current Travel Warnings and Public Announcements, including the Worldwide Caution Public Announcement, can be found. Up-to-date information on safety and security can also be obtained by calling 1-888-407-4747 toll free in the U.S., or for callers outside the U.S. and Canada, a regular toll-line at 1-202-501-4444. These numbers are available from 8:00 a.m. to 8:00 p.m. Eastern Time, Monday through Friday (except U.S. federal holidays).

Crime: Crime is endemic in Honduras and requires a high degree of caution by U.S. visitors and residents alike. U.S. citizens have been the victims of a wide range of crimes, including murder, kidnapping, rape, assault, and property crimes. Fifty-three U.S. citizens have been murdered in Honduras since 1995, with a very significant recent increase, and most cases remain unresolved. Kidnapping of U.S. citizens has occurred in Honduras, including two incidents in 2006. Poverty, gangs, and low apprehension and conviction rates of criminals contribute to a high crime rate, including horrific acts of mass murder.

U.S. citizens are encouraged to follow local news reports and seek additional information in the resources listed above. Criminals and pickpockets also target visitors as they enter and depart airports and hotels, so visitors should consider carrying their passports and valuables in a concealed pouch. Two-man teams on medium-sized motorcycles often target pedestrians for robbery. There have also been reports of armed robbers traveling in private cars targeting pedestrians on isolated streets. The Honduran government has occasionally joint police/military patrols in major cities in an effort to reduce crime. Problems with the judicial process include corruption and an acute shortage of trained personnel, equipment, staff, and financial resources. The Honduran law enforcement authorities’ ability to prevent, respond to, and investigate criminal incidents and prosecute criminals remains limited. Honduran police generally do not speak English. The government has established a special tourist police in the resort town of Tela and other popular tourist destinations, including Tegucigalpa, San Pedro Sula, La Ceiba, and Roatan, but the number deployed is small and coverage is limited. The San Pedro Sula area has seen occasional armed robberies against tourist vans, minibuses, and cars traveling from the airport to area hotels, even sometimes targeting the road to Copan. Armed men have forced vehicles transporting tourists off the road and robbed the victims, occasionally assaulting the driver or passengers. Several U.S. citizens have recently been murdered in San Pedro Sula and the vicinity shortly after arriving in the country. Assaults in this area may be based on tips from sources at airport arrival areas, so visitors are strongly urged to exercise caution in discussing travel plans in public.

Copan, the Bay Islands, and other tourist destinations have a lower crime rate than other parts of the country, but thefts, break-ins, assaults, and murders do occur. During a wave of home invasion robberies in Roatan in late 2005, assailants shot two foreign residents, killing one U.S. citizen. Exercise particular caution walking on isolated beaches, especially at night. Seven U.S. citizens have been murdered in Roatan since 1998, most recently in late 2005. Coxen Hole should be avoided after dark.

The Government of Honduras has a very limited presence in Northern Olancho, Colon and Gracias a Dios Departments, which are well known for lumber and narcotics smuggling and violence. Travelers in those areas should use extra caution. See the description of highways/areas to be avoided in the Traffic Safety and Road Conditions section below for details.

Incidents of crime, including carjacking and kidnapping, along roads in Honduras are common. There have been frequent incidents of highway robbery on a number of roads including Limones to La Union, Olancho (route 41) via Salama and northward to Esquipulas Del Norte.

Travelers should always drive with their doors locked and windows rolled up to avoid potential robberies at traffic lights and other places, such as congested downtown streets. Avoid driving at night. All bus travel should be during daylight hours and on first-class conveyances, not on economy buses. Please pick taxis carefully, and note the driver’s name and license number. Instruct the driver not to pick up other passengers, agree on the fare before you depart, and have small bills available for payment, as taxi drivers often do not make change.

Do not resist a robbery attempt. Most criminals have weapons, and most injuries and deaths have resulted when victims have resisted. Two foreign tourists were murdered in July 2002 while resisting an armed robbery on a public bus in which they were traveling. In 2004, an American citizen was murdered while attempting to flee an armed robbery in progress and another American was shot while resisting a carjacking. Two American citizens were murdered while resisting armed robberies in 2005. Do not hitchhike or go home with strangers, particularly from nightspots. Whenever possible, travel in groups of two or more persons. Use the same common sense while traveling in Honduras that you would in any high crime area in the U.S.: do not wear excessive jewelry; do not carry large sums of money, nor display cash, ATM/credit cards, or other valuables you do not need.

Avoid walking at night in most areas of Honduras. Do not hike alone in backcountry areas, or walk alone on beaches, historic ruins, or trails.

Individuals and groups should register their travel plans with the State Department via the Internet at the Department’s secure travel registration web site. Travelers may also wish to send passport, date of birth, and emergency contact information to the American Citizens Services Unit of the U.S. Embassy in Tegucigalpa via fax at 011-504-238-4357, prior to travel. Individuals as well as groups should always keep in their possession a photocopy of their U.S. passport data page; carry an additional copy in their suitcase; and leave a copy at home with a friend or family member.

The theft abroad of a U.S. passport should be reported immediately to the U.S. Embassy in Tegucigalpa and to local police. If you are the victim of a crime while overseas, in addition to reporting to the local police, please contact the U.S. Embassy in Tegucigalpa or the Consular Agency in San Pedro Sula for assistance. The Embassy and Consular Agency staff can, for example, assist you to find appropriate medical care, to contact family members or friends and explain how funds could be transferred. Although the investigation and prosecution of most crimes is solely the responsibility of local authorities, Consular staff can help you understand the local criminal justice process and to find an attorney if needed.

Medical Facilities: Medical care in Honduras varies greatly in quality and availability. Outside Tegucigalpa and San Pedro Sula, medical care is inadequate to address complex situations. Support staff facilities and necessary equipment and supplies are not up to U.S. standards anywhere in Honduras. Facilities for advanced surgical procedures are not available. Wide areas of the country, including the popular tourist areas of the Bay Islands, do not have a general surgery hospital. Ambulance services are limited in major cities and almost non-existent elsewhere.

Scuba diving is popular in the Bay Islands, but the limited medical facilities there pose a special risk in the event of an emergency. There is a decompression chamber on Roatan and Utila for divers, but no advanced medical care on either island for diving related accidents.

Medical Insurance: The Department of State strongly urges Americans to consult with their medical insurance company prior to traveling abroad to confirm whether their policy applies overseas and whether it will cover emergency expenses such as a medical evacuation. U.S. medical insurance plans seldom cover health costs incurred outside the U.S. unless supplemental coverage is purchased. Further, U.S. Medicare and Medicaid programs do not provide payment for medical services outside the U.S. However, many travel agents and private companies offer insurance plans that will cover health care expenses incurred overseas including emergency services such as medical evacuations. When making a decision regarding health insurance, Americans should consider that many foreign doctors and hospitals require payment in cash prior to providing service and that a medical evacuation to the U.S. may cost thousands of dollars. Uninsured travelers who require medical care overseas often face extreme difficulties. When consulting with your insurer prior to your trip, ascertain whether payment will be made to the overseas health-care provider or whether you will be reimbursed later for expenses you incur. Some insurance policies also include coverage for psychiatric treatment and for disposition of remains in the event of death. Useful information on medical emergencies abroad, including overseas insurance programs, is provided in the Department of State’s Bureau of Consular Affairs brochure, Medical Information for Americans Traveling Abroad, available via the Bureau of Consular Affairs home page or auto fax: (202) 647-3000.

Other Health Information: Mos-quito-borne illnesses are an ongoing problem in Honduras. All persons traveling in Honduras, even for a brief visit, are at risk of contracting malaria. Take a prophylactic regimen best suited to your health profile. The country regularly suffers from outbreaks of dengue fever during the rainy season. Travelers should take precautions against being bitten by mosquitoes to reduce the chance of contracting such illnesses.

Severe air pollution, which can aggravate or lead to respiratory problems, often occurs throughout the country during the dry season due in large part to widespread forest fires and agricultural burning.

Individuals traveling to Honduras should ensure that all their routine vaccinations are up to date. Vaccination against Hepatitis A and Hepatitis B is strongly recommended. Travelers taking prescription medications should bring an adequate supply with them when coming to Honduras and ensure that they are properly labeled. Information on vaccinations and other health precautions, such as safe food and water precautions and insect bite protection, may be obtained from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s hotline for international travelers at 1-877-FYI-TRIP (1-877-394-8747); fax 1-888-CDC-FAXX (1-888-232-3299), or via the CDC’s Internet site at http://www.cdc.gov/travel. For information about outbreaks of infectious diseases abroad consult the World Health Organization’s website at http://www.who.int/en. Further health information for travelers is available at http://www.who.int/ith.

Traffic Safety and Road Conditions: Honduran road conditions differ significantly from those in the U.S. The information below is provided for general reference only and may be subject to change.

Because of crime and poor road conditions, driving can be very dangerous, and travelers should carry a cellular phone in case of an emergency. Travelers should exercise extreme caution while driving on isolated stretches of road and passing on mountainous curves. Rockslides are common, especially in the rainy season (May through December). Traffic signs, even on major highways, are often inadequate, and streets in the major cities are often unmarked. Travelers should always drive with their doors locked and windows rolled up to avoid potential robberies at traffic lights and other places such as congested downtown streets.

Honduran roads are poorly lit and marked. Vehicles are often driven at night without adequate illumination, and animals and people wander onto the roads at all hours. For these reasons, and because of the high incidence of crime, the U.S. Embassy strongly discourages car and bus travel after dark.

Major cities are connected by an inconsistently maintained, two-lane system of paved roads, and many secondary roads in Honduras are unpaved. During the rainy season, even major highways are often closed due to rockslides and flooding during heavy rains.

Some of the most dangerous stretches for road travel include: Tegucigalpa to Choluteca, because of dangerous mountain curves; El Progreso to La Ceiba, because of animal crossings and the poor condition of bridges from flooding; Route 39 through northern Olancho Department between Gualaco and San Esteban; and Limones to La Union, Olancho (route 41) via Salama and northward to Saba. Locals also refer to this latter stretch of road as the “Corridor of Death” because of frequent incidents of highway robbery. The Embassy has received reports of robberies on the road from Tegucigalpa to Danlí. The only recommended route to the north coast from the south is CA-5 to route 21 to CA-13 via Tela to La Ceiba and Trujillo. Hijackings of private and commercial vehicles from the U.S. to Honduras have occurred. While Honduras and the U.S. have signed and ratified a Stolen Vehicle Treaty, existing Honduran laws protect good faith buyers (even of stolen vehicles) so the recovery and return of these vehicles to their original owners is not guaranteed. Vehicle insurance may mitigate loss; please check with the National Insurance Crime Bureau at http://www.nicb.org, private insurance carriers, and our web site information on Commercial Vehicle Hijackings at http://honduras.usembassy.gov/english/mission/sections/RSO/comveh_highsec.htm for more information. For specific information concerning Honduran driving permits, vehicle inspection, road tax, and mandatory insurance, please contact the Honduran National Tourist Organization offices in New York via the Internet at http://www.hondurastips.honduras.com/.

Marine Safety and Oversight: The areas off both coasts of Honduras are the subject of maritime border disputes between Honduras and its neighbors. The Honduran Navy patrols these areas, and all private vessels transiting Honduran territorial waters should be prepared to be hailed and possibly boarded by Honduran military personnel to verify documentation. While the Honduran Navy previously used private vessels as patrol vessels, this is no longer the case. In the event that any vessel is hailed in Honduran waters in the Caribbean by a non-military vessel or any suspicious vessel and directed to prepare for boarding, the vessel should immediately contact the U.S. Coast Guard Operations Center by radio or INMARSAT at 305-415-6800. Anyone needing more information can also contact the U.S. Embassy during working hours and request to speak with the U.S. Military Group (USMILGP) office. There have been incidents of armed assaults against private sailing vessels by criminals posing as fishermen off the northeast coast of Honduras, particularly in the numerous small islands northeast of the Department of Gracias a Dios. Sailors should contact the Coast Guard and yacht facility managers in their areas of travel for current information.

Aviation Safety and Oversight: The U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has assessed the Government of Honduras as not being in compliance with ICAO international aviation safety standards for the oversight of Honduras’s air carrier operations. For more information, travelers may visit the FAA’s Internet web site at www.faa.gov/avr/iasa/index.cfm.

Severe air pollution often leads to the closing of some or all of Honduras’s four international airports during the dry season. Some travelers have been compelled to travel by bus to neighboring countries in order to catch onward flights.

Real Estate Investment: U.S. citizens should exercise extreme caution before entering into any form of commitment to invest in property, particularly in coastal areas and the Bay Islands. Honduran laws and practices regarding real estate differ substantially from those in the United States, and fraudulent deeds and titles are common. In addition, the Honduran judicial system is weak and inefficient, often prolonging disputed cases for many years before resolution. Approximately 80% of the privately held land in the country is untitled. Americans have spent thousands of dollars in legal fees and years of frustration trying to resolve property disputes, even in cases in which local attorneys and Honduran and U.S. real estate agents had given assurances to the investor. Violence has been used against Americans involved in disputed property cases. Potential investors should engage competent local legal representation before making any commitments. Investors should thoroughly check references of attorneys and real estate agents.

Honduran law places certain restrictions on land ownership by foreigners in coastal and border areas. Squatters claim a number of properties owned by U.S. citizens. For further information on investing in property in Honduras, please review the State Department’s Investment Climate Statement, part of the Country Commercial Guide at http://www.buyusa.gov/honduras/en/14.html. For information on contracting Honduran legal representation, please check with other investors. You may also refer to the list of attorneys available on the Embassy’s homepage at http://honduras.usembassy.gov/.

Financial Market Investment: Due to poor regulation and lack of guarantees, investment in the Honduran “Bolsa de Valores,” or securities market, as well as banking institution bonds, fideicomisos (trusts), and certificates of deposit from uninsured financial institutions pose high risk to investors. Extreme caution should be exercised before and while undertaking such activities, as American citizens have lost large sums of money through investments in such precarious markets. For further information on investing in Honduras, please review the State Department’s Investment Climate Statement, part of the Country Commercial Guide at http://www.buyusa.gov/honduras/en/14.html.

Customs Regulations: U.S. citizens who intend to stay in Honduras for an extended period of time and who bring vehicles or household goods into the country should consult Honduran customs officials prior to shipment. With the exception of “antique” cars, all vehicles imported into Honduras by foreigners must be less than seven (7) years old. For specific information regarding customs requirements, please contact the Embassy of Honduras in Washington, D.C. at: http://www.hondurasemb.org/ for more information. Honduran customs authorities may enforce strict regulations concerning temporary import export of items such as antiquities, medications, and business equipment. For example, Honduran law prohibits the export of antiques and artifacts from pre-colonial civilizations. To protect the country’s biodiversity, it is illegal to export certain birds, feathers, and other flora and fauna. For specific information regarding exportation requirements, please contact the Embassy of Honduras in Washington, D.C. at http://www.hondurasemb.org/.

The Government of Honduras is strictly enforcing the law that requires a Honduran permit for the importation of firearms into Honduras. Travelers must obtain a firearm importation permit from a Honduran Embassy, Consulate General or Consulate located in the U.S. prior to bringing firearms into the country. Please note that a U.S. government-issued or airline-issued permit is not valid for importation of firearms into Honduras. Firearms that arrive without the requisite Honduran permit will be confiscated and the bearer will be prosecuted to the full extent of Honduran law.

Criminal Penalties: While in a foreign country, a U.S. citizen is subject to that country’s laws and regulations, which sometimes differ significantly from those in the U.S. and may not afford the protections available under U.S. law. Penalties for breaking the law can be more severe than in the U.S. for similar offenses. Persons violating Honduran laws, even unknowingly, may be expelled, arrested or imprisoned. Penalties for possession, use, or trafficking in illegal drugs in Honduras are severe, and convicted offenders can expect long jail sentences and heavy fines.

“Sexual tourists” travel alone or in groups to Honduras for the purpose of purchasing sexual favors from minors. This activity violates Honduran law, and American citizens are imprisoned in Honduras for sexual offenses involving minors. In addition, U.S. citizens and residents charged with these crimes are subject to prosecution upon their return to the U.S., regardless of the outcome of the judicial proceedings overseas. Using or disseminating child pornography in a foreign country is also a crime prosecutable in the United States. Therefore, the U.S. Embassy strongly warns American citizens against traveling to Honduras for the purpose of “sexual tourism.”

Disaster Preparedness: Honduras is prone to severe and damaging weather during the June 1 to November 30 hurricane season. U.S. citizens are urged to monitor news media and the U.S. National Hurricane Center at: www.nhc.noaa.gov for information on possible storms. General information about natural disaster preparedness is available via the Internet from the U.S. Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) at www.fema.gov.

Children’s Issues: International adoptions from Honduras are very limited. Current information on Honduran adoption procedures and the immigrant visa application process is available from the Consular Section of the U.S. Embassy.

Prospective adoptive parents are urged to check with the Consular Section to ensure that all required documentation has been approved by the U.S. Bureau of Citizenship and Immigration Services of the Department of Homeland Security and to confirm that their child’s adoption is complete before traveling to Honduras to apply for their child’s immigrant visa. Adoptive parents are also urged to carry with them complete adoption paperwork when traveling with their adopted child to, from, and within Honduras.

Honduras is a signatory to the Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction, but the U.S. Department of State has determined that Honduras has failed to comply with its obligations under the Convention. No child has ever been returned to the United States from Honduras under the provisions of the Convention.

Registration/Embassy Location: Americans living or traveling in Honduras are encouraged to register their presence through the State Department’s travel registration website, and to obtain updated information on travel and security within Honduras. Americans without Internet access may register directly with the U.S. Embassy in Tegucigalpa. By registering, whether via the Internet or in person at the Embassy, American citizens make it easier for the Embassy to contact them in case of emergency.

The Embassy and consulate are located at:
Avenida La Paz in Tegucigalpa,
Honduras
Internet Web site:
http://honduras.usembassy.gov/
Telephone: 011-504-236-9320 or 011-504-238-5114
For information on services for U.S.
citizens, please ask for ext. 4400.
American Citizens Services Unit Fax: 011-504-238-4357

The consular agency in San Pedro is located at:
Banco Atlantida Building–11th Floor
San Pedro Sula, Honduras
Telephone: 011-504-558-1580

The Consular Agent is available during limited hours perform notarial services, to assist U.S. citizens with emergencies, and to accept U.S. passport and U.S. Report of Birth applications for adjudication at the Embassy in Tegucigalpa. Please call for office hours.

The Consular Agent does not provide visa information or services. For more details about all U.S. Embassy and consular services in Honduras, please see the Embassy web site at: http://honduras.usembassy.gov/ or visit the Bureau of Consular Affairs web site at: http://travel.state.gov/.

International Adoption : January 2007

The information below has been edited from a report of the State Department Bureau of Consular Affairs, Office of Overseas Citizens Services. For more information, please read the International Adoption section of this book and review current reports online at www.travel.state.gov/family.

Disclaimer: The information in this flyer relating to the legal requirements of specific foreign countries is based on public sources and current understanding. Questions involving foreign and U.S. immigration laws and legal interpretation should be addressed respectively to qualified foreign or U.S. legal counsel.

Please Note: The adoption process in Honduras is currently in flux. Policies regarding eligibility requirements for adoptive parents, residency requirements, and time frame are under review by the Honduran Family Court (IHNFA).

Patterns of Immigration: Please review current reports online at www.travel.state.gov/family.

Adoption Authority: Instituto Hondureño de la Niñez y la Familia (IHNFA) for children under 14 years old. Honduran Family Court for children 14 and older.

Instituto Hondureño de la Niñez y la Familia (IHNFA)
Honduras, Centro America
Tegucigalpa, Col. Humuya
Calle la salud
Apartado Postal 3234
Phone: (504) 23.57.754, (504)
23.57.755, (504) 23.57.756
Fax: (504) 23.53.598
Website: http://www.ihnfa.hn/

Adoption Agencies and Attorneys: All adoption agencies must be accredited. IHNFA has the information about registration and accreditation to operate.

The U.S. Embassy in Tegucigalpa maintains a listing of attorneys in Honduras on their website at: http://honduras.usembassy.gov/attorneylistfeb06.pdf.

Adoption Fees: Between U.S. $3,000 and U.S. $10,000 for attorney fees.

Adoption Procedures: If a child is under 14 years old, a petition (available at the IHNFA) must be submitted with the IHNFA. If a child is 14—18 years old, a petition may be submitted to the Honduran Family Court by an attorney.

Documentary Requirements: These are currently under review by IHNFA. Please contact IHNFA for more specific information.

Honduran Embassy in the U.S.:
3007 Tilden Street N.W.
Washington, D.C. 20008
Telephone: (202) 966-7702.
E-mail: [email protected]
Website: http://www.hondurasemb.org/

Honduran Consulates are located in Atlanta, Boston, Chicago, Houston, Jacksonville, Los Angeles, Miami, New Orleans, New York, Phoenix, San Francisco, San Juan, and Tampa.

U.S. Immigration Requirements: Prospective adoptive parents are strongly encouraged to consult USCIS publication M-249, The Immigration of Adopted and Prospective Adoptive Children, as well as the Department of State publication, International Adoptions. Please see the International Adoption section of this book for more details and review current reports online at www.travel.state.gov/family.

U.S. Embassy:
The Consular Section is located at:
Avenida La Paz
Tegucigalpa, Honduras.

Americans may contact the American Citizen Services Unit of the Consular Section at:
Email: usahonduras@ state.gov
Telephone: (504) 238-5114 ext. 4400.
Website: http://honduras.usembassy.gov/

Additional Information: Specific questions about adoption in Honduras may be addressed to the U.S. Embassy in Tegucigalpa. General questions regarding intercountry adoption may be addressed to the Office of Children’s Issues, U.S. Department of State, CA/OCS/CI, SA-29, 4th Floor, 2201 C Street, NW, Washington, D.C. 20520-4818, toll-free Tel: 1-888-407-4747.

Honduras

views updated May 29 2018

HONDURAS

Republic of Honduras

Major City:
Tegucigalpa

Other Cities:
Amapala, Comayagua, Copán, La Ceiba, Puerto Cortés, San Pedro Sula, Santa Bárbara, Santa Rosa de Copán, Tela

EDITOR'S NOTE

This chapter was adapted from the Department of State Post Report dated June 1996. Supplemental material has been added to increase coverage of minor cities, facts have been updated, and some material has been condensed. Readers are encouraged to visit the Department of State's web site at http://travel.state.gov/ for the most recent information available on travel to this country.

INTRODUCTION

HONDURAS , whose name is derived from the depth, or hondura, of the waters which surround its northern shores, is an underdeveloped Central American nation, struggling to improve its economic and social circumstances. It has had a history of turbulence since the coming of the Spaniards early in the 16th centurypolitical struggles, war with its neighbors, intervention by others in its internal affairsall major deterrents to the encouragement of progress.

Honduras is a country of rugged and varied terrain, a predominantly rural aspect, and a strong Indo-His-panic culture. Its ancient temple city of Copán was one of the great ceremonial centers of the vast Mayan empire.

MAJOR CITY

Tegucigalpa

Tegucigalpa, capital of the Republic of Honduras, is in a mountain-ringed valley about 3,200 feet above sea level. It is a provincial and picturesque city full of contrasts between the antique and the modern. At several points, streets of stairs connect one level of the city with another. At others, the city climbs the hillsides on terraces.

The predominant architectural style is Spanish colonial. Central Tegucigalpa is built around the traditional square. Narrow streets, remaining cobblestones, blank walls pierced by heavy doors and iron-grilled windows, and reddish tile roofs all add to an impression of architectural unity. But this unity is now being broken by the construction of new, modern buildings. Traces of former days contrast sharply with the new, modern residential sections surrounding the old town.

Spaniards founded Tegucigalpa in 1579 as a silvermining town with the imposing name of Real Minas de San Miguel de Tegus Galpa. In Indian language this means hill or mountain of silver. In 1880 the capital of the republic was transferred from Comayagua to Tegucigalpa. Until 1898, Tegucigalpa and Comayaguela, two settlements divided by the Choluteca River, were separate towns. The two were united in 1898 with the provision that each should retain its own municipal council. It was not until 1938 that they, together with other neighboring communities, were united to form the Central District.

Food

Pasteurized, fresh milk, as well as cheese, butter, eggs, cooking oil, and ice cream are available locally. Occasional shortages occur of items such as milk, eggs, flour, rice, beans, and chicken. Satisfactory locally bottled beer and soft drinks are also available.

Good quality frying chickens are available. Several outlets sell good quality beef (including fillet), veal, ham, and pork. Cuts and taste often differ from US meats. Good frozen and fresh lobster tails and shrimp are available at reasonable prices. Several supermarkets carry a fluctuating supply of local and imported food items and local meats. Items imported from the US are slightly more expensive due to high transportation costs and import duties.

Fresh fruits and vegetables are available year round, but supplies vary with the season. Local vegetables include tomatoes, cabbage, broccoli, cauliflower, carrots, beets, corn, eggplant, and lettuce. Avocados, oranges, bananas, limes, melons, pineapples, and other tropical fruits are available year round.

Clothing

Summer clothing is suitable for most of the year in Tegucigalpa. Bring a complete wardrobe, as local selection is limited, expensive, and of lower quality. Local tailors and seamstresses are good, but quality materials are expensive. Tegucigalpa's weather is tropical by day and cool in the early morning and evening. During the cool season (mid-November to February) it may be chilly during the day. At this time, lightweight wools and long sleeves are worn.

Men: Bring tropical-worsted, dacron, and other lightweight suits. One or two lightweight woolen suits or slacks with sport jackets are comfortable for cooler months.

Locally manufactured shirts (some well-known US brands) compare to those made in the US and cost about the same. Many men purchase locally made "guayaberas" (loose-fitting shirts), which are frequently worn at casual gatherings. Bring a supply of shoes, as those available locally are not the same quality as those made in the US.

Women: Bring a good supply of lightweight, synthetic, cotton, and cotton-blend clothes for the dry and rainy seasons. During the cool season, you may use long-sleeved synthetic knits, lightweight wools, sweaters, light jackets, and blazers. Include street-length dresses and skirts, separates, and sports clothes in your wardrobe. Shorts are inappropriate except for the beach. Rainy weather and unpaved streets are hard on shoes. Bring sandals, sport shoes, and boots for picnics and hiking. Bring plenty of lingerie and hose or panty hose, since sizes, styles, and colors are limited, and quality is only fair. Good quality imported items are expensive here.

Children: Local prices for imported children's wear are high and selection is limited. Children will need washable synthetic or cotton clothing most of the year with sweaters and/or jackets for cool months, and umbrellas. All schools in Tegucigalpa require uniforms for which materials can be purchased locally.

Supplies And Services

Local shops are open from 9 am to noon and 2 pm to 6 pm daily and 8 am to noon on Saturdays. Several large grocery stores are open on Sundays from 10 am to 6 pm.

Tailors and seamstresses are available in Tegucigalpa. Most make only simple, inexpensive clothes. A variety of material is available in all price ranges; however, quality material is expensive and selection is fair to poor.

Dry-cleaning is adequate for most fabrics, except leather. Laundry service is available. Shoe repair is satisfactory. Beauty shops and barbershops offer adequate service, but operators are not professionally trained, and sanitary precautions are not as strict as in the US. The barbershop in the Hotel Maya is cheap, excellent and hygienic.

Religious Activities

Most faiths are represented in Tegucigalpa. English-speaking Catholic and Protestant services are available. Tegucigalpa has several Catholic and Protestant Missions representing the Seventh Day Adventists, Assembly of God, Central American Mission, Baptist, Four-Squared Gospel, Jehovah's Witnesses, Mennonites, Lutheran, Mormon, Southern Baptist, and World Gospel Mission. The American community is also served by the nondenominational Union Church and an English-language Episcopal Church.

Most Hondurans are Roman Catholic. Highlights of the religious calendar in Tegucigalpa are Christmas and Semana Santa (Holy Week). Christmas week through New Year's Eve is celebrated with much gaiety and fireworks. Holy Week is rigorously observed. Most stores and all government offices remain closed from Wednesday through Sunday. Vehicular traffic on Good Friday is minimal. Honduran Catholics celebrate February 2 and 3 as feast days of the Patron Saint of Honduras, Our Lady of Suyapa.

Education

The largest school in Tegucigalpa offering a US curriculum is the American School. The school, a private institution organized under Honduran law, is not affiliated with the US Government. An elected school board, which includes US members, administers the school. About 10% of the student body are US citizens, 80% are Hondurans, and 10% are other nationalities. Enrollment is about 1,000, including pre-kindergarten through grade 12. Through guidance and financial support of the State Department's Office of Overseas Schools, it has improved significantly, upgrading teacher's professionalism and improving facilities. A new building for the high school was completed in 1991 and a new preschool complex will be completed in the Spring of 1995. The school has a large gym and modern exercise equipment.

Most classes are conducted in English with one period of Spanish-language instruction daily. The school follows the US curriculum through primary school (grade 6). Beginning in grade 7, students may choose from two curriculums: one prepares students to enter US colleges, the other prepares students for the National University of Honduras.

The American School is located in Colonia Las Lomas del Guijarro, a residential area. Overall, children of US parents do well at the American School, scoring above average on scholastic aptitude tests (SAT), many gaining acceptance to prestigious colleges of their choice in the US after graduation.

All students in grades K to 12 wear uniforms. Boys wear uniform pants, white, short-sleeved shirts, and dark socks. Girls wear jumpers with white, short-sleeved blouses and white socks. Girls may wear uniform pants with a white, short-sleeved blouse. All shirts/blouses must have the American School patch sewn on the sleeve. Material for the jumpers and uniform pants is available at the school as are the patches; shirts/blouses may be purchased from the school or local merchants and are readily available. A navy blue sweater or windbreaker is necessary for cooler days. Most students wear tennis shoes, or black or dark brown dress shoes on occasion. Kindergarten children wear the same uniform. The school, accredited by the Southern Association of Schools and Colleges, has a parent-teacher organization. Extracurricular activities include cheerleading, band, sports, drama, and chorus.

School begins in late August and ends in June. Advance registration is necessary; the address is:

American School
Tegucigalpa
APO AA 34022
Fax (504) 32-2380

Some American children attend Academia Los Pinares. A board of missionaries administers this school, located in a highland area 1/ 2 hour by bus from Tegucigalpa. A US curriculum is followed from kindergarten through grade 12. The Honduran curriculum is also offered in grades 7 to 12. Bible study is a required course, emphasizing moral values. The grading system is academically more rigorous than that of the American School. Classes are in English with one period of Spanish-language instruction daily. Pinares offers a full range of sports activities, plus band and chorus.

Enrollment at the beginning of the 1994-95 school year was 625 in pre-kindergarten through grade 12. The enrollment was 15% US citizens, 5% other nationalities, and 80% Hondurans. The school year runs from September to June. Academia Los Pinares students wear dark green uniforms with green-and-white checkered shirts. Many students wear tennis shoes. Socks are white.

Address all correspondence to:

Director, Academia Los Pinares
Apartado 143C
ETegucigalpa, Honduras, CA

American children also attend the Discovery School, a small private preschool and elementary school located in Colonia Payaqui, a residential area. A US curriculum and hands-on approach are followed from Kindergarten through sixth grade. Classes are capped at 15 students. Classes are in English with a daily Spanish class. Enrollment for is about 30 students, in three multi-grade classes, and about 20 in the preschool. Parents interested in sending a child to the Discovery School should write directly to the school.

Discovery School
TGU 00015
P.O. Box 025387
Miami, FL 33102-5387

The Mayan School and the Elvel School are two other English-language schools in Tegucigalpa. Several recently opened preschools offer varied curriculums. Parents wishing to enroll their children in a preschool should visit various facilities to determine which best suits their child's needs.

Special Educational Opportunities

The University of Honduras offers limited facilities for college age students and adults. All classes are taught in Spanish. Advanced study is usually undertaken abroad. French-language lessons are taught at the Alliance Francaise under the auspices of the French embassy. The Alliance offers an excellent curriculum from beginning to advanced studies. Guitar, piano, and marimba lessons are available.

Sports

Horseback riding is popular, and you can enjoy it year round. A stable near the outskirts of town offers English riding lessons. Horses are boarded for a monthly fee, which includes feed, utilities, rent, and membership. Lessons are available on an hourly basis after the membership fee is paid.

There are two Country Clubs which offers tennis and golf memberships. The Hotel Honduras Maya and the Alameda Hotel offer pool memberships. The Country Club and Los Delfines del Maya have competitive swim teams for young people. Bosques de Zambrano, a 40 minute drive from Tegucigalpa has indoor and outdoor pools, skeet shooting, tennis courts, picnic grounds, and restaurant services.

Tegucigalpa has three ballet schools for children and adults. Karate and judo classes are available for all ages.

Little league baseball, basketball, and soccer are played at the American School. Adults can join in pickup basketball or volleyball games.

Scuba diving, snorkeling, and fishing in the Bay Islands are fantastic. An active scuba diving club (Honduras Underwater Group) makes regular trips to various diving areas. You can also charter sailing yachts in the Bay Islands or rent small cays for overnighting.

The rugged hills around Tegucigalpa and the La Tigre cloud forest offer excellent hiking opportunities. Tegucigalpa has limited museums, zoological parks, and playgrounds.

Amateur archeologists may be interested in the Mayan ruins scattered throughout the country. All archeological relics are the property of the state, and exportation is prohibited by Honduran law and a treaty with the US.

Bring all sporting equipment and special clothing with you since selection is limited and prices are high.

Touring and Outdoor Activities

The former Presidential Palace, which has been converted into a museum is a beautiful, old building situated above the river. Near the palace is the more modern Congress building. A stroll through its columned patio area is interesting. A drive or walk up the cobblestone streets to the old La Leona section of the city leads to La Leona Park, with its lovely view of Tegucigalpa. In this area are a few colonial style homes. Concordia Park is a small popular park that has replicas of the Copan ruins.

The National Cathedral of San Miguel was begun in 1756 and consecrated in 1782. One of the oldest pieces in the church is the stone baptismal font. As you enter the valley of Tegucigalpa, you will see Suyapa Basilica, home of the Patron Saint of Honduras, the Virgin of Suyapa, etched against hills to the east.

The Pan American Agricultural School at Zamorano is about 25 miles from Tegucigalpa over a mountainous paved road. School grounds are beautiful and well kept, and the colonial style architecture of the buildings is attractive. Nearby is San Antonio de Oriente, a picturesque mining town, home of well-known Honduran primitive painter, Juan Antonio Velasquez. It is a morning's hike from the Pan American School grounds, or you can go by four-wheel-drive vehicle.

Valle de Angeles is about a 30minute drive over a paved road that winds through hills to the quaint village where you will find an arts and crafts center. Santa Lucia, near Valle de Angeles, is a small silver mining town perched on top of one of the many hills surrounding Tegucigalpa. The age of the principal church in Santa Lucia is unknown, but a wooden plaque dated 1598 was found in the old building.

Parque Aurora, a lovely park off the north road, has a lake for rowing, a picnic area, roller skating rink, miniature golf, playground equipment, and small zoo.

Comayagua, th colonial capital of Honduras, is situated in a broad valley. It is a 90 minute drive on a paved road from Tegucigalpa. Comayagua's Cathedral, built over 400 years ago, is one of the most beautiful in Central America.

Lake Yojoa, the largest lake in Honduras, is about 2½ hours from Tegucigalpa. An hour's drive from Lake Yojoa is Pulhapanzak Falls. A jeep or four-wheel-drive vehicle is recommended.

Cedeno and Choluteca are reached by a paved road, the spur that connects Tegucigalpa with the Pan American Highway on the South Coast. A dirt road leads to the bathing beach of Cedeno on the Gulf of Fonseca, southwest of Choluteca. There is excellent fishing in the many shrimp farm canals near Choluteca.

The country's cultural heritage includes the remains of a great center of pre-Columbian civilization in America, the Mayan ruins of Copan. This Mayan center rose and mysteriously declined seven centuries before Columbus set foot on Honduran soil. Since their discovery in 1893, the ruins of Copan have been explored, excavated, and studied by some of the world's leading archeologists. Copan is one of the greatest ceremonial centers of temple cities of a vast empire evolved from ancient peoples who inhabited Mexico and Central America before the birth of Christ. Visit by car or tour bus. Ranging from 10 to 40 miles off the North Coast are several picturesque islands, the largest of which are Guanaja, Roatan, and Utila. Once the haven of buccaneers and pirates, the islands are now sparsely populated by friendly descendants of English settlers who welcome all visitors. The Bay Islands offer lovely scenery, excellent snorkeling and diving, sailing, relaxed atmosphere, and good food, especially seafood. Go by boat, scheduled airlines, or chartered aircraft.

Tela, on the North Coast, has fine, sandy beaches fringed by graceful palms. Telamar, a seaside resort, offers fair accommodations. La Ceiba also on the North Coast, is accessible daily by plane.

Entertainment

Movie theaters show current and old American films with English soundtrack and Spanish subtitles. They also feature some Mexican, Italian, French, and British films. Prices are low, even for first-run movies (L10 per person or $1.10). Several new, air-conditioned, multi-cinema movie theaters are in the suburbs, and several comfortable movie theaters are in town.

The National School of Fine Arts has showings of local art. Classes are conducted in ceramics, painting, woodcarving, and sculpturing. The average cost per class session is L25 (US $2.80). Photography is a popular hobby. You can find considerable human interest subject matter as well as panoramic scenes. Most popular types and sizes of film are available in the commissary as is developing service for black-and-white and color films. Mail-order firms in the US can also be used for processing.

Occasionally, cultural attractions are sponsored by the US Government and other embassies. Locally produced concerts, folk festivals, and plays are also offered. Plays in English and Spanish are presented by a local dramatic group, Teatro Reforma. Mixed Company, an amateur English-speaking theater group, also presents several plays a year. Both groups welcome Hondurans and members of the international community. The National University has a theater group that presents occasional plays in Spanish. Instituto Hondureno de Cultura Interamericana (Binational Center) presents concerts, lectures, and local art shows.

Social Activities

The English-speaking Women's Club of Tegucigalpa is open to any English-speaking woman, regardless of nationality, and offers an excellent opportunity to meet Hondurans, Americans, and women from other countries. The club offers a monthly entertainment program and a variety of classes such as oil painting, international cooking, discussion groups, bridge, book club, etc.

OTHER CITIES

AMAPALA is the chief Pacific port in Honduras. It is located in the southern part of the country, on Tigre Island in the Gulf of Fonseca. Lumber and coffee are shipped to Amapala by launch from the mainland for export. Amapala is about 70 miles southwest of Tegucigalpa and has a population over 4,000.

COMAYAGUA , located about 35 miles northwest of Tegucigalpa, was the most important city of colonial Honduras. Founded in 1537, Comayagua, the conservative stronghold, rivaled Tegucigalpa, dominated by liberals, in the political struggle following Honduras' independence from Spain in 1821. The two cities alternated as capital until 1880, when Tegucigalpa became the permanent site. Comayagua today is the center of an agricultural and mining region. It has colonial landmarks, including a magnificent cathedral. The population over 40,000.

COPÁN is a village of about 2,000 people on the Honduran-Guatemalan border, 125 miles northwest of Tegucigalpa. It is near the ruined city of Copán, considered to be the center of the ancient Mayan culture. Of note among the ruins is the Hieroglyphic Stairway, dating to the year 756 and bearing the lengthiest known Mayan inscription.

LA CEIBA , located in northern Honduras on the Caribbean Sea, is about 100 miles north of Tegucigalpa. Situated at the foot of Peak Bonito, La Ceiba has beautiful beaches and is a departure point for the Bay Islands. The city is a commercial and processing center for the surrounding agricultural region; coconuts and citrus fruits are shipped from its port. La Ceiba was Honduras' main banana port until disease destroyed the surrounding plantations in the 1930s. The population in 1995 was about 89,200.

PUERTO CORTÉS lies on the Gulf of Honduras near the Guatemalan border, about 100 miles west of La Ceiba. Founded in 1525, Puerto Cortés is the principal Atlantic port, exporting mainly bananas, but also coffee, coconuts, hardwood, abaca, and minerals. The population here is approximately 42,000 (1987 est.).

SAN PEDRO SULA is the second largest city in Honduras, located 100 miles northwest of Tegucigalpa. With a metropolitan population over 280,000, San Pedro Sula is a commercial center, producing foodstuffs, clothing, beverages, tobacco products, soap, and building materials. Industry here is small and consumer-oriented. The country's only railroad links northwestern banana and sugar plantations with the principal northern ports.

SANTA BÁRBARA is a commercial and administrative center in western Honduras, 80 miles northwest of Tegucigalpa. The community of over 26,000 residents, rests in the hot lowlands close to the Ulúa River and Lake Yojoa. In the city's outlying areas, livestock and sugarcane are economic mainstays; in the core, manufacturing of clothing and furniture is important. Nearby, ruins of the abandoned city of Tencoa have been found. Santa Bárbara can be reached by a spur from the Inter-Oceanic Highway; it has an airfield.

Situated 25 miles from the Guatemala border and 115 miles west of Tegucigalpa, SANTA ROSA DE COPÁN is the country's western-most major city. It was founded in the 1700s and first called Los Llanos. Today it is the commercial hub of western Honduras, with 32,000 residents. The varied economy here includes tobacco blending and cigar making, and the production of lumber, furniture, leather products, clothing, and beverages. Good transportation is assured by access to several highways in Honduras and El Salvador; Santa Rosa de Copán also has an airfield. A nearby tourist stop is the ancient Mayan city of Copán, 25 miles outside of town. Several ruins can be seen, mostly buried under tropical vegetation. Courtyards, ball courts, and stone columns are among the sites.

TELA is situated in the northwestern region on the Caribbean Sea, between Puerto Cortés and La Ceiba. It is the headquarters for a large area of banana plantations, as well as a port and commercial center. Tela has an estimated population of 71,000.

COUNTRY PROFILE

Geography and Climate

The Republic of Honduras is situated in the middle of six republics comprising the Central American Isthmus between Mexico and Panama. Roughly triangular in shape, it has a 459-mile Caribbean coastline to the north and narrows in the south to 89 miles at the Gulf of Fonseca on the Pacific Ocean. It is bounded on the west by Guatemala, the southwest by El Salvador, and the east and southeast by Nicaragua.

Honduras has an estimated land area of 43,277 square miles, slightly larger than Tennessee. Second largest of the six Central American Republics, it ranks 14th in size among all Latin American nations. However, population distribution is unequal. The northeastern part (Mosquitia, consisting of eastern Department of Colon, most of Olancho, and all of Gracias a Dios) is thinly inhabited. It comprises 44.5% of the entire national territory and only 8.6% of the population.

Honduras also has insular possessions, including the picturesque Bay Islands formed by the summit of a submerged mountain range. The Bay Islands (Roatan, Utila, Guanaja, Barbereta, Santa Elena, and Morat) form one of the country's 18 departments. Farther northeast lie the Swan Islands, previously used by the US as a weather research station and now recognized as Honduran territory. Puerto Cortes (Honduras' first container-loading facility), Tela, La Ceiba, and Puerto Castilla are major Caribbean ports. Honduras has two secondary Pacific ports: Amapala, on Tiger Island in the Gulf of Fonseca, and San Lorenzo, on the mainland.

Honduran topography is exceptionally rugged. The Central American Cordillera crosses Honduras from east to west, making it the most mountainous of the six republics. The highest mountain peaks are in the southwest. Lowlands are the northern and eastern coastal plains, a narrow southern coastal plain, and river valleys. Principal rivers are in the north and flow into the Caribbean. Government estimates list 63.6% of the land surface as mountainous and 34.4% as plains and valleys.

Geographically and commercially, the country consists of two general regions: the highlands of the interior and southern Honduras and the tropical, banana-producing North Coast. Southern coastal lowlands are grouped with the highland region because of their economic linkage with Tegucigalpa, located in southwest central Honduras.

Tegucigalpa, located in a mountain basin at about 3,200 feet, is surrounded by jutting peaks, one of which reaches over 7,000 feet. The city proper lies at the foot of and on the slopes of Mount Picacho. It is 82 miles from the Gulf of Fonseca on the Pacific coast and 230 miles from the Caribbean to the north. The Choluteca River separates Tegucigalpa and its twin city, Comayaguela. Seven small bridges connect the twin cities.

Tegucigalpa's altitude renders a moderate climate, and most days are like spring. Moderate to cool nights relieve occasional hot days. Average monthly temperatures vary from 66°F in January to 74°F in May. Extreme temperatures as low as 44°F and as high as 90°F may occur. Seasonal differences vary more in rainfall than in temperature. The rainy season usually begins in mid-May and continues through mid-November, with heavy rains ending in late October. During the rainy season, rains occur in the late afternoons and early evenings, and days are mostly sunny and clear. From mid-November to February, cooler temperatures and strong winds prevail. The hot, dry season in Tegucigalpa can be uncomfortable and lasts for about 34 months, beginning as early as mid-January. It reaches its peak in April and continues until the first rains. During this time water shortages occur, the earth becomes brown and parched, and heavy dust and smoke from brush/grassland burnings hang in the air.

Population

Honduras' population is estimated at 6.1 million (2000), about 55 persons per square mile. Population distribution is concentrated in a rough crescent beginning at the South Coast, running through Tegucigalpa and Comayagua to San Pedro Sula, and then eastward along the North Coast through Tela to La Ceiba. Tegucigalpa, including Comayaguela (Central District), has a population of more than 800,000. Beginning in 1950, migration to the city from rural areas caused the population to rise sharply. Other population centers are San Pedro Sula, the country's industrial center; Puerto Cortes and La Ceiba on the North Coast; and Choluteca in the south.

The family is the basic social unit. Family ties extend to cousins, aunts, uncles, in-laws, and even godparents (known as "compadres"). Many families are large and often include representation from several social strata and different political affiliations. Although Roman Catholicism predominates, freedom of religion exists, and many other sects and denominations are represented.

Most Honduran Indians have been assimilated into the Hispano-American culture. Today, more than 90% of the population is comprised of mestizos, i.e., a mixture of white and Indian. A Caribbean black population is centered on the North Coast and the Bay Islands where most were born. Spanish is the official language, but North Coast blacks and most inhabitants of the Bay Islands speak an English dialect. A large colony of Catholic Palestinian emigrants is active in commerce and trade.

About 8,500 US citizens, many of whom are missionaries, reside in Honduras. Others are employed by US-based firms and the US Government. A small international colony includes British, Chinese, German, Italian, French, Dutch, Finnish, Greek, and Spanish citizens. Although some Hondurans possess great wealth, a gap exists between upper class and middle-class groups and the poorer rural and urban populations. The middle class consists principally of professionals, merchants, entrepreneurs, and government employees.

Honduras is largely agricultural. More than 29% of the population depends on agriculture for its livelihood. Basic dietary staples are corn (usually prepared as tortillas), red beans, rice, fish, and eggs. Meat and fresh vegetables are added to the diet as one progresses up the economic scale.

Public Institutions

The 1982 constitution provides for a strong executive, a unicameral National Congress, and a judiciary appointed by the National Congress. The president is directly elected to a 4-year term by popular vote. The congress also serves a 4-year term; congressional seats are assigned the parties' candidates in proportion to the number of votes each party receives in the various departments. The judiciary includes a Supreme Court of Justice, courts of appeal, and several courts of original jurisdiction--such as labor, tax, and criminal courts. For administrative purposes, Honduras is divided into 18 departments, with municipal officials selected for 4-year terms.

Reinforced by the media and several political watchdog organizations, human rights and civil liberties are reasonably well protected. There are no known political prisoners in Honduras, and the privately owned media frequently exercises its right to criticize without fear of reprisals.

Honduras held its sixth consecutive democratic elections in November 2001, to elect a new president, unicameral Congress, and mayors. For only the second time, voters were able to cast separate ballots for each office, and for the first time, denied the president-elect party's absolute majority in the Congress. The incidence of cross-voting between presidential and congressional candidates was marked.

The two major parties--the Liberal Party and the National Party--run active campaigns throughout the country. Their ideologies are mostly centrist, with diverse factions in each centered on personalities. The three smaller registered parties--the Christian Democratic Party, the Innovation and National Unity Party, and the Democratic Unification Party--have increased their political muscle in the National Congress by doubling their representation. Despite significant progress in training and installing more skillful advisers at the top of each party ladder, electoral politics in Honduras remain traditionalist and paternalistic.

Under the 1982 Constitution, the Armed Forces are entrusted with ensuring both internal and external security. A branch, the Public Security Force (FUSEP), assumes police functions. The Armed Forces also play an important role in national political and economic affairs. They have supported the democratic process.

For administrative purposes, Honduras is divided into 18 departments. The chief official of each department is a governor appointed by the President.

Arts, Science, and Education

Tegucigalpa has six institutions of higher education. The National Autonomous University of Honduras (UNAH), founded in 1847, has its principal campus in Tegucigalpa with branches in San Pedro Sula and La Ceiba. UNAH and the local professional associations, such as the College of Engineers, share responsibility of issuing professional licenses. The public Universidad Pedagogica Nacional and the private Jose Cecilio del Valle University, a Catholic University, are also located in Tegucigalpa. Through extension programs, non-degree students can elect courses in painting, drama, archeology, and sculpture at any of these institutions. The newest private university in Tegucigalpa is the 1987 founded Central American Technical University (UNITEC). UNITEC offers 2-year programs, as well as BS and MS degrees in fields such as accounting, computer science, and human relations. The private University of San Pedro Sula was founded in 1972 and offers degrees in business administration, economics, architecture, and anthropology.

In 1982 a scientific center of investigation was established at UNAH. The University has organized a marine biology center at La Ceiba. Despite these recent efforts, Hondurans pursue little scientific investigation and research.

The National School of Fine Arts and the National School of Music train qualified students. The Ministry of Culture and Tourism directs these institutions and sponsors the Cuadro Folklorico of Honduras and a Garifuna (a Caribbean coast ethnic group) song-and-dance group. The Institute of History and Anthropology, a part of the Ministry of Culture and Tourism, maintains a small museum in one of Tegucigalpa's historic houses and offers exhibits on topics of natural history, Honduran political history, and archeology. A study center at the museum conducts archeological studies and preserves Mayan artifacts. A second museum devoted to Honduran history can be found in downtown Tegucigalpa. A museum of North coast history and anthropology recently opened in San Pedro Sula. An excellent museum is located at the famous Copan ruins.

Aside from occasional visiting cultural presentations and the opportunity to attend courses at educational institutions, cultural opportunities are limited and do not compare with those available in larger regional cities in the US.

Commerce and Industry

Agriculture is the principal industry in Honduras. Although much farming is done at a low level of technology for basic staples such as corn and beans, commercial farming for export has become increasingly important in recent years. The tropical location combined with the mountainous terrain creates a variety of micro-climates suitable for a wide range of crops. Bananas, coffee, and sugar are the most important export crops; coffee alone accounts for some 30% of total exports. Nontraditional crops such as cantaloupes, watermelons, and vegetables such as cucumbers and squash are produced for the winter market in the US on an increasingly larger scale. Many other fruits, nuts, and vegetables are also grown but have not yet become significant exports.

Despite agriculture's importance, the Honduran countryside often seems empty when viewed from the roadside. This is due to both extensive forests and extensive cattle raising areas. Although cattle ranching remains important throughout Honduras, beef production has declined recently. The same may be said for the forestry industry. Although Honduras still has abundant forest reserves, primarily pine but with extensive tropical hardwood forests in some parts, poor government policies and inadequate reforestation have reduced commercial exploitation. Much of the population still uses wood as a primary fuel. This, along with clearing land for cattle and other food production, has resulted in deforestation in southern and central areas particularly.

The fishing industry is concentrated on the North Coast and in the Bay Islands. The large fishing fleet takes lobster, shrimp, and, increasingly, fin fish for both local and export markets. Farm-grown shrimp concentrated along the Gulf of Fonseca in the south form the base of a dynamic industry, which began in earnest in the early 1980s. As over-fishing in the north causes catches to decline, aquaculture in the south increases in importance. Recently disease has hurt production in the southern shrimp farms.

Honduras historically was a mining country, producing gold, silver, lead, and zinc. However, poor policies and low mineral prices have reduced mining's importance. El Mochito, the only large mine, still produces zinc and lead. Several smaller mines are active, and individuals do placer mining for gold on rivers in the east. No petroleum production exists, but onshore exploration activities were initiated in 1991.

Manufacturing consists primarily of consumer goods for local markets. The notable exception is, the booming apparel industry that generates considerable employment, primarily on the north coast. Many local apparel companies do assembly operations for well-known US brands and companies. In 1990, the first privately operated industrial park was inaugurated and others are expected soon. Occupants of these parks and free zones include US and Asian companies producing apparel for the US market.

Although not traditionally an important tourism destination, the industry shows signs of becoming more dynamic. Reef diving off the Bay Islands and well-preserved Mayan ruins are current attractions. Accommodations on the islands have improved and new development projects are in planning stages. Two American carriers (Continental and American), as well as several Central American airlines, serve Honduras.

Principal exports are bananas, coffee, sugar, shrimp, and apparel. Other exports include tobacco products, melons, winter vegetables, wood products, and minerals. Principal imports are petroleum products, fertilizers and pesticides, plastic resins, and paper products. A wide variety of machinery, vehicles, and consumer goods also reaches Honduran markets. The US buys about 55% of Honduran exports and provides 50% of its imports.

Transportation

Local

Individually operated buses and microbuses ("busitos") provide service within Tegucigalpa, San Pedro Sula, and nearby cities such as Choluteca and Danli. Bus fare is 75 centavos ($.08). No transfers are given, and often you must take several buses to a given destination. Taxi service is adequate in downtown areas of Tegucigalpa, but some drivers pick up as many passengers as possible along the way. Taxis can be hard to find in most residential areas and often you must walk to a main street. Major hotels and the airport in Tegucigalpa and San Perdo Sula have a fleet of cabs that charge two or three times normal rates. Taxis are not metered, so negotiate the fare first. Rental cars are available and taxis can be hired on a daily or hourly basis.

Regional

Rail service in Honduras is confined to the banana zone along the Caribbean coast and is not reliable.

Honduras has three international airports, located in Tegucigalpa, the capital city, San Pedro Sula, the commercial center and the coastal city of La Ceiba. Passenger and air freight services are reliable and efficient.

Air service from Tegucigalpa to Miami is provided by American Airlines and Taca Airlines. In addition, Taca provides service to New Orleans and Houston as well as to Guatemala City, San Salvador, Managua, San Jose, San Andres, and Panama. Continental Airlines provides air service from Tegucigalpa to Houston. Lacsa, a Costa Rican airline, provides air service via San Pedro Sula to Cancun, San Jose, Panama, Barranquilla, New Orleans, Los Angeles, and New York. Since delays can occur in receiving your baggage when coming from the US, include a change of clothing and toiletries in your carry on bags.

Islena, a domestic air carrier, connect Tegucigalpa with the North Coast and the Bay Islands. Charter service and aircraft rentals (small single and twin-engine equipment) are available from private flying services operating out of Tegucigalpa, San Pedro Sula, and La Ceiba. Small jets land in Tegucigalpa, San Pedro Sula, and La Ceiba.

Of Honduras' 22,724 miles of roads, about 4,053 miles are paved. Potholes are constant hazards, particularly during the rainy season. Night driving is discouraged because of such hazards as poor road conditions, animals on the road, pedestrians, unlit vehicles, and heavy commercial traffic. It takes 4 hours to drive from Tegucigalpa to San Pedro Sula.

When political and security conditions permit, you can drive to neighboring Central American capitals.

Bus service is available from Honduras to principal cities of Central America. However, buses are often overcrowded and rarely meet US safety and comfort standards. There is, however, a comfortable and very reasonably priced express bus service between Tegucigalpa and San Pedro Sula.

Communications

Telephone and Telegraph

Telephone service is adequate, but obtaining a telephone in a new housing area is difficult.

Telecommunications of Honduras (HONDUTEL) provides domestic and international telephone service. The monthly rate for residential telephone service is L20 (US $2.25). Additional calls and/or increased calling time increase your phone bill. Direct-dial, long-distance calling within Honduras and to the US and many other countries is available. Costs are based on destination, and rates are available through operator assistance. Night rates are charged from 10 pm to 7 am daily. Direct-dial calls placed from the continental US to Honduras are considerably cheaper. AT&T credit card holders may use the less costly "USA Direct" service. Sprint 121 service is also available. Worldwide telephone service offers good connections.

Telegraph service, also through HONDUTEL, is available to all parts of the world at a rate of L7 ($0.8) per word, including name and address. An urgent telegram costs L1.40 ($.18) a word

Radio and TV

Radio reception is satisfactory. US-style music is featured on several stations, but news is exclusively in Spanish. A good shortwave radio is necessary to receive American stations and international broadcasts including the Voice of America (VOA).

Five local TV stations can be seen in Tegucigalpa, all with Spanish-language programming. Local viewing will improve your Spanish. Some local companies offer cable service with a wide range of stations, including major networks, CNN and entertainment-oriented stations (HBO Ole, CINEMAX, etc.).

Newspapers, Magazines, and Technical Journals

Six Spanish-language dailies are published in Tegucigalpa and San Pedro Sula. One weekly English-language newspaper is published in Honduras. Major sources of English-language news are the Latin American air express editions of the Miami Herald, the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, the Washington Post, and USA Today. They normally arrive the day of, or day after, publication.

Overseas editions of Time and Newsweek are available at several newsstands at lesser cost. Several bookstores in Tegucigalpa carry limited selections of paperbacks, US magazines, and children's books. The Binational Center library carries a good selection of US newspapers, magazines, and some technical journals.

Health and Medicine

Medical Facilities

If you require medication for longterm conditions, bring an adequate supply and/or make arrangements with your physician and pharmacist to ensure a continued supply. Drugs may be obtained locally but are sporadically available. In addition, finding the exact item desired can be difficult.

Many local physicians have had part or all of their medical education in the US or Europe and enjoy the confidence of the community. Diagnostic facilities, such as radiology units and laboratories, provide most basic services. Three private hospitals are utilized frequently and two have emergency services. Hospitalization is usually limited to short stays, as comfort and nursing care are only fair and services limited.

Ophthalmology and optometry services are good. A new ophthalmology clinic has up-to-date outpatient care services and 24hour emergency services. Lenses, frames, glasses, and accessories are imported but are cheaper than in the US.

Routine dental care is quite good. Orthodontia is excellent and inexpensive. Many types of medical specialists are available and often are good.

Community Health

Honduras provides very little environmental sanitation or community health controls. Tap-water is considered contaminated and must be purified by the 3 minute boil-and-filter method before using for drinking, making ice cubes, brushing teeth, or washing fresh produce. All raw food products such as fruits, vegetables, and meats should be considered contaminated, and must be treated or properly cooked. Most endemic health hazards, including intestinal parasites and bacterial infections such as typhoid and infectious hepatitis, are directly related to water and food contamination. Pasteurized milk and other dairy products are available.

During the latter part of the dry season (February-April) water shortages occur. Many homes have water storage tanks (cisterns) with electric pumps in readiness for shortages. During this same period, burning empty fields within the city results in an inordinate amount of smoke in the air. Upper respiratory infections and lung ailments, such as allergies and asthma, may be exacerbated during this period of dry, dusty, warm weather with smoke. If you are subject to any of these illnesses, bring a nebulizer, vaporizer and/or air purifier.

Rabies is present in Honduras but does not constitute a serious health problem. Mosquitoes and other flying insects are present in Tegucigalpa and can be somewhat controlled by repellents, sprays, and good screening. Malaria is exists outside Tegucigalpa, and malarial suppressants are recommended when overnighting in areas with elevation lower than Tegucigalpa. Crawling insects can be problems, and controlling them in homes requires constant care. To keep bugs out of food, use airtight containers.

NOTES FOR TRAVELERS

Passage, Customs & Duties

The best air travel to Tegucigalpa is via Miami on American Airlines (daily, nonstop flights are available). Luggage often does not arrive on the same flight as the traveler, therefore, use your carry on bag effectively (change of clothing, special medicines, etc.).

A valid U.S. passport is required to enter and depart Honduras. A visa is not required, but tourists must provide proof of return or onward travel. Visitors are given a permit to remain in Honduras for 30 days. Honduran immigration may grant up to two thirty-day extensions for a total of 90 days. Thereafter, tourists must leave the country prior to reentering. On departure, visitors are required to pay an exit fee, either in dollars or in local currency, at the airline counter.

Honduran customs authorities may enforce strict regulations concerning temporary importation into or export from Honduras of items such as firearms, antiquities, medications, and business equipment. For example, Honduran law prohibits the export of antiques and artifacts from pre-colonial civilizations. To protect the country's biodiversity, it is illegal to export certain birds, feathers and other flora and fauna.

U.S. citizens who intend to stay in Honduras for an extended period of time and who bring vehicles or household goods into the country should consult Honduran customs officials prior to shipment.

For specific information regarding customs requirements, contact the Embassy of Honduras in Washington or one of Honduras's consulates in the United States.

Americans living in or visiting Honduras are encouraged to register at the consular section of the U.S. Embassy in Tegucigalpa and to obtain updated information on travel and security within Honduras. Travelers can register in person or fill out the form available on the Embassy website and fax it to the Embassy. Please include a copy of the data page of your passport and emergency contact information.

The U.S. Embassy and Consulate are located at: Avenida La Paz in Tegucigalpa, Honduras; Fax: 011-504-238-4357; Web site: http://www.usmission.hn; Telephone: 011-504-236-9320 or 011-504-238-5114. For information on services for U.S. citizens, ask for ext. 4400.

The Consular Agency in San Pedro Sula is located at: Banco Atlantida Building-8th Floor, San Pedro Sula, Honduras, Telephone: 011-504-558-1580.

The Consular Agent at this office is available during limited hours to accept U.S. passport applications for adjudication at the Embassy in Tegucigalpa, perform notarial services and assist U.S. citizens with emergencies. Please call for office hours. The Consular Agent does not provide visa information or services.

Pets

The Government of Honduras' Ministry of Natural Resources has established import restrictions for pets. Before arrival, you must request an import permit and obtain a veterinarian certificate, which authorizes a 40 day in-house quarantine. Bring vaccination certificates for distemper, hepatitis, leptospirosis, and parvovirus. You must also bring, upon arrival in country, a health certificate not more than 14 days old and a rabies vaccination certificate that is at least 6 months, but not more than 1 year old. Local veterinarian services are fair to good.

Currency, Banking, and Weights and Measures

The official monetary unit is the lempira, named after a heroic Indian chief who fought against the Spanish conquistadors. It is usually written as L1 or 1 Lps.

Occasionally, the shopper will hear Hondurans use "peso". This monetary unit existed before the lempira was adopted and is currently equivalent to the lempira.

Lempiras are divided into 100 centavos. Bills the same size as US bills are issued in denominations of 1, 2, 5, 10, 20, 50, and 100 lempiras. Coins are issued in 1, 2, 5, 10, 20, and 50 centavos.

Currently, the official rate of exchange is L16.36=US$1. The Central Bank of Honduras regulates both imports and foreign exchange. The value of the lempira against the dollar (exchange rate) is subject to periodic adjustment according to supply of and demand for dollars and other political economic factors.

The official system of weights and measures is the metric system, but the US system is, used most in markets, shops, and gasoline stations. The old Spanish system (e.g., vara vs. meter) is used in legal affairs. Most mechanics and carpenters are also familiar with US weights and measures.

Disaster Preparedness

Honduras is prone to flooding and landslides from heavy rains, especially during the rainy season which generally occurs from June to December. Hurricane Mitch caused extensive damage and loss of life in October 1998. General information about natural disaster preparedness is available via the Internet from the U.S. Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) at http://www.fema.gov/.

LOCAL HOLIDAYS

Jan. 1 New Year's Day

Jan. 15 Martin Luther King's Day

Mar/Apr. Holy Thursday*

Mar/Apr. Good Friday*

Mar/Apr. Holy Saturday*

Mar/Apr. Easter*

Apr. 14 Day of the Americas

May 1Honduran Labor Day

May 1Labor Day

Sept. 15 Independence Day of Central America

Oct. 3 Birthday of General Francisco Morazan

Oct. 12 Discovery of America

Oct. 21 Honduran Armed Forces Day

Dec. 25 Christmas Day

*variable

RECOMMENDED READING

These titles are provided as a general indication of the material published on this country. The Department of State does not endorse unofficial publications.

Acker, Alison. Honduras: The making of a Banana Republic. South End Press: Boston, 1988.

American University. Foreign Area Studies. Area Handbook for Honduras. U.S. Government Printing Office: Washington, D.C., 1984.

Anderson, Thomas P. Politics in Central America: Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras and Nicaragua. Praeger: New York, 1982.

. The War of the Dispossessed. University of Nebraska: Lincoln, 1981.

Bair, Frank E., ed. Countries of the World and Their Leaders Year-book 1993. Detroit, MI: Gale Research, 1993.

Bergsten, Horst, and Moran. American Multinationals and Interests. The Brookings Institution: 1978.

Chamberlain, R.S. The Conquest and Colonization of Honduras. Francisco Morazan: 1950.

Charnay, Desire. The Ancient Cities of the New World. AMS Press, Inc.: 1973

Coe, Michael. The Maya. Praeger Publishers: New York, 1973.

Durham, William H. Scarcity and Survival in Central America: Ecological Origins of the Soccer War. Stanford University Press: 1979.

Goetz and Morley. The Sacred Book of the Ancient Quiche Maya. University of Oklahoma Press: 1978.

Henderson, John S. The World of the Ancient Maya. Cornell University Press: Ithaca, 1981.

Houlson, Jane H. Blue Blaze: Dangers & Delight in the Strange Islands of Honduras. Birmingham, AL: Southern University Press, 1987.

Huston, R.G. Journey in Honduras & Jottings by the Way. Conway, NH: La Tienda, 1988.

Karnes, Thomas L. The Failure of Union: Central America 1824-1975. Arizona State University: Tempe, 1976.

Kepner and Soothill. The Banana Empire. Russell & Russell: 1963.

Lerner Publications, Department of Geography Staff. Honduras in Pictures. Minneapolis, MN: Lerner Publications, 1987.

MacCameron, Robert. Bananas, Labor, and Politics in Honduras (1954-1963). Maxwell School: Syracuse University Press: 1983.

MacLeod, Murdo J. Spanish Central America: A Socioeconomic History, 1520-1720. University of California Press: 1973.

Meyer, Harvey. Historical Dictionary of Honduras. The Scarecrow Inc.: 1976.

McCann, Thomas. An American Company: The Tragedy of United Fruit. Crown: New York, 1976.

Morris, James A. Honduras: Caudillo Politics and Military Rulers. Boulder: Westview, 1984.

O' Henry. Cabbages and Kings. Doubleday & Co., Inc.: 1953.

Panet, J.P., and Leah Hart. Honduras & the Bay Islands. Champlain, NY: Passport Press, 1990.

Parker, Franklin D. Travels in Central America 1821-1840. University of Florida Press: 1970.

Peckenham, Nancy and Street, Annie. Honduras: Portrait of a Captive Nation. Praeger Publishers: New York, 1985.

Rosenberg, Mark B. and Shepherd, Philip L. Honduras Confronts Its Future. Lynne Rienner Publishers, Inc.: Boulder, 1986.

Soltera, Maria. A Lady's Ride Across Spanish Honduras. University of Florida Press: 1964.

Squier, E.G. Honduras. Trubner & Co.: 1970.

Stephens, John L. Incidents of Travel in Central America. Chiapas and Yucatan. In two volumes. Dover Publications, Inc.: 1969.

Stockes, William S. Honduras. Greenwood Press: 1973.

Stone, Doris. Pre-Columbian Man Finds Central America. Peabody Museum Press: 1976.

Thompson, J. Eric. The Rise and Fall of Maya Civilization. University of Oklahoma Press: 1977.

Williams, Mary. Anglo-American Isthmian Diplomacy 1815-1915. Russell & Russell, Inc.: 1965.

Wilson, Charles Morrow. Empire in Green and Gold. Greenwood Press: 1968. Fiction and Travelogs

Honduras

views updated May 17 2018

HONDURAS

Republic of Honduras

República de Honduras

COUNTRY OVERVIEW

LOCATION AND SIZE.

Honduras is located in Central America. Its northern border, between Guatemala and Nicaragua, lies along the Caribbean Sea. The southwestern tip of the country, between El Salvador and Nicaragua, borders the northern Pacific Ocean. Slightly larger than Tennessee, Honduras has an area of 112,090 square kilometers (43,278 square miles).

POPULATION.

In July of 2000 the population of Honduras was estimated at 6.25 million, with an annual growth rate of 2.52 percent. In 2000, for every person who died in Honduras, approximately 6 were born. The birth rate during this period was 32.65 per 1,000, the death rate 5.31 per 1,000.

Approximately 90 percent of Hondurans are ethnic mestizo (mixed Amerindian and European). The remainder of the population is primarily Amerindian (7 percent). Blacks make up 2 percent of the population, while 1 percent of the country is white.

A significant portion of the Honduran population about 43 percentis under the age of 15. Approximately 54 percent are between the ages of 15 and 64. Those over 65 account for only 3 percent of the population. The life expectancy for males in Honduras is 67.91 years, while females are expected to live slightly longer, to 72.06 years.

OVERVIEW OF ECONOMY

The Honduran economy, one of the least developed in Latin America, has traditionally been fueled by the export of bananas and coffee. In the 1980s these crops accounted for between one-half and two-thirds of the country's total exports. Such a narrow export base limited growth and left the entire economy vulnerable to changing market conditions and poor weather, so in the 1990s moves were made toward economic diversification. The production of nontraditional exports such as melon, pineapple, and shrimp increased; the manufacturing industry grew; and the services sector, once fairly limited, emerged as a vital component of the economy. This diversification helped the Honduran economy withstand the effects of Hurricane Mitch, which swept through the country in October of 1998, devastating the agricultural sector. In the northern Sula Valley, the hurricane destroyed 70 percent of the banana plantations and brought heavy losses to basic grains. Coffee production was cut by about 20 percent. Despite these losses, the economy still gained 3 percent in 1998, led by strong performances in the manufacturing and services industries. The 3 percent growth was considered solid given the severity of the hurricane, which killed 7,000 people, destroyed 200,000 homes, and left 1.5 million Hondurans temporarily homeless. The damage caused by Mitch was estimated at US$5 billion, equivalent to 95 percent of the country's gross domestic product in 1998.

Honduras, despite moves to improve its economy, still depends on international aid and imported goods to meet consumer and fiscal demands. This dependence was heightened by Hurricane Mitch. The storm put domestic production on hold, increasing the need for imported goods and loans to help finance reconstruction. By 1999 Honduras was US$4.4 billion in debt, most of it owed to multilateral lending agencies and the United States. In 1999, in exchange for debt relief of nearly US$1 billion, the Honduran government agreed to restructure the economy along lines agreed to by the International Monetary Fund (IMF). As part of the structural adjustment program , Honduras agreed to privatize certain sectors of the economy. It also made a commitment to fight poverty and corruption, reform social security, strengthen the financial sector, and improve education and health care for the poor.

To spur the economy and increase foreign investment, the Honduran government, under President Carlos Roberto Flores Facusse, pledged in 1999 to accelerate the privatization programs which had stalled under the previous administration. Earlier privatization initiatives and the expansion of the tourist and manufacturing industries led to an increase in foreign investment in Honduras in the 1990s. Foreign investment in 1993 amounted to US$27 million. By 1999, that figure had grown nearly 10 times to US$230 million. Investment in Honduras will likely continue to increase as privatization initiatives move forward and industries expand. In the medium term Honduras will rely on close to US$3 billion in multilateral funding to assist in reconstruction costs and poverty alleviation programs.

POLITICS, GOVERNMENT, AND TAXATION

Since gaining its independence from the Spanish empire in 1821, Honduras has been plagued by political and financial instability. Changes of government have often been accompanied by violence and bloodshed. Rebellions, coups, and civil wars characterized much of the 20th century.

Two parties, the Partido Liberal (PL) founded by Celeo Arias in the 1880s, and the Partido Nacional (PN) established in 1902 by Manuel Bonilla, have dominated Honduran politics for the last century and continue to play a predominant role. The PN, which garners support from the military, is the more conservative of the parties, with strongholds in less-developed rural areas. The PL is more to the political left and draws support from an urban base, although it has a constituency among rural landowners as well.

Honduras has spent much of its independence under military rule. A break in military control occurred in 1955 when a group of military reformers staged a coup and installed an interim government, paving the way for constitutional elections. In 1957, a civilian, Ramon Morales, was elected to a 6-year term as president. Morales introduced agrarian reforms and social welfare legislation, including social security provisions. He also introduced a labor code to protect the rights of workers, and took Honduras into the Central American Common Market, a free trade zone made up of 5 Central American countries. In 1963 a military coup prevented Morales from running for a second term. General Oswaldo Lopez Arellano became the country's leader and placed agricultural development and the banking system under government control.

The military ran the country until 1981, when Honduras was returned to civilian rule. In 1982 a new constitution was drafted, and in 1986 Roberto Suazo Cordoba of the Liberal Party was elected president, marking the first peaceful transition of power between civilians in over 30 years.

The Liberal Party held the presidency for 4 years. Then, in 1990 the Nationalists took over with the election of Rafael Leonardo Callejas. Callejas moved to bring the military under civilian control, and instituted fiscal reforms to stabilize the economy, concentrating primarily on deficit reduction and currency stabilization. His presidency, however, was marred by allegations of corruption. Despite his reforms, the Liberal Party, under the leadership of Roberto Reina, regained the presidency in 1994. Under Reina the economy improved, with growth reaching 5 percent in 1997. International reserves were increased, and inflation dropped to 12.8 percent a year.

The current president of Honduras is Carlos Flores Facusse, a member of the Partido Liberal. In November 1997 he was elected to a 4-year term which began in January of 1998. His party holds over half the seats in the 128-seat National Congress. The Honduran government remains highly centralized despite slow-moving reforms to increase the power and participation of local municipalities.

Efforts to decentralize the political system (to give more power to the leaders of local governments) have been accompanied by economic reforms, with the government loosening its control over various economic operations, including those in the financial sector. In 1997, the Central Bank of Honduras was given greater independence in an effort to strengthen the country's financial system. In 2000 mandatory currency reserves were lowered from 25 percent to 19 percent. The government hopes that lowering reserve requirements and giving banks higher liquidity will increase loan disbursements and stimulate the economy.

Flores has also instituted a series of tax reforms designed to boost private investment and reduce the fiscal deficit. Flores reduced export tariffs , most notably in the banana sector, cutting duties from 50 cents a box to 4 cents. He also lowered the business income tax from 42 percent in 1997 to 25 percent in 1999. In order to offset losses from the cuts, the administration raised the sales tax from 7 percent to 12 percent. Flores has also undertaken efforts to increase privatization. The state-owned telecommunications company, Empresa Hondurena de Telecomunicaciones (Hondutel), and the state-owned electric company, Empresa Nacional de la Energia Electrica (ENEE) are prime candidates for privatization.

INFRASTRUCTURE, POWER, AND COMMUNICATIONS

In 1998 mudslides and flooding caused by Hurricane Mitch devastated the Honduran infrastructure . Nearly half of the country's road network was damaged by the storm. Over 160 bridges were destroyed. Approximately 50,000 telephone lines went down. Water and sewage pipes were damaged, as were seaports, airports, and schools throughout the country.

Honduras has 9,074 miles of primary, secondary, and municipal roads. About 18 percent of them are paved. The country has 2 main highways. The north-south highway

Communications
CountryNewspapersRadiosTV Sets aCable subscribers aMobile Phones aFax Machines aPersonal Computers aInternet Hosts bInternet Users b
199619971998199819981998199819991999
Honduras5538690N/A5N/A7.60.1920
United States2152,146847244.325678.4458.61,508.7774,100
Mexico9732526115.7353.047.023.021,822
Nicaragua3028519040.24N/A7.82.2120
aData are from International Telecommunication Union, World Telecommunication Development Report 1999 and are per 1,000 people.
bData are from the Internet Software Consortium (http://www.isc.org) and are per 10,000 people.
SOURCE: World Bank. World Development Indicators 2000.

connects the capital, Tegucigalpa, with San Pedro Sula. The Pan-American highway runs parallel to the Pacific coast and connects Honduras to Nicaragua and El Salvador. While road construction has remained stagnant over the past 5 years, the number of automobiles has substantially increased. There were 273,927 registered vehicles in Honduras in 1995. By 1999, that number had risen to 417,431, increasing traffic and congestion, especially in urban areas. There are also about 600 miles of rail lines to accommodate overland traffic.

The main Honduran port is Puerto Cortes on the northern coast. With 4,000 square feet of docking space capable of accommodating 10 vessels at a time, Puerto Cortes handles over half the country's export trade, on and off-loading 14 to 25 containers of goods an hour. Consistent with its larger privatization efforts, the Flores administration is seeking to open Honduran ports to private sector participation.

The 4 international airports in Honduras have already been turned over to private management. A U.S.-Honduran consortium led by the San Francisco International Airport (SFIA) will run the airports for the next 20 years. Under the terms of the agreement with the Honduran government, the consortium will invest US$120 million in the airports over the next 20 years, making physical improvements and raising the standards of efficiency, safety, and services.

The telecommunications infrastructure was greatly expanded in the 1990s. Empresa Hondurena de Telecomunicaciones (Hondutel), the state-owned telecommunications firm, increased the number of phone lines from 87,311 in 1990 to 373,032 in 1998. In 2000, as part of its structural adjustment agreement with the IMF, the Honduran government attempted to partially privatize Hondutel by selling 51 percent of the company's shares to the private sector. However, an October auction produced only a single bid for the shares. Telefonos de Mexico offered to pay US$106 million for the majority stock, but that offer was soundly rebuffed by Honduran privatization officials who set the minimum selling price at US$300 million. As part of the takeover agreement, any company which purchases the shares in Hondutel will be required to install 23,500 pay phones and add 600,000 kilometers of fixed lines in Honduras by the end of 2005. Honduran officials are seeking buyers in the United States and Europe, hoping to possibly attract an international consortium to take over company operations.

In 1999 Hondurans received about two-thirds of their energy from state-owned hydroelectric plants, with thermal plants providing the rest. Energy demands are increasing by about 12 percent a year, driven upwards by a widening industrial base and a rural electrification program. The heavily indebted state-run energy corporation, Empresa Nacional de la Energia Electrica (ENEE), is increasingly turning to private sources for help in meeting the country's growing energy needs. The Flores administration has expressed a commitment to privatize the state-run power plants, both hydroelectric and thermal, which together provided over three-quarters of the country's energy in 1999.

ECONOMIC SECTORS

Honduras has traditionally had a limited industrial capability, relying primarily on agricultural exports like bananas and coffee for the bulk of its foreign exchange. In the 1990s this began to change as Honduras made aggressive moves to shore up its economy by diversifying exports and broadening its industrial base. The services sector was also targeted for growth, resulting in the rapid expansion of the tourist industry.

Honduras is thought to have extensive mineral deposits which have yet to be exploited, indicating the potential for growth in the mining industry. Seeking to capitalize on the situation, the Flores administration passed legislation to increase foreign investment in the sector. However, some of Honduras's most fertile mining grounds are located near the Nicaraguan border and, as land disputes between the nations are common, this has led to political complications and has stifled industry expansion.

Growth in the manufacturing sector, led by the expansion of the maquila (offshore assembly for re-export ) industry, has been most pronounced. The re-export business was one of the few areas of the economy to escape Hurricane Mitch virtually unscathed.

Agricultural activity, which registered substantial declines after Hurricane Mitch, is not expected to fully recover before 2001. The severe damage wrought by the storm to traditional export crops has increased the pace of agricultural diversification. The cultivation of melons, pineapples, sugar cane and African palm were expanded in the wake of the storm.

AGRICULTURE

Despite declines in production caused by Hurricane Mitch, agriculture continues to dominate the Honduran economy, supplying in 1999 over 60 percent of the jobs and over half of all merchandise export earnings. That year, out of a working population of 2.13 million people, 834,900 of them held agricultural jobs. Coffee and bananas have traditionally made up the bulk of Honduras's agricultural exports.

Coffee is produced in 14 of the country's 18 provinces by 70,000 independent producers. Over the last decade, the coffee industry has been beset by financial problems. Some of these problems have resulted from poor weather. In 1998, prior to Hurricane Mitch, Honduras was the tenth largest coffee producer in the world. The damage caused by Hurricane Mitch contributed to an 11 percent decline in coffee production in 1999. Other problems came as a result of the structure of the industry itself. With so many small producers, quality control was hard to maintain. This caused great price volatility and made revenues less dependable. Furthermore, many small coffee producers and exporters took out loans before the hurricane, putting them in debt to the Central Bank following the destruction of their crops. Government subsidies to assist coffee farmers have been slow in coming, adding to the coffee industry's problems.

Banana production, which takes place on the northern coast, is controlled primarily by the subsidiaries of 2 U.S. conglomerates, Chiquita and Dole. These companies have established effective monopolies over the banana export trade in Honduras. However, legal challenges to the monopolies are growing more frequent.

Like the coffee sector, the banana sector had its share of trouble in the 1990s. Between 1991 and 1994, production was affected by strikes and floods. The industry recovered in 1995, but was then devastated in 1998 when Hurricane Mitch destroyed a majority of the banana plantations. In 1999, production fell by over 70 percent. Banana exports are not expected to reach pre-hurricane levels until 2001 or 2002. A reduction in the banana export tax from 50 U.S. cents per box to 4 cents will likely help boost the recovery.

With bananas and coffee proving highly susceptible to price volatility, bad weather, and labor unrest, Honduras has made efforts to diversify its agricultural exports. The development of nontraditional crops such as melon, pineapple, sugarcane, and African palm has expanded since the mid-1990s. Between 1995 and 1999, African palm production rose 50 percent. Sugar production during the same period increased from 67.5 million bags, to 82.8 million bags, reaching a high in 1998 of 89.4 million bags. In the wake of the hurricane, the pace of diversification increased with many banana farmers turning over some of their fields to the production of non-traditional crops.

During the 1990s commercial shrimp farming emerged as one of Honduras's most dynamic industries, posting steady gains in production and revenue between 1995 and 1998. Volume and earnings fell slightly in 1999 after Hurricane Mitch, but the industry quickly recovered. Shrimp is the third most important agricultural export after bananas and coffee, generating revenues of US$153 million in 1999.

INDUSTRY

MINING.

The mining industry in Honduras has achieved noticeable growth in recent years, with output increasing by 7 percent in 1999. However, between 1995 and 1999 the industry's contribution to the gross domestic product remained steady at around 2 percent. Honduras's primary mineral exports are silver, lead, and zinc. With a substantial portion of the country's mineral deposits still unexploited, the potential for growth in the sector is high. Attempts to expand the industry, however, have been complicated by political and environmental factors. Despite new mining laws, which were introduced by the Flores administration in 1998 to increase investment in the sector, foreign companies have been hesitant to operate in Honduras. The Canadian company Greenstone had to abandon its operations in the Copan region near the border with Nicaragua, in 1999 because of territorial disputes between Nicaragua and Honduras. Mining interests near Tegucigalpa have been opposed by environmental groups, offering another setback to the industry.

MANUFACTURING.

Unlike the mining industry, the manufacturing sector has experienced unimpeded growth over the last decade, with the most dramatic expansion being in the maquila industry. The industry produced about US$545 million in foreign exchange earnings in 1999 (just over 18 percent of the gross domestic product at market prices), exceeding agriculture proceeds to become the single largest export category. The number of workers in the sector grew from 9,000 to 120,000 between 1990 and 1998. A majority of these workers70 percentwere women aged 15 to 26. Between the years 2000 and 2005, the industry will likely expand by another 80,000 workers, with new investment expected to reach US$700 million.

Growth in maquila can be attributed to a number of factors, including favorable tax provisions, a solid manufacturing infrastructure, and low wage costs. A series of laws passed between 1975 and 1999 granted national and foreign companies tax and duty exemptions in specified areas called free zones. This made the maquila industry more lucrative for domestic companies and established Honduras as a particularly attractive base of operations for foreign firms.

In May 2000 the U.S. Congress decided to eliminate an 18 percent duty on finished apparel from Africa, the Caribbean, and Central America, making Honduran maquila producers more competitive. As investment and labor increases, the maquila sector will likely diversify and begin performing more technical operations, such as the cutting and dying of fabrics. As it stands now, a majority of these operations take place in the United States.

In July 2000 Honduras was granted North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) parity for its exports, meaning it would receive the same trade benefits as signatories of NAFTA even though it was not an actual party to the agreement. Although NAFTA parity had been granted to other Central American and Caribbean countries, Honduras was in an especially good position to benefit from enhanced access to American markets. Its port facilities are some of the most developed in Central America, and its proximity to American markets facilitates high levels of trade.

SERVICES

TOURISM.

Tourism is one of the fastest growing industries in Honduras. The country hosts a variety of attractions including beaches and coral reefs, historic colonial cities, Mayan ruins, and lush national parks. Revenues from tourism rose steadily in the 1990s, from US$30.6 million in 1991 to US$185 million in 1999. In 1994 Honduras had around 230,000 recreational visitors. By 1999 the number had increased to 375,000.

The government has attempted to expand the tourist industry in part through large-scale development projects. A plan emerged in the late 1990s to allow foreign nationals to own land and operate tourist-related businesses within 40 miles of the coast. This plan was vigorously opposed by the coastal Amerindians who feared the development would disrupt their livelihoods. Amerindians may be a minority in the overwhelmingly mestizo population, but they have grown more vocal in recent years. In 2000 Congress rejected the measure that would have allowed foreigners to run tourist operations in the coastal regions. Clashes over coastal development between the government and indigenous groups will likely continue.

FINANCIAL SERVICES.

When financial services in Honduras were liberalized in the 1990s, the banking industry underwent a period of expansion. By the end of the decade, the sector had begun to consolidate. After the 1999 collapse of Banco Corporativo, Bancahsa and Banco del Ahorro Hondureno merged to create the largest bank in the country. By the late 1990s, financial assets in Honduras had been consolidated into the hands of a few large banks. With most the 19 finance houses and 11 insurance companies being grouped under holding companies with common shareholders, banks can easily shift assets in response to changing market forces and new regulations.

Only 2 foreign banks operate out of Honduras: Lloyds Bank and Citibank, the latter of which owns Banco de Honduras. The country's 2 stock exchanges one in the capital, Tegucigalpa, and the other in San Pedro Sularun mainly short-term credit operations.

In an effort to shore up confidence in the banking system and stem capital flight (the movement of financial assets from domestic markets to foreign countries), the Banco Central de Honduras (the central bank) in 1995 authorized the holding of U.S. dollar accounts in Honduran banks. Import and export operations benefited from the move. In another measure to retain capital, insurance companies were allowed to issue policies in U.S. dollars, having been formerly restricted to providing coverage in lempiras.

INTERNATIONAL TRADE

Honduras conducts a majority of its trade with the United States. In 1999 over one-third of Honduras's exports went to America, not including merchandise produced in the maquila sector. Although technically a function

Trade (expressed in billions of US$): Honduras
ExportsImports
1975.295.400
1980.8291.009
1985.780.888
1990.831.935
19951.2201.643
19981.5332.500
SOURCE: International Monetary Fund. International Financial Statistics Yearbook 1999.

of manufacturing, Honduras lists maquila as a service export instead of a product export. With maquila exports included, the United States received over 70 percent of total Honduran exports. Nearly half of Honduras's importsabout 47 percentcame from the United States (over 60 percent with maquila). Other trading partners included Germany, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Guatemala, Mexico, and Japan.

During the 1980s coffee and bananas in Honduras accounted for a majority of total exports. Over the past decade, exports were diversified. By 1999, due to a widening agricultural base and the effects of Hurricane Mitch, which destroyed much of the banana crop, the export share of coffee and bananas had been reduced to 25 percent.

In 1999 coffee and shellfish were the leading export earners. Coffee receipts came to US$256.1 million, and shellfish exports generated US$193.2 million. Revenues from banana exports, which were US$279.8 million in 1996, fell in 1998 to US$175.7 million. After Hurricane Mitch, banana receipts dropped to US$37.7 million.

The Honduran government in the 1980s instituted policies to curb imports. This led to pent-up demand, and a decade later when trade was liberalized, import levels rapidly rose, exceeding export levels and widening trade deficits . The situation was exacerbated by Hurricane Mitch, which lowered export production and raised the demand for imported goods. By 1999, trade deficits, excluding maquila value, had widened by 60 percent to US$1.48 billion (US$764.2 million with maquila).

Honduras is looking to expand its regional trading relationships in order to lessen its economic dependence on the United States. Honduras, along with El Salvador and Guatemala, established a trade agreement with Mexico in June 2000 which was meant to reduce tariffs on industrial and agricultural products and give Central American countries enhanced access to Mexican markets. In 1993 Honduras also entered into a free-trade agreement with Guatemala, El Salvador, and Nicaragua. Central American policy makers hoped the creation of the free-trade area, known as the Group of Four (G4), would make the region more competitive in the world economy. Efforts to expand regional trade have been partly successful. In Honduras, exports to G4 countries rose from 13 percent of the total in 1997 to 17 percent in 1999. However, border disputes between Honduras, Nicaragua, and El Salvador could potentially complicate the agreement.

Problems arose in 1999 when Honduras recognized Colombia's right to a stretch of maritime land off the coast of Nicaragua. Nicaragua, claiming ownership of the land, responded by levying a 35 percent surcharge on all Honduran imports. The dispute, which is still unresolved, has left relations between the countries strained. Disputes in other areas between the countries have led to violence. Military clashes have occurred over fishing rights in the Gulf of Fonseca, and in recent years Honduras has also clashed with El Salvador over contested land in the province of La Paz.

MONEY

Between 1919 and 1990, the lempira maintained an artificially fixed rate against the U.S. dollar at L2.0:US$1. This meant the Honduran economy was vulnerable to shifts in U.S. monetary policy . Furthermore, the printing of domestic currency was constrained by the need to keep local money supplies in line with U.S. dollar reserves. In March of 1990, in an effort to give the Central Bank and the Honduran government more control over the country's fiscal development, the fixed rate was removed and the value of the lempira sharply declined. By the end of that year, the exchange rate had risen to L5.3:US$1. The government tried to support the currency by strictly enforcing laws which required exporters to repatriate foreign exchange earnings (meaning exporters selling to the United States, for instance, would have to convert their profits from dollars to lempiras when placing them back in Honduran banks). However, these efforts were insufficient and the lempira continued its downward slide throughout the first half of the 1990s. In 1994, in a further attempt to stabilize the currency, the Central Bank

Exchange rates: Honduras
lempiras (L) per US$1
Dec 200015.1407
200015.1407
199914.5039
199813.8076
199713.0942
199612.8694
SOURCE: CIA World Factbook 2001 [ONLINE].

established a public U.S. dollar auction system. In this system the Central Bank sold American dollars to domestic commercial banks at a slightly elevated exchange rate. This allowed the Central Bank to make money on the exchange, and by pulling lempiras out of the system (taking them from commercial banks in exchange for dollars) it lowered the supply of domestic currency, thereby raising its price. By the end of 1995, the lempira's decline had begun to slow, improving the performance of the external sector and boosting investor confidence. By 1999 the lempira had steadied at L14.5:US$1, representing a 3.3 percent appreciation against the U.S. dollar in real terms for the year.

POVERTY AND WEALTH

Hurricane Mitch devastated Honduras in 1998, causing over 7,000 deaths. Over 1.5 million people were left homeless by the storm. Thousands of buildings were destroyed, and roads and bridges were washed away. The economy came to a near standstill, worsening the effects of already endemic poverty.

Since 1998, the government of Honduras has committed to a development strategy which was coordinated in conjunction with the World Bank and IMF. The World Bank is currently supporting a US$30 million Social Investment Fund aimed at alleviating poverty through the improvement of the country's infrastructure at the community level. The project includes self-help programs for the poor and involves the construction of numerous schools in rural areas. The World Bank has also initiated a US$25 million nutrition and health program for 255,000 poor women and children. The program's goals include the establishment of up to 160 health care centers with a priority given to rural areas.

The infant mortality rate in 2001 was high at 36 deaths per 1,000 live births. Approximately 25 percent of children were suffering from malnutrition. Despite World Bank initiatives, Honduras remains one of the poorest countries in the Americas with an estimated gross domestic product of US$6.5 billion in 2001. More than 53 percent of the population live below the poverty line,

GDP per Capita (US$)
Country19751980198519901998
Honduras614733681682722
United States19,36421,52923,20025,36329,683
Mexico3,3804,1674,1064,0464,459
Nicaragua999690611460452
SOURCE: United Nations. Human Development Report 2000; Trends in human development and per capita income.
Distribution of Income or Consumption by Percentage
Share: Honduras
Lowest 10%1.2
Lowest 20%3.4
Second 20%7.1
Third 20%11.7
Fourth 20%19.7
Highest 20%58.0
Highest 10%42.1
Survey year: 1996
Note: This information refers to income shares by percentiles of the population and is ranked by per capita income.
SOURCE: 2000 World Development Indicators [CD-ROM].

42 percent of the population do not have access to safe drinking water, and a quarter of the population are illiterate. Over 50 percent of Honduras's rural population are agricultural workers who own no land or are small-scale landowners who have less than 5 hectares. Land reform that provides technical as well as financial assistance in the form of micro credit (small-scale loans) could reduce poverty in Honduras by allowing farmers to earn income, be self sufficient, and increase overall production.

WORKING CONDITIONS

After a 1954 banana strike, trade unions emerged as a major force in Honduran politics. In 1999, with 14 percent of its labor force organized, Honduras was the most heavily unionized country in Central America. Still, the strength of unions diminished in the 1990s. Despite the labor movement's opposition to privatization, the Flores administration remained committed to economic reforms that would give up state-owned companies to the private sector, while union calls for higher wages were ignored.

While the law in Honduras grants workers the right to form and join unions, there have been cases reported of employers seeking to disrupt union activities by harassing or firing union sympathizers. As of 1999, the labor court in Honduras was considering numerous appeals by workers who claimed to have been fired by their companies for engaging in union activities.

Forced labor is forbidden by law, but there have been some cases reported of forced overtime in the maquila sector, particularly for women. Child labor is prohibited as well. Children under 14 years old are barred from the workforce, even if they have parental permission to work. Allowing a child to work illegally is punishable by up to 5 years in prison; however, frequent violations occur in rural districts. According to a human rights report issued in 1999 by the U.S. State Department, an estimated 350,000 children in Honduras work illegally.

The labor force in Honduras is mostly unskilled. The general level of education is low and training is limited. Children between ages 7-13 receive free, compulsory education, but in order to continue after the age of 13 tuition is required. A majority of families cannot afford to pay for education, and instead of continuing with school, most children move into the labor force after they turn 14. In 1999, out of 841,236 children aged 15 to 19, only 187,561 were receiving regular schooling. The illiteracy rate in Honduras is around 19 percent. Public spending on education, traditionally low in Honduras, has declined in recent years, falling to 4.1 percent of the gross domestic product in 1999.

In January 1998 the average minimum wage in Honduras was raised 17 percent. In 1999 it was hiked another 25 percent, and in 2000, the wage was raised again, this time by 8 percent. The wage varies from sector to sector, the lowest being US$2.12 a day in non-export agriculture. The highest minimum wage is paid in the export sector, where workers receive at least $3.47 a day. Even the highest minimum wage is insufficient to provide a standard of living over the poverty line.

The maximum workday is 8 hours. Workers cannot be required to work more than 44 hours in a week, and they must be given at least one 24-hour rest period every 8 days. The labor code stipulates that workers be given 10 days of paid vacation after 1 year of work, and 20 days after 4 years of work. These laws, however, are often ignored. Demand for jobs is so high that workers cannot afford to complain.

COUNTRY HISTORY AND ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT

1502. Christopher Columbus visits Honduras on his third voyage to the New World.

1524. Spanish colonization of Honduras begins.

1537. Native Honduran Chief Lempira murdered by the Spaniards.

1821. Honduras gains independence from Spain and joins the Central American Federation.

1830. Francisco Morazan becomes the nation's first president.

1842. The Central American Federation falls apart. Morazan is murdered.

1870s. A revolution takes place. Church and state are separated under Marco Aurelio Soto.

1880s. Partido Liberal, one of the dominant political parties, is founded by Celeo Arias.

1899. First banana concession is granted to Vicaro brothers, later becoming Standard Fruit (Dole).

1902. Manuel Bonilla establishes the Partido Nacional.

1907. The Cuyamel Fruit Company is set and is later bought by United Fruit (Chiquita).

1929. Honduras becomes the largest banana exporter in the world.

1954. A banana workers strike establishes unionized labor and gains recognition from the government.

1956. The Honduran military takes control of the government.

1957. Civilian rule is restored. Ramon Villeda Morales is elected president.

1957. Morales promotes social reforms, and Honduras joins the Central American Common Market.

1963. Statist General Oswaldo Lopez Arellano takes control of the government in a military coup.

1981. Honduras again returns to civilian rule.

1982. Debt crisis sparks fiscal austerity.

1989. Rafael Leonardo Cellejas of the Partido Nacional is elected president. He makes moderate reforms.

1994. Carlos Roberto Reina of the Partido Liberal becomes president, inheriting wide public sector debt.

1998. President Carlos Flores Facusse (PL) decentralizes the government and privatizes the economy.

1998. Hurricane Mitch hits Honduras with devastating force.

1999. Honduras receives US$3 billion in loans to help finance reconstruction after Hurricane Mitch.

2000. Honduras qualifies for debt relief under the Debt Initiative for Heavily Indebted Poor Countries (HIPC).

FUTURE TRENDS

Honduras is still recovering from Hurricane Mitch, which swept through the country in 1998, interrupting the implementation of much-needed reforms, including decentralization and privatization programs. As the country rebuilds itself, and those reforms get back on track, Honduras could experience a period of solid economic growth.

The offshore manufacturing sector will continue to expand, and competitive access to American markets will keep export revenues high. Mining production could increase as well, which, along with the growth in manufacturing, could widen the export base, raise trade revenues, and generate foreign investment. Increased activity in the tourist sector will also play an important role in the country's economic revitalization. However, regional disputes still threaten to undermine the Honduran economy.

The ongoing land dispute between Nicaragua and Honduras flared up again in 1999 when Honduras recognized Colombia's right to a stretch of maritime land claimed by Nicaragua. Nicaragua, in retaliation, imposed a 35 percent tariff on all Honduran imports. Honduras, in turn, has threatened to impose trade sanctions on Nicaragua effective April 2000 if the tariffs are not lifted. The case has been taken up by the International Court of Justice in the Netherlands but will likely take years to resolve. In the meantime, Honduran exporters will suffer high regional tariffs, costing millions of dollars and stifling domestic growth.

On the political front, the Honduran democratic process will be put to the test in November 2001 when the country's next presidential election is set to be held. The 2 main parties are fiercely competitive and regard one another with hostility. The level of acrimony between them was heightened by a recent dispute over the eligibility of candidates. The dispute threatens to jeopardize political stability and plunge Honduran politics back into violence.

Honduras may benefit from the joint initiative developed by the World Bank and the IMF, known as the Debt Initiative for Heavily Indebted Poor Countries. The program provides debt relief for poor countries who, in exchange, commit to economic reforms. Reforms in Honduras have been opposed by the unions, but union influence has waned and, so far, the reforms are proceeding. The reforms include privatizing the telecommunications industry as well as power production in order to meet the terms of a 3-year poverty reduction program signed with the IMF in April 1999. It has been estimated that relief from the HIPC program will save Honduras nearly US$1 billion over 20 years.

DEPENDENCIES

Honduras has no territories or colonies.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Economist Intelligence Unit. Country Profile: Honduras, 2000. London: Economist Intelligence Unit, 2000.

International Monetary Fund. Interim Poverty Reduction Strategy Papers. <http://www.imf.org/external/NP/prsp/2000/hnd/01/>. Accessed August 2001.

U.S. Central Intelligence Agency. CIA World Factbook 2000: Honduras. <http://www.odci.gov/cia/publications/factbook/geos/ho.html>. Accessed August 2001.

U.S. State Department: Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor. 1998 Human Rights Report: Honduras Country Report. Released February 1999. <http://www.usis.usemb.se/human/human1998/honduras.html>. Accessed August 2001.

U.S. State Department: Bureau of Western Affairs. Background Notes: Honduras, March 1999. <http://www.state.gov/www/background_notes/honduras_0399_bgn.html>. Accessed August 2001.

U.S. State Department. Country Report, Honduras, Bureau of Economic Policy and Trade Practices. <http://www.state.gov/www/issues/economic/trade_reports/1999/honduras.pdf>. Accessed August 2001.

World Bank. World Bank Development Report. WashingtonD.C.: World Bank Group, 2000.

John Mazor

CAPITAL:

Tegucigalpa.

MONETARY UNIT:

Lempira (L), also known as the peso. One lempira equals 100 centavos. Coin denominations include 1, 2, 5, 10, 20, and 50 centavos, and notes include 1, 2, 5, 10, 20, 50, and 100 lempiras.

CHIEF EXPORTS:

Coffee, bananas, shrimp, lobster, meat, zinc, lumber.

CHIEF IMPORTS:

Machinery and transport equipment, industrial raw materials, chemical products, fuels, foodstuffs.

GROSS DOMESTIC PRODUCT:

US$5.25 billion (purchasing power parity, 1998 est.).

BALANCE OF TRADE:

Exports: US$1.2 billion (1999 est.). Imports: US$2.7 billion (1999 est.).

Honduras

views updated May 08 2018

Honduras

Culture Name

Honduran

Alternative Names

Hondureño catracho (the national nickname; can be amusing, insulting, or friendly, depending on the context. "Catracho" comes from the name of Florencio Xatruch, the general who led the Honduran expeditionary force against William Walker in Nicaragua in 1856.)

Orientation

Identification. The name of the country means "depths." It was so named by Christopher Columbus on his fourth voyage because of the deep waters at the mouth of the Tinto o Negro River off the Mosquito Coast. Regional traditions exist in the south (Choluteca and Valle) and the north coast as well as among the minority ethnic groups. All these people self-identify as Hondurans, however. Spanish-speaking people in the center of the country are the most numerous and are culturally dominant. They do not use a special name to refer to themselves or their region.

Location and Geography. The nation has an area of 43,266 miles (112,492 square kilometers). Honduras is in the middle of Central America. The physical environment is tropical, with a long dry season (six months or more) in the south and the interior and a shorter dry season in the north. The center of the country originally was covered with pine and broadleaf forests of oak and other trees, but much of the pine forest has been logged and much of the oak forest has been cut for farming. The north coast was once primarily rain forest, but much of it has been cleared for commercial banana plantations. The northeast is called the Mosquitia. It includes the "Mosquito Coast," which is actually a long series of white sand beaches and freshwater lagoons. Inland from the coast, the Mosquitia has one of the last great stands of tropical rain forest left in North America, plus pine woods and grasslands.

Different ethnic groups live in specific environments. The Anglo-African-Caribbean "Bay Islanders" live on the Bay Islands off the north coast. The Garífuna people live along the Caribbean Coast of Central America, from Belize to Nicaragua. The Miskito and Tawahka people live in the rain forests of the eastern lowlands, and in similar lands in neighboring areas of Nicaragua. The Pech and Jicaque people live in some of the more remote areas in the central highlands. The Chortí and Lenca peoples live in the rugged western highlands. Hispanic-Hondurans live in the north, south, and center of the country.

The capital city, Tegucigalpa, was chosen because it is near the geographic center of the country. It completely fills a small, deep valley in the headwaters of the Choluteca River, in the central highlands.

Demography. Honduras had a population of 5,990,000 in 1998. In 1791, the population was only 93,501. The pre-Hispanic population was probably much higher, but conquest, slavery, and disease killed many people. The population did not reach one million until 1940.

The major ethnic group include the Chortí, a native people with a population of about five thousand in the department of Copán. There may still be a few people who can speak the Chortí language, which belongs to the Mayan family. The Lenca are a native people in the departments of La Paz, Intibucá, and Lempira, as well as some other areas. The Lenca language is extinct, and culturally the Lenca are similar in many ways to the other Spanish-speaking people in the country. The Lenca population is about one hundred thousand. The Jicaque are a native people who live in the department of Yoro and the community of Montaña de la Flor (municipality of Orica) in the department of Francisco Morazán. Only those in Montaña de la Flor still speak the Tol (Jicaque) language, which is in the Hokan family. The Jicaque group in Yoro is much larger and has been almost completely assimilated into the national culture. There are about nineteen thousand Jicaque in Yoro and about two hundred in Montaña de la Flor. The Pech are a native people in the departments of Olancho and Colón, with a few living in Gracias a Dios in the Mosquitia. They speak a Macro-Chibchan language and have a population of under three thousand. The Tawahka are a native people in the department of Gracias a Dios in the Mosquitia. Tawahka is a Macro-Chibchan language that is very closely related to Sumo, which is spoken in Nicaragua. Most Tawahkas also speak Misquito and Spanish. The Tawahka population is about seven hundred. The Misquitos are a native people with some African and British ancestry who reside in the department of Gracias a Dios in the Mosquitia. Misquito is a Macro-Chibchan language, although most Misquitos speak fluent Spanish. The Misquito population is about thirty-four thousand. The Garífuna are a people of African descent with some native American ancestry. They originated on the Caribbean island of Saint Vincent during colonial times from escaped slaves who settled among a group of Arawak-speaking Carib Indians and adopted their native American language. In 1797, the Garífuna were forcibly exiled by the British to Roatán in the Bay Islands. The Spanish colonial authorities welcomed the Garífuna, and most of them moved to the mainland. The Garífuna population is about one hundred thousand. The Bay Islanders are an English-speaking people who are long settled in the Caribbean. Some are of African descent, and some of British descent. The Bay Islanders population is about twenty-two thousand.

Linguistic Affiliation. Spanish is the dominant national language. Although originally imposed by the conquistadores, it has been widely spoken in Honduras for over two hundred years. Almost all residents speak Spanish, although some also speak English or one of the Native American languages discussed in the previous paragraph. Honduran Spanish has a distinct accent. Hondurans use some words that are not heard in other Spanish-speaking countries, and this gives their speech a distinctive character.

Symbolism. In spite of the 1969 war with El Salvador and tense relations with Nicaragua, the Honduran people feel that they are part of a larger Central American community. There is still a sense of loss over the breakup of Central America as a nation. The flag has five stars, one for each Central American country (Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, and Costa Rica). Factory goods are not labeled "made in Honduras," but "Central American product, made in Honduras." Independence Day (15 September) is shared with the other Central American countries, and is a fairly muted national holiday. Some people complain that there is little point celebrating independence from Spain, since Honduras has become virtually a colony of the United States. By 1992, Columbus Day had become a day of bereavement, as Hondurans began to realize the depth of cultural loss that came with the Spanish conquest. May Day is celebrated with parades and speeches. In the 1990s, the national government found this symbol of labor unity threatening and called out the army to stand with rifles before the marching workers.

History and Ethnic Relations

Emergence of the Nation. Francisco Morazán led the fight for independence from Spain (achieved in 1821) and resistance to the breakup of Central America (1830). In 1855, North American soldiers of fortune (filibusterers) led by William Walker tried to convert Central America into a United States colony. They held Nicaragua until they were expelled in 1857 by Nicaraguan regular troops and volunteer fighters. In 1860 Walker invaded Honduras, at Trujillo, where he ended up before an army firing squad. United States banana companies dominated Honduran politics after 1911. Fruit companies were able to choose presidents and as late as the 1970s were powerful enough to refuse to pay higher taxes imposed on banana exports by the military government. A 1920 letter by a U.S. fruit company executive describing how easily Honduran politicians could be bribed and dominated is still a source of national embarrassment.

National Identity. Because of the relationship of Honduras with the United States, the national culture often is defined in opposition to that of the United States. Hondurans feel an affinity with other Latin Americans and Central Americans, although this is mixed with fear and resentment of some neighboring countries, especially El Salvador and Nicaragua.

The Spanish conquest was a violent episode of genocide and slavery. It produced a people with blended European, native American, and African ancestry. Many Latin American countries have a similar large ethnic group called mestizos or criollos, but what is unusual about Honduras is that the Spanish-speaking people of mixed ancestry, who make up about 88 percent of the population, proudly call themselves indios (Indians). Hondurans call indigenous peoples indígenas, not indios.

Ethnic Relations. Music, novels, and television shows circulate widely among Spanish-speaking countries and contribute to a sense of Latin culture that transcends national boundaries. Ethnic relations are sometimes strained. For centuries, most indigenous peoples lost their land, and the nation did not value their languages and cultures. The Indian and Garífuna people have organized to insist on their civil and territorial rights.

The Bay Islanders (including those of British decent and those of African descent) have ties with the United States. Because the Islanders speak English, they are able to work as sailors on international merchant ships, and despite their isolation from the national culture, they earn a higher income than other residents.

Arab-Hondurans are descended from Christian Arabs who fled Muslim persecution in the early twentieth century after the breakup of the Ottoman Empire. Many have successful businesses. Some Hispanic-Hondurans envy the economic status of Arab-Hondurans, who are usually called turcos, a name they dislike since they are not of Turkish descent. (Many of the original Arab immigrants carried passports of the Ottoman Empire, whose core was Turkey.)

Urbanism,Architecture, and the Use of Space

In the cities, houses are made of store-bought materials (bricks, cement, etc.), and some of the homes of wealthy people are large and impressive. In the countryside, each ethnic group has a distinct architectural style. Most of the homes of poor rural people are made of local materials, with floors of packed earth, walls of adobe or wattle and daub, and roofs of clay tiles or thatch.

The kitchen is usually a special room outside the house, with a wood fire built on the floor or on a raised platform. Porches are very common, often with one or more hammocks. The porch often runs around the house and sometimes connects the house to the kitchen. When visiting a rural home, one is received on the breezy porch rather than inside the house. The porch is used like the front parlor. The house is often plastered with mud, and people paint designs on it with natural earths of different colors.

A central plaza forms the heart of most towns. Important government buildings face it, as does a Catholic chapel or cathedral. Successful businesses are situated on or near the plaza. People are attracted to their city centers, and some municipal governments have started converting inner-city streets to pedestrian walkways to accommodate the crowds. Plazas are formal parks. People sit on benches under the trees and sometimes chat with friends or strangers. Villages have an informal central place located near a soccer field and a few stores and a school. In the afternoon, some people tie their horses to the front porch of the store, have a soft drink, and watch children play ball.

Food and Economy

Food in Daily Life. Beans and corn tortillas are the mainstays of the diet. The beans are usually fried, and the tortillas are small, thick, and usually handmade; ideally, they are eaten warm. A farm worker's lunch may be little more than a large stack of tortillas, a few spoonfuls of beans, and some salt. The ideal meal includes fried plantains, white cheese, rice, fried meat, a kind of thickened semisweet cream called mantequilla, a scrambled egg, a cabbage and tomato salad or a slice of avocado, and a cup of sweet coffee or a bottled soft drink. These meals are served in restaurants and homes for breakfast, lunch, and dinner year-round. Plantains and manioc are important foods in much of the country, especially the north and the Mosquitia. Diners often have a porch or a door open to the street. Dogs, cats, and chickens wander between the tables, and some people toss them bones and other scraps. There are Chinese restaurants owned by recent immigrants. In the early 1990s, North American fast-food restaurants became popular.

Food Customs at Ceremonial Occasions. Special and holiday foods are an improved version of the typical meal but feature more meat and perhaps more of an emphasis on cream and fried plantains. Christmas food includes torrejas, a white bread soaked in hot syrup, and nacatamales, which are like the Mexican tamales, but are larger and moister with a more gelatinous dough and are wrapped in banana leaves.

Basic Economy. Fifty-four percent of economically active people work in agriculture. Most are smallholder farmers who call themselves campesinos. Because the internal food market is irregular, campesinos try to grow their own maize (corn), beans, and plantains. Once they have achieved that goal, they raise a cash crop. Depending on whether they live in a valley, the mountains, or along the coast and on whether they live near a good road, a campesino household may raise a cash crop of coffee, cattle, cabbage, tomatoes, citrus fruit, maize, beans, or other vegetables. Long-term donations of wheat from the United States have kept food prices low but have provided a disincentive for grain farmers. Some large-scale commercial farmers produce melons, beef, coffee, and shrimp for export.

Land Tenure and Property. Land may be private, communal, cooperative, or national. Private land includes buildings and most of the agricultural and grazing land and some forested land. Communal land usually consists of the forest or rough pasture traditionally used by a rural community. Forest trees are owned by the government even if an individual owns the land. Many smallholders and rural communities do not have clear title to or ownership papers for their land even though their families have worked it for generations.

Cooperatives were formed in the mid-1970s to manage land taken from large landowners under agrarian reform policies. Much of this land is of good quality, and cooperatives can be several hundred acres in size. Most of the members or their parents once worked on large estates that were expropriated, usually by the workers and occasionally with some violence, and often suffered some repression while doing so. These farms are still owned cooperatively, although in almost all cases the farmers found it too difficult to work them collectively, and each household has been assigned land to work on its own within the cooperative's holdings. By 1990, 62,899 beneficiaries of agrarian reform (about 5 percent of the nation, or 10 percent of the rural people) held 906,480 acres of land (364,048 hectares, or over 4 percent of the nation's farmland). In the 1970s and 1980s, wealthy people, especially in the south, were able to hire lawyers to file the paperwork for this land and take it from the traditional owners. The new owners produced export agricultural products, and the former owners were forced to become rural laborers and urban migrants or to colonize the tropical forests in eastern Honduras.

As late as the 1980s there was still national land owned but not managed by the state. Anyone who cleared and fenced the land could lay claim to it. Some colonists carved out farms of fifty acres or more, especially in the eastern forests. By the late 1980s, environmentalists and indigenous people's advocates became alarmed that colonization from the south and the interior would eliminate much of the rain forest and threaten the Tawahka and Miskito peoples. Much of the remaining national land has been designated as national parks, wilderness areas, and reserves for the native peoples.

Commercial Activities. In the 1990s, Koreans, Americans, and other foreign investors opened huge clothing factories in special industrial parks near the large cities. These maquilas employ thousands of people, especially young women. The clothing they produce is exported.

Major Industries. Honduras now produces many factory foods (oils, margarine, soft-drinks, beer), soap, paper, and other items of everyday use.

Trade. Exports include coffee, beef, bananas, melons, shrimp, pineapple, palm oil, timber, and clothing. Half the trade is with the United States, and the rest is with other Central American countries, Europe, Japan, and the rest of Latin America. Cotton is now hardly grown, having been replaced by melon and shrimp farms in southern Honduras. Petroleum, machinery, tools, and more complicated manufactured goods are imported.

Division of Labor. Men do much of the work on small farms. Tortilla making is done by women and takes hours every day, especially if the maize has to be boiled, ground (usually in a metal, hand-cranked grinder), slapped out, and toasted by hand, and if the family is large and eats little else. Campesino children begin playing in the fields with their parents, and between the ages of about six and twelve, this play evolves into work. Children specialize in scaring birds from cornfields with slingshots, fetching water, and carrying a hot lunch from home to their fathers and brothers in the field. Some villagers have specialties in addition to farming, including shopkeeping, buying agricultural products, and shoeing horses. In the cities, job specialization is much like that of other countries, with the exception that many people learn industrial trades (mechanics, baking, shoe repair, etc.) on the job.

Social Stratification

Classes and Castes. Large landholdings and, to a lesser extent, successful businesses generate income for most of the very wealthy. Some of these people, especially in the city of Danlí, consider themselves a kind of aristocracy, with their own social clubs and old adobe mansions downtown. These people import new cars and take foreign vacations.

Educated, professional people and the owners of mid size businesses make up a group with a lifestyle similar to that of the United States middle class. However, some professionals earn only a few hundred dollars a month. They may work several jobs and tend to have old cars and small houses that are often decorated with much care.

Urban workers are often migrants from the countryside or the children of migrants. They tend to live in homes they have built for themselves, gradually improving them over the years. Their earnings may be around $100 a month. They tend to travel by bus.

Campesinos may earn only a few hundred dollars a year, but their lifestyle may be more comfortable than their earnings suggest. They often own land, have horses to ride, and may have a comfortable, if rudimentary home of wood or adobe, often with a large, shady porch. If a household has a few acres of land and if the adults are healthy, these people usually have enough to feed their families.

Symbols of Social Stratification. As in many countries, wealthier men sometimes wear large gold chains around their necks. Urban professionals and workers dress somewhat like their counterparts in northern countries. Rural people buy used clothing and repair each garment many times. These men often wear rubber boots, and the women wear beach sandals. In the late 1980s and early 1990s, many men carried pistols, usually poked barrel-first into the tops of their trousers. By 2000 this custom had become somewhat less common. Many campesinos, commercial farmers, and agricultural merchants carried guns at that time.

There is a subtle difference in accent among the different classes. The highest-status people pronounce words more or less as in standard Spanish, and working-class pronunciation uses a few systematic and noticeable modifications.

Political Life

Government. The most important political offices are the national president, members of congress (diputados ) and city mayors. In addition to the executive branch (a president and a cabinet of ministers) and a unicameral congress, there is a supreme court.

Leadership and Political Officials. Honduras still has the two political parties that emerged in the nineteenth century: the Liberales and the Nacionalistas. The Liberales originally were linked to the business sector, and the Nacionalistas with the wealthy rural landowners, but this difference is fading. Both parties are proUnited States, and pro-business. There is little ideological difference between them. Each is associated with a color (red for Liberals and blue for Nationalists), and the Nationalists have a nickname (los cachurecos which comes from the word cacho, or "horn," and refers to the cow horn trumpet originally used to call people to meetings). People tend to belong to the same party as their parents. Working on political campaigns is an important way of advancing in a party. The party that wins the national elections fires civil servants from the outgoing party and replaces them with its own members. This tends to lower the effectiveness of the government bureaucracy because people are rewarded not for fulfilling their formal job descriptions but for being loyal party members and for campaigning actively (driving around displaying the party flag, painting signs, and distributing leaflets).

Political officials are treated with respect and greeted with a firm handshake, and people try not to take up too much of their time. Members of congress have criminal immunity and can literally get away with murder.

Social Problems and Control. Until the 1990s, civilians were policed by a branch of the army, but this force has been replaced by a civil police force. Most crime tends to be economically motivated. In cities, people do not leave their homes unattended for fear of having the house broken into and robbed of everything, including light bulbs and toilet paper. Many families always leave at least one person home. Revenge killings and blood feuds are common in some parts of the country, especially in the department of Olancho. Police are conspicuous in the cities. Small towns have small police stations. Police officers do not walk a beat in the small towns but wait for people to come to the station and report problems. In villages there is a local person called the regidor, appointed by the government, who reports murders and major crimes to the police or mayor of a nearby town. Hondurans discuss their court system with great disdain. People who cannot afford lawyers may be held in the penitentiary for over ten years without a trial. People who can afford good lawyers spend little time in jail regardless of the crimes they have committed.

Until after the 1980s, crimes committed by members of the armed forces were dismissed out of hand. Even corporals could murder citizens and never be charged in court. In 1991, some military men, including colonels, raped and murdered a university student. Her school and family, the press, and the United States embassy exerted pressure until two men were sent to prison. This event was the start of a movement to modernize and improve the court system.

Military Activity. The Cold War was difficult for Honduras. In the past thirty years, the military has gone through three phases. The military government of the 1970s was populist and promoted land reform and tried to control the banana companies. The governments in the 1980s were nominally civilian, but were dominated by the military. The civilian governments in the 1990s gradually began to win control of the country from the military.

In the 1980s, the United States saw Honduras as a strategic ally in Central America and military aid exceeded two hundred million dollars a year. The army expanded rapidly, and army roadblocks became a part of daily life. Soldiers searched cars and buses on the highways. Some military bases were covers for Nicaraguan contras. In the mid-1990s, the military was concerned about budget cuts. By 2000, the military presence was much more subtle and less threatening.

For several reasons, the Honduran military was less brutal than that of neighboring countries. Soldiers and officers tended to come from the common people and had some sympathies with them. Officers were willing to take United States military aid, but were less keen to slaughter their own people or start a war with Nicaragua.

Social Welfare and Change Programs

The most important social change in the last few years has been the influence of Evangelical Protestant missionaries, who have converted many Hondurans to Pentecostal religions. There are also urban social change agencies, and many that work in the villages. Their fields of activity include soil conservation, gardening, and natural pest control. One of the most important reformers was an agronomist educator-entrepreneur named Elías Sánchez, who had a training farm near Tegucigalpa. Sánchez trained tens of thousands of farmers and extension agents in soil conservation and organic fertilization. Until his death in 2000, he and the people he inspired transformed Honduran agriculture. Farmers stopped using slash-and-burn agriculture in favor of intensive, more ecologically sound techniques.

Nongovernmental Organizations and Other Associations

United States military aid was accompanied by economic aid. Much of this money was disbursed to nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), and during the 1980s there were over two hundred of these groups. About a hundred worked in agricultural programs. CARE, Catholic Relief Services, World Neighbors, and Habitat for Humanity were some of the many international organizations that opened offices in Honduras. By the early 1990s, Honduran biologists and some foreign scientists and activists were able to attract attention to the vast forests, which were often the homes of native peoples and were under threat from logging, colonial invasion and cattle ranching. The Miskito people's NGO, Mopawi, was one of several native people's organizations that attracted funding, forged ties with foreign activists, and were able to reverse destructive development projects. Most native peoples now have at least one NGO that promotes their civil rights. In the large cities there are some organizations that work in specific areas such as street children and family planning. Rural people receive much more attention from NGOs than do the urban poor.

Gender Roles and Statuses

Division of Labor by Gender. Men are more prominent than women in public life, but women have served as judges, big city mayors, trial lawyers, members of congress, cabinet members, and heads of the national police force. Women have been especially active in religious life. To counter the inroads made by Evangelical missionaries, the Catholic Church encourages lay members to receive ecclesiastical training and visit isolated communities, to perform religious services. These people are called celebradores de la palabra ("celebrators of the word"). They hold mass without communion. Many of them are women. Women also manage stores and NGOs and teach at universities. Male-only roles include buying and trucking agricultural products, construction, bus and taxi drivers, and most of the military.

The Relative Status of Women and Men. Honduran people occasionally say that theirs is a machista (macho, sexist) country. This is mostly a stereotype, but some men shout catcalls at women on the street, especially when the men are in groups. There are also cases of sexual harassment of office staff. However, most men are fond of their families, tolerant of their behavior, and sensitive to women, who often have jobs outside the home or run small stores. Adolescents and young adults are not subject to elaborate supervision during courtship.

Marriage,Family, and Kinship

Marriage. Marriage is based on the Western ideal of falling in love. There are few formal rules prohibiting marriage with people of different social backgrounds, although people tend to marry neighbors or people they meet at school or work. Almost everyone eventually marries or lives with someone and has children. Founding a household is a financial struggle for most couples, and so women's earnings are appreciated. Divorce and remarriage are fairly common and are slightly stigmatized. Monogamy is the formal rule, although a middle-aged man who can afford to may set up a separate house with a younger woman. If they find out about the younger women, most wives find the idea disgusting and threatening to the marriage.

Domestic Unit. The ideal household of a couple and their children is not always possible. When young couples cannot afford housing, they may live with their parents until they have several children of their own. As in other Latin American countries, when a couple marries, their new family assumes both of their names. For example, if a woman named María García marries a man named Carlos Martínez, they and their children become the Martínez-García family. In many households, men and women make major decisions together regarding household expenses, children's education, etc. In the cities, many households with only a moderate income include a live-in domestic servant who does the housekeeping.

Inheritance. Inheritance practice varies widely, but in general when a person dies the widow or widower inherits half the property (called the parte conyugal, or "the spouse's part") and the children get the other half, unless a will was made to the contrary. The spouse's part provides economic security for widows and helps preserve farms more or less intact. Sometimes there is a preference for the oldest son to inherit a larger share. There is also a tendency for sons to inherit land and daughters to inherit livestock, furniture, and money.

Kin Groups. In the cities, families tend to spend Sunday afternoon having an elaborate meal with the wife's parents. The ideal is for married children to live near their parents, at least in the same city, if not in the same neighborhood or on a contiguous lot. This is not always possible, but people make an effort to keep in touch with the extended family.

Socialization

Child Rearing and Education. Urban professionals and elites are indulgent toward children, rarely punishing them and allowing them to interrupt conversations. In stores, middle-class shoppers buy things their children plead for. Obedience is not stressed. Bourgeois children grow up with self-esteem and are encouraged to feel happy about their accomplishments.

The urban poor and especially the campesinos encourage children to play in small groups, preferably near where adults are working. Parents are not over protective. Children play in the fields where their parents work, imitating their work, and after age of six or seven they start helping with the farm work. Campesinos expect children to be obedient and parents slap or hit disobedient children. Adults expect three- to four-year-old children to keep up with the family while walking to or from work or shopping, and a child who is told to hurry up and does not may be spanked. Campesino children grow up to be disciplined, long-suffering, and hard working.

Higher Education. Higher education, especially a degree from the United States or Europe, is valued, but such an education is beyond the reach of most people. There are branches of the National University in the major cities, and thousands of people attend school at night, after work. There are also private universities and a national agricultural school and a private one (Zamorano).

Etiquette

A firm handshake is the basic greeting, and people shake hands again when they part. If they chat a bit longer after the last handshake, they shake hands again just as they leave. Among educated people, when two women greet or when a man greets a woman, they clasp their right hands and press their cheeks together or give a light kiss on the cheek. Campesinos shake hands. Their handshakes tend to be soft. Country women greeting a person they are fond of may touch the right hand to the other person's left elbow, left shoulder, or right shoulder (almost giving a hug), depending on how happy they are to see a person. Men sometimes hug each other (firm, quick, and with back slapping), especially if they have not seen each other for a while and are fond of each other. This is more common in the cities. Campesinos are a little more inhibited with body language, but city people like to stand close to the people they talk to and touch them occasionally while making a point in a conversation. People may look strangers in the eye and smile at them. People are expected to greet other office workers as they pass in the hall even if they have already greeted them earlier that day. On country roads people say good-bye to people they pass even if they do not know each other. In crowded airports and other places where people have to wait in a long, slow line, some people push, shove, cut in front of others, go around the line, and attract attention to themselves to get served first.

Religion

Religious Beliefs. Almost all Hondurans believe in God and Jesus Christ, though sometimes in a vague way. In a traditionally Catholic country, many people have joined Evangelical Protestant churches. People usually keep their religious beliefs to themselves but Catholics may wear a crucifix or religious medal around their necks. Many people have a sense of divine destiny. Accidental death is attributed to the will of God rather than to a seat belt that was not buckled or another physical cause. The upper classes are still predominantly Catholic, while many of the urban poor are now Evangelical. Newspapers carry stories of witchcraft, writing about people who were ill until a healer sucked a toad or a sliver of glass from their bodies.

Religious Practitioners. The Catholic Church is the national religion, as stated in the Constitution. However, the liberal reforms of the 1820s led to the confiscation of Church property, the closing of the seminary, and a great decline in the number and morale of the Catholic clergy. By the 1960s mass was only heard regularly in the larger towns. At that time, foreign clergy, including French Canadians, began revitalizing the Honduran Church. Many priests supported campesino movements in the 1970s, and some were killed for it by the military. In the 1980s the bishops were strong enough to play a key role in resisting pressure from the United States for Honduras to go to war with Nicaragua. Various Protestant churches have been active in Honduras since the early twentieth century, especially since the 1970s, and have gained many converts. The Evangelical clergy is an informal lay clergy for the most part and small Pentecostal chapels are common in villages and in poorer neighborhoods in the cities.

Rituals and Holy Places. Most Catholics go to church only on special occasions, such as Christmas and funerals. Evangelicals may go to a small chapel, often a wood shack or a room in a house, for prayer meetings and Bible readings every night. These can be important havens from the pressures of being impoverished in a big city.

There is a minor ritual called cruzando la milpa ("crossing the cornfield") practiced in the Department of El Paraíso in which a magico-religious specialist, especially one who is a twin, eliminates a potentially devastating corn pest such as an inch-worm or caterpillar. The specialist recites the Lord's Prayer while sprinkling holy water and walking from one corner to the other of the cornfield in a cross pattern. This person makes little crosses of corn leaves or caterpillars and buries them in four spots in the field.

Death and the Afterlife. Beliefs about the afterlife are similar to the general Western tradition. An additional element is the concept of the hejillo, (standard Spanish: hijillo ) a kind of mystic contagion that comes from a dead human body, whether death was caused by age, disease, or violence. People who must touch the body wash carefully as soon as possible to purify themselves.

Medicine and Health Care

Sickness or an accident is a nightmare for people in the countryside and the urban poor. It may take hours to get a patient to a hospital by traveling over long dirt roads that often lack public transportation. Doctors may be unable to do much for a patient if the patient's family cannot afford to buy medicine. If the patient is an adult, the household may have to struggle to make a living until he or she recovers. Some traditional medical practitioners use herbal medicines and set broken bones.

Secular Celebrations

Independence Day falls on 15 September and features marches and patriotic speeches. Labor Day, celebrated on 1 May, includes marches by workers. During Holy Week (the week before Easter), everyone who can goes to the beach or a river for picnics and parties. On the Day of the Cross (Día de la Cruz ) in May in the countryside, people decorate small wooden crosses with flowers and colored paper and place the crosses in front of their homes in anticipation of the start of the rainy season. Christmas and the New Year are celebrated with gift giving, festive meals, dancing, and fireworks.

The Arts and Humanities

Support for the Arts. Some art is publicly supported through the Ministry of Culture, as well as through sales of tickets, CDs, etc. Some artists also have day jobs.

Literature. There is a modest tradition of serious literary fiction. The novel Prisión Verde (Green Prison ) by Ramón Amaya is perhaps the best known work of fiction. It describes the sufferings of workers on an early twentieth century banana plantation.

Graphic Arts. There is a Honduran school of impressionist painting whose favorite themes include village street scenes. This style was first developed by Antonio Velázquez of the historic mining village of San Antonio de Oriente, department of Francisco Morazán, in the 1950s. Velázquez was the barber at the nearby agricultural college at Zamorano. He was self-taught, and Hondurans refer to his style as "primitivist." Newspaper cartoons are popular and important for social critique. The cartoonist Dario Banegas has a talent for hilarious drawings that express serious commentary.

Performance Arts. There are various theater groups in San Pedro Sula and Tegucigalpa, of which the most important is the National Theater of Honduras (TNH), formed in Tegucigalpa in 1965. Its directors have been faculty members of various public schools and universities. Other groups include University Theater of Honduras (TUH) and the Honduran Community of Theater Actors (COMHTE), formed in 1982. These groups have produced various good plays. Honduras also has a National School of Fine Arts, a National Symphonic Orchestra, and various music schools. There are a handful of serious musicians, painters, and sculptors in Honduras, but the most well-known group of artists may be the rock band Banda Blanca, whose hit single "Sopa de Caracol" (Conch Soup) was based on Garífuna words and rhythms. It topped Latin music charts in the early 1990s. There are still some performances of folk music at fiestas and other events, especially in the country. The accordion, guitar, and other string instruments are popular.

The State of the Physical and Social Sciences

Perhaps the most highly developed social science is the archaeological study of the ancient Maya at the site of Copán and elsewhere in western Honduras. Much of this work is done by foreigners, but many Hondurans also conduct research. Among the applied sciences, the best known institution is the Pan-American School of Agriculture (Zamorano), near Tegucigalpa, where scientists and students conduct agricultural research. Zamorano attracts an international student body and faculty and offers the best practical education in commercial agriculture in Latin America. The Honduran Agricultural Research Foundation (FHIA) on the north coast, was once a research center for the banana industry. It is now supported by the Honduran and United States governments and other donors and conducts research on tropical crops.

Bibliography

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Becerra, Longino. Evolución Histórica de Honduras, 1999.

Beneditt, Leonardo, Ismael Zepeda, JoséAntonio Montoya et al. Enciclopedia Multimedia Honduras Nuestro País, 1999.

Bentley, Jeffery W. Diccionario Campesino Hondureño, in press, probable date of publication 2001.

Chapman, Anne. Masters of Animals: Oral Traditions of the Tolupan Indians, Honduras, 1978.

. Los Hijos del Copal y la Candela, 1992.

Coelho, Ruy Galvão de Andrade. Los Negros Caribes de Honduras, 1995.

Durham, W. H. Scarcity and Survival in Central America: The Ecological Origins of the Soccer War, 1979.

Fash, William L. & Ricardo Agurcia Fasquelle. Visión del Pasado Maya, 1996.

Gamero, Manuel. "Iberoamérica y el Mundo Actual." In A. Serrano, O. Joya, M. Martínez, and M. Gamero (eds.), Honduras Ante el V Centenario del Descubrimiento de América, 1991.

Joya, Olga. "Identidad Cultural y Nacionalidad en Honduras." In A. Serrano, O. Joya, M. Martínez, and M. Gamero (eds.), Honduras Ante el V Centenario del Descubrimiento de América, 1991.

Martínez Perdomo, Adalid. La Fuerza de la Sangre Chortí, 1997.

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Jeffrey W. Bentley

Honduras

views updated May 29 2018

Honduras

In 1823 the short-lived Mexican Empire, which had incorporated Central America after the rupture with Spain, collapsed. The failure of the Spanish and Mexican empires in rapid succession prompted Honduras, in many ways the poorest of Spain's former American provinces, to join the United Provinces of Central America. With fewer than 150,000 inhabitants widely dispersed in small villages tucked away in isolated mountain valleys, Honduras seemed more an administrative designation than a nation in gestation. Cattlemen running large herds on the savannas of Olancho in the east and on the coastal plains of Choluteca in the south had little in common, or contact with the indigenous and mestizo peasant smallholders in the western borderlands with El Salvador and Guatemala, or with the gangs of mahogany cutters on the North Coast. Treacherous mule tracks winding over mountains and through rivers comprised the only links among these diverse communities. Municipal rivalry between Comayagua, the run-down seat of provincial government during the colonial era, and Tegucigalpa, an insurgent mining and commercial town thirty miles to the south, further divided the province. Nevertheless, a sufficient sense of national identity had taken root; in time the province became the nation of Honduras.

As Spanish, Mexican, and, somewhat later, Central American dominions successively fell away due to circumstances largely beyond their control, the prospect of national independence, ready or not, reverberated across Honduras. These events inflamed the longstanding rivalry between Comayagua and Tegucigalpa. Men of means in both these dusty towns and throughout Honduras—generally government bureaucrats, soldiers, lawyers, church officials, mine operators, retail merchants linked to mercantile houses in Guatemala and Belize, and cattle ranchers and exporters—tried to discern the implications of this devolution of power to the province and took whatever steps they deemed expedient to protect their interests. Elites in Tegucigalpa briefly tried to end their subordination to Comayagua by becoming a separate province within the Central American confederation.

Soon, however, events in the neighboring provinces of Guatemala, El Salvador, and Nicaragua began to dictate the Honduran political agenda. Two native sons, José Cecilio del Valle, a poor but ambitious lawyer and self-taught philosopher originally from Choluteca, and Francisco Morazán, an equally ambitious military and political man of humble Tegucigalpa origins, quickly emerged as leaders, respectively, of the Conservatives and Liberals in the confederation. Both were elected president of Central America: Morazán in 1830 and again in 1834 after del Valle, elected earlier that same year, died before taking office.

These early struggles between Liberals and Conservatives kept the provincial government at Comayagua in a constant uproar as one provisional head of state succeeded another, but the rest of Honduras was generally spared serious upheaval. Morazán's supporters in Comayagua sought to impose on Honduras the variant of liberalism then in vogue in Guatemala and El Salvador, which advocated the disestablishment of the Roman Catholic Church. Such enlightened iconoclasm goaded Conservatives to revolt. As Morazán's impending defeat became evident in 1838, Conservatives took control and helped dismantle the Federation by declaring Honduras an independent republic on October 26, 1838.

CONSERVATIVE HEGEMONY (1838–1875)

During the subsequent forty years, Conservatives, such as Francisco Ferrera (1840–1847), Juan Lindo Zelaya (1847–1852), Santos Guardiola (1885–1862), and José María Medina (1864–1871), elaborated a republican facsimile of the colonial regime. The resurrected and renovated colonial institutions were familiar to, and aptly suited, the mestizo and indigenous peasant majority in Honduras. Nonetheless, unreconstructed Liberals, such as Trinidad Cabañas (1852–1855) intransigently refused to abandon the liberal agenda. All too often, the ideological struggles degenerated into personal feuds between rival caudillos (warlords) and their small, poorly armed bands of retainers. As a result, endemic civil anarchy and widespread social banditry persisted year after year.

That these conflicts were often succored by partisans in Guatemala, El Salvador, and Nicaragua certainly helped to perpetuate them; and diplomats from beyond the isthmus meddled as well as exacerbated them. Frederick Chatfield, the first British consul to Central America (1834–1852), made a career of gunboat diplomacy to advance what he deemed to be Britain's interests. The British repeatedly took and abandoned the Bay Islands until 1859, and they bombarded and occupied North Coast ports in 1849 and again in 1873 to compel loan repayments. At mid-century, the United States, in the person of amateur archaeologist Ephraim George Squier, briefly challenged Chatfield over, among other things, coaling rights to Tigre Island in the Gulf of Fonseca. Even private filibusters contributed to the domestic turmoil in Honduras: most notably the Tennessee soldier of fortune William Walker, who in the aftermath of his astonishing saga in Nicaragua, tried to recoup his dream of empire in Honduras but ended up before a firing squad instead.

Meanwhile, Forty-Niners seeking passage to California inspired Squier to promote an inter-oceanic railway across Honduras from Puerto Cortés to the Gulf of Fonseca. Conflicting survey reports, wildly varying estimates of costs, and a soft financial market led Squier to abandon the project. Alternate routes across Panama and the continental United States soon made a Honduran interoceanic railway virtually irrelevant to the needs of world trade. Honduran elites, however, had been beguiled by the dream of opening up their nation's undeveloped hinterland by means of an interoceanic railroad. In the 1860s, President José María Medina borrowed enough money from London bankers to construct a sixty-mile section of narrow-gauge track from Puerto Cortés through and beyond San Pedro Sula. This short spur of track did little to alter the primary means of transportation for most Hondurans from what it had been since the earliest colonial days—feet, horses, and mules; but the enormous foreign debt Honduras incurred hovered over the country for almost a century and thwarted almost every bid to coax foreign capital there.

Despite the impediments of political turmoil, rural isolation, and the lack of modern means of transportation, the ordinary Honduran campesino, though poor, may actually have fared better than his counterparts elsewhere in Central America. The Honduran elites, on the other hand, were much poorer than their Central American peers. Because the peasants lived in widely scattered villages isolated by rugged mountain ranges and had ample land to cultivate, the elites found it impossible to mobilize them for export agricultural production. Moreover, widespread folk participation in diversified exports—livestock, hides and pelts, precious metals, logwood, indigo, sarsaparilla, rum, and tobacco—supplemented peasants' subsistence but never provided a large surplus for the elite.

THE NEW LIBERALISM (1875–1903)

In the early 1870s, a new kind of liberalism dedicated to order and material progress had replaced conservative doctrines in Guatemala and El Salvador. The new Guatemalan strongman, Justo Rufino Barrios, in order to secure his eastern flank against cross-border raids from sanctuaries in Honduras, masterminded the overthrow of Conservative President Medina and his replacement by a handpicked fellow Liberal. Barrios initially chose Céleo Arias (1872–1874), but when Arias was unable to maintain order, he backed Ponciano Leiva. When Leiva (1874–1876) also failed to quell dissent, Barrios replaced him too.

The third replacement, Marco Aurelio Soto (1876–1883), although a Honduran, had risen to high office in Guatemala under Barrios. As Barrios's disciple, Soto espoused the new liberal gospel of rapid economic progress and absolute social and political obedience. Soto and his chief adviser, Ramón Rosa, quickly restored order, wrote a new constitution, and drafted numerous legal codes. With order restored, they turned their attention to progress. By 1880, Soto had tied all the important towns and many small villages into a telegraph grid and connected it to international cable networks in the United States and Europe. He also began construction of the Southern Highway, a cart road designed to link Tegucigalpa, the newly designated capital, to the port of San Lorenzo on the Gulf of Fonseca.

In 1880, Soto and a New York export-import merchant established the New York and Honduras Rosario Mining Company to work an abandoned silver mine the president owned. The merchant's son, Washington S. Valentine, took charge of the company's operation at San Juancito, a few miles northeast of Tegucigalpa. The Rosario turned out to be the richest silver mine between Mexico and Bolivia, and a mining boom soon gripped the Honduran Pacific Slope. Foreign capitalists, primarily North American, formed more than one hundred companies to rework abandoned colonial silver and gold mines using modern techniques and imported machinery. Despite staunch support from Soto and his successor, Luis Bográn (1883–1891), almost all of the concerns failed before they produced any bullion—Rosario being a singular exception. Anemic capitalization, incompetent management, inappropriate technology, and steadily falling silver prices conspired to snuff the boom. Although mining failed to realize the Hondurans' high expectations, it did stimulate highway construction, wholesale and retail commerce, and a range of small-scale industries.

Honduras
Population:7,483,763 (2007 est.)
Area:43,278 sq mi
Official language:Spanish
Languages:Spanish, English, Amerindian languages
National currency:lempira (HNL)
Principal religions:Roman Catholic, 97%; Protestant, 3%
Ethnicity:mestizo (mixed Amerindian and European), 90%; Amerindian, 7%; black, 2%; white, 1%
Capital:Tegucigalpa (est. pop. 1,007,000 in 2005)
Other urban centers:El Progresso, La Ceiba, San Pedro Sula
Annual rainfall:95 inches in the north, 33 inches in Tegucigalpa
Principal geographical features:Mountains: Central American Cordillera; Volcanic Highlands include the peak Las Minas (9,417 ft)
Rivers: Choluteca, Goascorán, Nacaome, Patuca, Ulúa
Lakes: Yojoa
Islands: Islas de la Bahía
Economy:GDP per capita: $3,100 (2006 est.)
Principal products and exports:Agricultural: bananas, coffee, shrimp
Manufacturing: assembly plants, paper, textiles, wood products
Government:Independence from Spain, 1821. Constitution, 1982; frequently amended. and is governed as a democratic constitutional republic. The president is popularly elected to a 4-year term, and is both chief of state and head of government. The 128-seat National Congress is the legislature, its members are elected in proportion to the votes their party's presidential candidate receives and serve 4-year terms. Cabinet appointed by the president. 18 departments.
Armed forces:Army: 8,300
Navy: 1,400
Air force: 2,300
Paramilitary: 8,000 Public Security officers
Reserves: 60,000
Transportation:Rail: 434 mi
Ports: Puerto Castilla, Puerto Cortes, San Lorenzo, Tela
Roads: 1,724 mi paved; 6,728 mi unpaved
Airports: 12 paved runway and 100 unpaved runways airports; international airports at Tegucigalpa and San Pedro Sula.
Media:Major newspapers include El Heraldo, La Prensa, La Tribuna, and Tiempo. There are 241 AM, 53 FM, and 11 television stations.
Literacy and education:Total literacy rate: 80% (2001)
Public education is free, and required for children ages 6 to 12. The National Autonomous University of Honduras is the most prominent of several universities in Honduras.

Much of what was accomplished during the decade and a half of sustained peace under Soto and Bográn was undone during a bloody civil war that erupted soon after Bográn left office. Near the end of his first term in 1887, Bográn had organized the Progressive Party to withstand former president Céleo Arias's challenge to his re-election later that year. In the next election, former president Ponciano Leiva, the Progressive Party's candidate, was challenged by Dr. Policarpo Bonilla, leader of the Liberal Party since Céleo Arias's death. Leiva won the openly rigged election, but after a little more than a year (1891–1893), he was edged out of office and eventually replaced by his minister of war, Domingo Vásquez (1893–1894).

Vásquez's heavy-handed tyranny soon provoked rebellion by Liberal exiles in Nicaragua headed by Policarpo Bonilla, General Manuel Bonilla (no relation to Policarpo), and General Terencio Sierra—all future presidents of Honduras. Although Vásquez destroyed the initial invasion force, a second assault, generously supported by fellow Nicaraguan Liberal, José Santos Zelaya, dislodged Vásquez.

The victorious invaders, at Policarpo Bonilla's insistence, immediately convened a constituent assembly to rewrite the Honduran constitution according to liberal precepts. With his personal prestige at an all-time high, Bonilla easily won election as president. During his term (1895–1899), he relentlessly centralized power in the executive branch, embedded his surprisingly advanced ideas of public administration and jurisprudence in revisions of the country's legal codes, did what he could to heal the ravages of the civil war, and tried to put the country's economy on a sound footing. Bonilla was a fanatical proponent of disciplined political parties that offered voters clearly distinct choices. He also believed that regularly held democratic elections for single-term presidents would solve the bulk of Honduras's political problems. In keeping with his convictions, Bonilla refused to run for a second term. Unfortunately, his popularly elected successor, Terencio Sierra (1899–1903), shared little of Bonilla's vision for Honduras. Instead, he spent the bulk of his administration laying the groundwork for perpetuating his power.

THE BANANA REPUBLIC (1903–1956)

By 1900, bananas had already emerged as the nation's most important export product. Schooner and tramp steamer captains had begun to visit North Coast ports to purchase bananas for sale in New Orleans and other Gulf Coast cities. Although exports gradually rose during the late nineteenth century, large-scale commercial banana production lagged until a complex set of technological innovations were developed. After 1900 North American banana pioneers—the most prominent in Honduras being the Vacarro Brothers of New Orleans, founders of Standard Fruit Company at La Ceiba, and Samuel "the Banana Man" Zemurray, founder of Cuyamel Fruit Company and a later director of United Fruit Company—parlayed their entrepreneurial skills and access to investment capital into banana empires featuring vast plantations, fleets of cargo ships, precision marketing networks, and state-of-the-art radio communication systems. By 1930 United Fruit and Standard Fruit had made Honduras the leading banana exporter in the world, at 30 million bunches a year. Large numbers of Hondurans left their highland villages to work on the plantations, thus shifting the population center from the Pacific Slope to the North Coast. By 1940, however, the Great Depression, World War II, and Sigatoka and Panama banana plant diseases pushed Honduras behind Ecuador in production.

This dynamic banana economy further destabilized an already precarious political system. Because the banana companies needed land grants, favorable labor laws, and permission to build railroads and other facilities from the government, they increasingly meddled in Honduran political affairs. At first, however, they received spontaneous support from the government. The 1903 electoral contest, which ended with Manuel Bonilla getting the largest number of votes but not a majority, was thrown into the National Congress. When the Congress gave the election to a rival, General Bonilla revolted and took power. During his first term (1903–1907), he awarded generous concessions of every stripe to the fledgling banana companies, but his repression of opposition politicians and closure of the National Congress in 1904 ultimately led to his ouster by militant Liberals led by General Miguel R. Dávila.

President Dávila (1907–1911), despite the protection of the 1907 Central American Peace Treaties and the attendant Court of Justice, was plagued by repeated cross-border raids by political foes. His downfall, however, came when Samuel Zemurray financed an invasion by former president Manuel Bonilla in order to prevent Dávila from adopting a debt settlement plan that would have given vast power to mining magnate Washington S. Valentine and financier J. P. Morgan. Bonilla's term (1911–1913) was cut short by his death; he was succeeded by his vice president, Francisco Bertrand (1913–1919).

Bertrand was acceptable to both his fellow countrymen and the banana companies until he tried to engineer the election of his brother-in-law as president in 1919. The most popular opposition leader, General Rafael López Gutiérrez, led the resistance and ultimately won the presidency (1920–1924). The seventeen uprisings that occurred during López Gutiérrez's term were a prelude to the civil war that erupted when General Tiburcio Carías Andino won the 1923 election without a majority. Despite the presence of U.S. ships on both coasts and marines in North Coast towns and in the capital, much blood flowed before U.S. State Department special envoy Sumner Welles finally persuaded the rival factions to meet aboard the USS Milwaukee anchored off Amapala in the Gulf of Fonseca.

New elections were held, and Dr. Miguel Paz Baraona, Carías's running mate in 1923, was voted in. President Paz Baraona (1925–1929) temporarily reduced political tensions, managed to reschedule the massive Honduran foreign debt by negotiating the Lyall Plan with Great Britain, and held free elections at the end of his term in 1928, in which the opposition Liberal candidate Dr. Vincent Mejia Colindres (1928–1932) won. Mejia Colindres, in turn, also held free elections, in which the National Party leader, General Carías, emerged victorious, retaining power by various stratagems until 1948.

By 1924, the year of the last major political upheaval before mid-century, the United Fruit and Standard Fruit Companies had absorbed their lesser competition and had acquired virtually every concession they might need for the foreseeable future. Moreover, because of large profits, they were able to substitute economic pressure for strong-arm tactics. Still, the sharp plunge in employment and revenues that accompanied the Great Depression, the ravages of banana diseases, and World War II produced severe strains that would have automatically led to political disorder in earlier times. Carías (1933–1948), however, was able to surmount these difficulties (while meticulously repaying British bondholders on schedule). He even brought a modicum of prosperity to his country, put the national budget in the black, built many new roads in rural areas, and inaugurated air transport service to many otherwise isolated towns and villages. The cost, however, was high. The Carías dictatorship shelved democratic practices for the duration, reduced the National Congress to a rubber stamp, and harshly repressed labor organizations on behalf of the banana and mining companies.

In the mid-1940s, university students, taking their cue from successful student-led coups in neighboring dictatorships, began agitating for a return to democracy, and women protested outside the presidential palace seeking the release of political prisoners. Carías, finally bowing to these demands and to pressures from the United States, announced that he would not run again in 1948. He did, however, handpick his successor, Juan Manuel Gálvez Durán (1949–1954).

Despite his long association with the Carías dictatorship, Gálvez granted opposition parties and labor unions considerable latitude to organize and mobilize support. On the eve of the 1954 elections, U.S. Central Intelligence Agency agents in Honduras launched a covert operation against the leftist government of Guatemala, and more than fifty thousand North Coast workers went on strike against the United Fruit and Standard Fruit Companies. In these unsettled conditions, none of the three candidates—General Carías for the National Party, Abraham William Calderón for the National Reformist Movement, and physician Ramón Villeda Morales for the Liberal Party—received a majority. Gálvez, meanwhile, had suffered a heart attack and turned the government over to his vice president, Julio Lozano Díaz. Lozano declared himself chief of state and cobbled together an interim government with initial support from all three candidates in the 1954 election. But when it later became clear that Lozano intended to prolong his stay indefinitely, the small professional military founded by Carías acted on its own for the first time and ejected Lozano in October 1956.

MILITARY DOMINANCE (1956–1990)

The military junta, increasingly dominated by the head of the air force, Colonel Oswaldo López Arellano, negotiated a peace accord between the Liberals and Nationals in preparation for calling a constituent assembly to elect a civilian president for a six-year term. The junta also demanded that the new constitution guarantee the armed forces' political autonomy. The assembly elected the Liberal Villeda Morales, the candidate with the largest vote total in 1954. During his term (1957–1962), Villeda Morales worked to implement the Alliance for Progress, the Kennedy administration's plan to aid modernization and economic growth in Latin America. Labor unions prospered, and peasants began to acquire land through a small, government-sponsored agrarian reform which made the banana companies and the traditional landed elite nervous. Rapid population growth and the expansion of export agriculture (cotton, sugar, beef) since the 1940s had created a large landless population to which Villeda Morales promised further relief. When the Liberal Party chose as its candidate for the next elections Modesto Rodas Alvarado, a firebrand who pledged to restore civilian control over the armed forces, López seized power in October 1963, sending Villeda into exile. The Honduran military, in one guise or another, would remain the country's hegemonic political actor for the next thirty years.

In 1960 the Central American nations had formed a common market to circumvent the obstacles to economic development inherent in their small, separate domestic markets. Many Hondurans, however, later resented the fact that more aggressive Salvadoran entrepreneurs took advantage of new cross-border investment and trade opportunities to become a powerful force in the Honduran economy, the least developed in the region. In addition, shortly after López had himself named to a six-year term as president (1965–1971), acute economic problems were blamed on 300,000 Salvadoran peasants who had moved into rural Honduras because of extreme land scarcity in their own country. The continuing economic crisis and rising tensions with El Salvador over Honduran mistreatment of its citizens began to erode López's support within the armed forces and the National Party. His fall from power was postponed, however, when the so-called Soccer War erupted in mid-1969. The Honduran air force acquitted itself with distinction, but the Organization of American States intervened before the superior Salvadoran ground forces could make serious inroads into Honduras. The war stimulated popular support for the armed forces, but aggravated already poor economic conditions.

In 1971, López stood aside briefly to allow an elected bipartisan civilian government under National Party politician Ramón Ernesto Cruz to take office. When his government soon proved ineffective at controlling increasing social unrest, the military removed it in late 1972. The formerly conservative López returned to power at the head of a populist coalition composed of peasant organizations, labor unions, and progressive North Coast business groups. His government redistributed land to thousands of peasant families and increased the role of the state in the economy. However, after López was ousted in 1975 over an alleged United Brands bribe for slashing the export tax on bananas, right-wing military factions allied with the National Party and conservative economic interests regained influence under Colonel Juan Melgar Castro (1975–1978) and later General Policarpo Paz García (1978–1982).

The collapse of the Nicaraguan Somoza regime in 1979 helped the United States to persuade the Honduran military to return to the barracks and allow democratic elections. The Liberal Party won both the subsequent constitutional assembly elections (1980) and the presidential contest (1981), but the armed forces remained politically dominant. The new civilian president, Dr. Roberto Suazo Córdoba (1982–1986), formed a political alliance with armed forces chief General Gustavo Álvarez Martínez, a fanatical anticommunist trained in Argentina. Vastly increased U.S. military aid expanded and modernized the armed forces while the Contras, the anti-Sandinista rebels organized and armed by the United States, took up residence on the border with revolutionary Nicaragua. Until his ouster in an internal military dispute in 1984, Álvarez presided over a brutal "dirty war" against anyone suspected of radical political sympathies in Honduras. The military employed torture, secret prisons, and political assassinations without any protest from Suazo or the United States.

Suazo's democratically-elected successor, Liberal José Azcona del Hoyo (1986–1990), was less closely tied to the military, but he was too weak to challenge its political hegemony or address widespread corruption within the officer corps as Honduras became a major transhipment point for Colombian cocaine. The military left economic policymaking to the civilian authorities, but neither Suazo nor Azcona proved able to halt the economy's deterioration despite heavy financial assistance from the United States. Fiscal and trade deficits mounted, although military spending continued to rise.

THE MILITARY IN POLITICAL DECLINE (1990–1999)

Rafael Callejas (1990–1994) was the first National Party candidate to win the presidency since elections were resumed in the early 1980s. His victory represented the first time one of the nation's two principal competing political parties had replaced the other democratically and without violence in almost sixty years. Nevertheless, the conservative Callejas was a close friend of the armed forces, which had no plan to reduce its prerogatives. Instead, he concentrated on an ambitious economic reform program demanded by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the United States Embassy. Callejas reduced the nation's chronic fiscal deficit, liberalized trade, and convinced foreign entrepreneurs to invest in new maquiladora assembly industries on the North Coast. The Honduran economy improved although corruption allegations and politically-motivated overspending late in Callejas's term tarnished his economic record.

The challenge to the military was launched not by Callejas but by United States ambassador Cresencio Arcos. The end of the Cold War and the winding down of the armed conflicts in Central America reduced the Honduran military's importance to the United States. What had once been seen in Washington as a valuable anticommunist ally was now perceived as an expensive obstacle to democracy. American military aid fell dramatically, and Ambassador Arcos became one of the armed forces' fiercest critics. This abrupt, unexpected reversal of United States policy encouraged a wide range of Hondurans to mobilize against the military's power and prerogatives. Human rights organizations, unions, and students joined with the Roman Catholic Church and much of the private sector to demand an end to the armed forces' privileges. Honduran journalists added fuel to the fire by publishing a steady stream of articles implicating high-ranking military officers in corruption and other serious crimes.

Increasing political pressure ultimately forced a reluctant Callejas to appoint an independent human rights commissioner to investigate the military's 1980s suppression of opposition and an Ad Hoc Commission for Institutional Reform to examine allegations of corruption and abuse of power within the military's police branch. When these investigations concluded, the human rights commissioner's report provided evidence of the armed forces involvement in 184 specific cases of torture and political assassination, and the Ad Hoc Commission recommended that the notorious police investigative service be disbanded.

The Honduran military's decline accelerated rapidly under the two Liberal Party presidents who followed Callejas in office. Carlos Roberto Reina (1994–1998), former president of the Inter-American Court of Human Rights, was a politician from the left of the Liberal Party whose appointment to head the foreign ministry had been blocked by the military high command some years before. After he was inaugurated, Reina immediately implemented the Ad Hoc Commission's recommendations. In spite of strong military objections, he then persuaded the National Congress to pass amendments to the constitution that abolished entirely the military's control over the national police and ended obligatory military service. No longer able to force young Honduran men into the armed forces, the military shrank to about one-third its former size by the time Reina left office. In addition, with United States support, Reina reduced the military budget and removed the nation's telecommunications system and other lucrative public institutions from armed forces control.

Reina's administration continued the program of economic reform begun under Callejas. After a series of disruptive strikes, Reina was forced to make concessions to organized labor, but the Liberal government still met most IMF fiscal targets. Bouyed by surging maquiladora exports and increasing coffee prices, the Honduran economy was growing respectably by the end of Reina's term.

Liberal Carlos Flores Facussé (1998–2002) completed the subordination of the armed forces to civilian authority. The wealthy North Coast engineer and newspaper publisher passed a landmark constitutional reform that rescinded the formal political autonomy first granted the military in the 1957 Constitution. He appointed a civilian defense minister over military opposition and abolished the independent position of armed forces chief as well as the Superior Council of the Armed Forces, the military's collegial decision-making body. When resentment against these measures surfaced within the armed forces, Flores dismissed the armed forces chief of staff and a number of other high-ranking individuals and replaced them with officers willing to accept civilian control without question.

A TROUBLED DEMOCRACY (1999–)

The subordination of the once all-powerful Honduran military to civilian democratic control by 1999 was a major achievement. Hondurans could also be proud of the institutionalization of a system of free national elections during the 1980s and 1990s. Nevertheless, Honduras's new democracy was marred by poverty, corruption, and rising crime.

International financial institutions generally praised the economic management skills of Liberal presidents Reina and Flores as well as their National Party successor, former Central Bank head Ricardo Maduro (2002–2006). Flores spent most of his term rebuilding the country after Hurricane Mitch in 1998 destroyed the entire banana crop and most of the nation's roads and bridges. The Honduran economy recovered under Stanford-educated economist Ricardo Maduro on the strength of rising agricultural export prices, the success of the maquiladora sector, and mounting remittances (US$2.4 billion by 2006) from Hondurans living in the United States. The benefits of renewed economic growth, however, were distributed very unevenly, leaving most Hondurans mired in poverty. Per capita income remained under US$900 in 2006, and almost two thirds of the Honduran population of 7.3 million continued to live on less than two dollars a day. Taxes on elite and middle-class Honduras were too light to fund robust social programs to aid the poor urban majority or to restart the rural agrarian reform halted by Callejas.

Although corruption allegations against the Reina, Flores, and Maduro administrations were less serious than those that had been directed at the Callejas government, global monitoring organizations such as Transparency International judged Honduras to be one of the most corrupt countries in Latin America. Bribery and embezzlement scandals were common, as most Honduran politicians at all levels still viewed political office more as a prize to be exploited for personal gain than an opportunity to serve the public. Few corruption cases ever came to trial.

By the mid-1990s, many Hondurans began to view violent crime as the nation's number-one problem. Rates of robbery, assault, extortion, kidnapping, car theft, and homicide all exploded during the 1990s, especially in Tegucigalpa and San Pedro Sula. Many of these trends were associated with the arrival in Central America of the Los Angeles-based MS-13 (Mara Salvatrucha) and 18th Street youth gangs. These rival organizations took root after the United States deported thousands of Central American-born gang members to the region. Both gangs recruited aggressively in Honduras; by 2005, youth gangs encompassed an estimated 35,000 to 70,000 members. These new gangs also distributed narcotics for more established criminal organizations in the region. With only 7,500 poorly equipped, poorly trained, and often corrupt police officers, Honduran authorities were overwhelmed by rising crime.

President Maduro, who lost his own son in a kidnap attempt, instituted a hard-line zero-tolerance program that made gang membership a felony, increased resources for public security, and committed the army to the battle against crime. His policy resulted in the imprisonment of hundreds of gang members and led thousands of others to remove their tattoos and alter their style of dress. Analysts disagreed about the impact of Maduro's approach on crime rates, and the public security issue dominated the next presidential campaign. Liberal rancher Manuel "Mel" Zelaya (2006–), who narrowly won that contest, launched a new assault on crime early in his term that mobilized the country's large corps of private security guards to assist the police and army. He also promised social reforms to address the causes of crime as he developed closer relations with left-leaning governments in Latin America. Nonetheless, crime rates appeared to increase during Zelaya's first year in office.

See alsoAlliance for Progress; Álvarez Martínez, Gustavo; Azcona Hoyo, José Simón; Bertrand, Francisco; Bonilla, Policarpo; Bonilla Chirinos, Manuel; Cabañas, José Trinidad; Callejas Romero, Rafael Leonardo; Carías Andino, Tiburcio; Chatfield, Frederick; Comayagua; Contras; Cruz Ucles, Ramón Ernesto; Dávila, Miguel R; Drugs and Drug Trade; Ferrera, Francisco; Gálvez, Juan Manuel; Guardiola, Santos; López Arellano, Oswaldo; Lozano Díaz, Julio; Maquiladoras; Morazán, Francisco; Paz Baraona, Miguel; Paz García, Policarpo; Rodas Alvarado, Modesto; Rosa, Ramón; Soto, Marco Aurelio; Squier, Ephraim George; Standard Fruit and Steamship Company; Suazo Córdova, Roberto; Tegucigalpa; United Fruit Company; Vaccaro Brothers; Valle, José Cecilio del; Villeda Morales, Ramón; Walker, William; Welles, Sumner; Zelaya, José Santos; Zemurray, Samuel.

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                               Kenneth V. Finney

                                    J. Mark Ruhl