Where we work · Costa Rica
ISO and GRC certification consulting in Costa Rica
Achieve ISO and GRC certification in Costa Rica with Sterling: 8,100+ client engagements in 60+ countries, 20+ years.
- 21 standards, one team
- Accredited certification route
- New York office team
- Effivity and Academy included
Sectors that ask for certification in Costa Rica
- Medical device, pharmaceutical and life-sciences manufacturers
- Advanced and light manufacturers operating from free-zone parks
- Business-process, shared-service and digital-services centres serving overseas parents and clients
- Food, beverage and agri-food processors and exporters, including meat plants under SENASA inspection
- Banks, other supervised financial entities and the IT providers that serve them
- Public-sector suppliers and laboratories selling to public institutions
Clients include
ISO and GRC certification in Costa Rica at a glance
Costa Rica protects personal data through Ley 8968 and a small agency, Prodhab, attached to the Ministerio de Justicia y Paz. Quality is organised by Ley 10473, under which the Ente Costarricense de Acreditación accredits conformity assessment bodies and public institutions must use accredited or ECA-recognised ones. Financial supervisors apply Acuerdo CONASSIF 5-24, which tells banks to check that a cloud provider holds at least an ISO 27001 certificate. SENASA runs the official inspection system behind meat exports, the Ministerio de Salud registers health products, SETENA reviews environmental impact assessments, and PROCOMER administers the free-zone regime that medical device makers, advanced manufacturers and service centres use. Global ACI lists ECA as a mutual recognition signatory, with dated entries for ISO 9001, ISO 14001, ISO 45001 and ISO 50001. Certificates come from accredited certification bodies, never from Sterling. Sterling's New York office serves clients in Costa Rica on-site where the work needs it and remotely otherwise, bringing 20+ years and 8,100+ client engagements in 60+ countries, with Effivity and Sterling Academy included with the engagement.
ISO and GRC standards Sterling delivers in Costa Rica
Each card opens Sterling's guide to the standard: what it requires, how certification or compliance works and what sets the time and cost.
Quality & operational excellence
Information security, cyber & cloud
Privacy & data protection
AI governance & digital trust
Environment, energy & climate
Health & safety
Governance, risk & resilience
Financial services, payments & AML
Food safety & agriculture
Healthcare, medical devices & life sciences
Laboratories, inspection & accreditation
Automotive, aerospace, rail & defence
Construction, energy, oil & gas
Regulators and laws that drive certification in Costa Rica (10)
| Law or regulator | What it asks for | Standards it cites |
|---|---|---|
| Ley N.° 8968, Protección de la Persona frente al Tratamiento de sus Datos Personales (Protection of the Person regarding the Processing of their Personal Data) Agencia de Protección de Datos de los Habitantes (Prodhab), described on its own site as a body of maximum decentralisation attached to the Ministerio de Justicia y Paz, with independence of criterion and its own instrumental legal personality. The same page says Prodhab has no consultative functions among its current legal powers. | Applies to personal data held in automated or manual databases of public or private bodies, except databases kept for purely internal, personal or domestic purposes that are not sold or otherwise marketed. Requires people to be told in advance, expressly and clearly, who holds their data and why; written consent that can be revoked; accurate and current data; access, rectification and deletion rights; technical and organisational security; and express, valid authorisation before data is transferred. Databases kept for distribution, dissemination or commercialisation must be registered with Prodhab, and a registered protocol of conduct (protocolo de actuación) creates a rebuttable presumption of compliance for authorising data transfers. | |
| Ministerio de Economía, Industria y Comercio (MEIC), steward of the Sistema Nacional para la Calidad Standardisation, accreditation, metrology and conformity assessment (all sectors) | Ley N.° 10473, Ley del Sistema Nacional para la Calidad, in force from its publication (ECA's site records publication in La Gaceta No. 80, Alcance 88, on 7 May 2024). It names the Minister of MEIC as head of the system, creates the Laboratorio Costarricense de Metrología (Lacomet) and the Ente Costarricense de Acreditación (ECA), provides for the executive to designate a private non-profit Ente Nacional de Normalización for the development of voluntary technical standards, and requires public institutions to use conformity assessment bodies accredited or recognised by ECA. INTECO states that it holds the designation as national standardisation body under Acuerdo Ministerial N.° 018-MEIC-2022. | |
| Consejo Nacional de Supervisión del Sistema Financiero (CONASSIF), with SUGEF and SUGEVAL Banks, financial entities and securities firms supervised by SUGEF and SUGEVAL (information technology and cyber governance) | Acuerdo CONASSIF 5-24, Reglamento General de Gobierno y Gestión de la Tecnología de Información, published in Alcance 130 to La Gaceta 134 of 22 July 2024 (version 3 dated 15 July 2025 on SUGEF's site). It requires an information security management system, cyber security management and digital operational resilience, responsibility for IT services supplied by third parties, and, for cloud services, verification that the provider holds and keeps current at least an ISO 27001 certificate, with ISO 27017, ISO 27018 or Cloud Security Alliance practices checked as the service requires. | ISO/IEC 27001 |
| Superintendencia General de Entidades Financieras (SUGEF) Banks and other entities supervised by SUGEF (anti-money-laundering and payment-fraud controls) | SUGEF's current-regulation page lists SUGEF 13-19, Reglamento para la prevención del riesgo de legitimación de capitales (risk-based responsibilities and obligations for each type of obliged entity), and Sugef 5-26, Reglamento sobre aspectos mínimos de control para prevenir y mitigar estafas informáticas en perjuicio de los usuarios financieros. Neither listing names a management system standard. | |
| Servicio Nacional de Salud Animal (SENASA), Ministerio de Agricultura y Ganadería Meat and other food of animal origin, including export plants | SENASA operates the official food-safety inspection system for animal-origin products. It reports that an equivalence verification audit by the Food Safety and Inspection Service of the United States Department of Agriculture, held in February 2026, concluded favourably for Costa Rican beef exports, with no findings identified that posed a potential threat to public health. | |
| Ministerio de Salud Foods, medicines, cosmetics, chemicals and biomedical equipment and material | The Ministry's regulation page states that products of sanitary interest — foods, cosmetics, medicines, natural products with medicinal qualities, biomedical equipment and material, chemical, hygiene and household pesticide and fertiliser products — need a current sanitary registration, that importers need a current operating permit, and that registration is done online through the Regístrelo system, with evaluation periods set in Decreto N.° 39252-S. | |
| Secretaría Técnica Nacional Ambiental (SETENA), Ministerio de Ambiente y Energía Projects and activities with environmental impact | SETENA states that the Ley Orgánica del Ambiente N.° 7554 of 13 November 1995 created it as a body of maximum decentralisation within MINAE, to harmonise environmental impact with productive processes and to analyse and resolve environmental impact assessments. Its online procedures cover environmental viability for projects of low, moderate and high impact. | |
| Consejo de Salud Ocupacional (CSO), Ministerio de Trabajo y Seguridad Social Employers (occupational safety and health) | CSO states that Article 274 of the Código de Trabajo defines its functions as steward and coordinator of State occupational health policy. Its site says that, between 2016 and 2024, CSO and INTECO updated or created 162 voluntary national occupational safety and health standards, covering management systems, ergonomics, construction, noise, personal protective equipment and psychosocial risks among other topics. | ISO 45001 |
| Ministerio de Ciencia, Innovación, Tecnología y Telecomunicaciones (MICITT), through its Dirección de Ciberseguridad and the CSIRT-CR Government institutions and national cyber security | MICITT's cyber security page lists the national incident response team CSIRT-CR, the National Cybersecurity Strategy 2023–2027 and Decreto N.° 45061-MICITT, Reglamento para la Gobernanza en Ciberseguridad y la Resiliencia Cibernética de las Instituciones Gubernamentales. | |
| Ministerio de Ciencia, Innovación, Tecnología y Telecomunicaciones (MICITT) Developers and users of artificial intelligence | MICITT publishes the National Artificial Intelligence Strategy 2024–2027, which aims to promote the ethical, safe and responsible use, adoption and development of artificial intelligence, together with an action plan. It is a strategy, not a certification requirement. |
Accreditation and recognition
- Ente Costarricense de Acreditación (ECA): National accreditation body — Ley 10473 creates ECA as a public entity of non-state character with its own legal personality and patrimony, to back the technical competence and credibility of accredited bodies. ECA's own site lists accreditation schemes for testing and calibration laboratories, inspection bodies, certification bodies for management systems, products and persons, clinical laboratories, greenhouse-gas validation and verification bodies and proficiency testing providers. For management systems it names ISO 9001, ISO 14001, ISO 22000, FSSC 22000, ISO 28000, ISO 45001 and ISO 50001, assessed against INTE/ISO/IEC 17021-1.
Look for a certification body whose accreditation scope covers your standard and sector, from a national accreditation body recognised under the international arrangements of Global ACI (Global Accreditation Cooperation Incorporated, formerly the IAF MLA). Sterling does not certify.
Tenders and procurement
- Purchases of conformity assessment services by public institutions (All public institutions, under the Ley del Sistema Nacional para la Calidad (Ley 10473)): Public institutions that need services from testing, calibration or clinical laboratories, inspection bodies, certification bodies, validation and verification bodies or proficiency testing providers must use those accredited or recognised by ECA for the scope required, and must require and check that the conformity assessment bodies the State uses are accredited or recognised by ECA. Public purchasers are also told to require compliance with applicable national or Central American technical regulations, shown by conformity assessment proportionate to the risk. The law does not oblige a supplier to hold an ISO certificate.
- General Public Procurement Law and its unified digital procurement system (Ley General de Contratación Pública, N.° 9986, and the contracting institutions): The law centralises procurement procedures of the covered entities in a single unified digital system. It tells buyers to define specifications in terms of quality, performance and functionality, and to set the parameters used to check the quality of the goods, works or services. Each tender document therefore sets its own quality and technical conditions.
Economic zones
- Régimen de Zonas Francas (free-zone regime) and its parks: manufacturing in strategic sectors, services in strategic sectors, commercial exporters, park administrators, human health service centres outside the Greater Metropolitan Area
- Régimen de Perfeccionamiento Activo and Régimen Devolutivo de Derechos (inward-processing and duty drawback regimes): export manufacturing
Sterling in Costa Rica
Sterling delivers in Costa Rica from its New York office: one team from scoping to certificate, with Effivity ISO & GRC software and Sterling Academy access included. Sterling does not certify; certification decisions stay with independent bodies.
Questions Costa Rica clients ask
Who regulates personal data held by companies in Costa Rica?
The Agencia de Protección de Datos de los Habitantes, known as Prodhab, attached to the Ministerio de Justicia y Paz, applies Ley 8968, which was published in La Gaceta in September 2011. Prodhab's own site says it has no consultative functions among its legal powers and that the law has not been amended. Take specific questions to your counsel or to Prodhab.
Which body accredits certification bodies in Costa Rica?
The Ente Costarricense de Acreditación, ECA, created by Ley 10473 as a public entity of non-state character. Global ACI lists it as a mutual recognition signatory with dated entries for ISO 9001, ISO 14001, ISO 45001 and ISO 50001, but none for ISO 22000, ISO/IEC 27001 or ISO 13485, so ask any certification body for its accreditation certificate and scope.
Do public institutions in Costa Rica have to use accredited certification bodies?
Yes. Ley 10473 tells public institutions that need laboratory, inspection or certification services to use bodies accredited or recognised by ECA for the scope required. That rule concerns the bodies the State buys from; it does not make an ISO certificate compulsory for every supplier, because each tender sets its own conditions. Read the tender document.
What do Costa Rica's financial regulators say about ISO 27001?
Acuerdo CONASSIF 5-24 requires supervised entities that use cloud services to check that the provider holds and keeps current at least an ISO 27001 certificate, and to check ISO 27017, ISO 27018 or Cloud Security Alliance practices where the service needs them. It also requires the entities to run their own information security management system. Confirm scope with your supervisor.
Are certification audits in Costa Rica conducted in English?
Often for foreign-owned manufacturers and service centres, but Spanish is the official language of the Nation and the language of statutes, tenders and regulator filings. Agree the audit language, any interpreter and the language of controlled documents with the certification body when you apply, and say early if shop-floor or call-centre interviews will run in Spanish.
Which public holidays affect audit scheduling in Costa Rica?
The labour ministry's 2026 circular lists twelve dates under the Código de Trabajo, including Holy Thursday and Good Friday, 1 May, 25 July, 15 August, 15 September and 25 December. Employers, including foreign-owned ones, must grant them. Avoid Holy Week and the year-end period for audit weeks, and check the circular for the year you plan.
Start with a free discovery call
A Sterling consultant goes through your entities, your regulators and your target date with you. No proposal until the scope is agreed.
Sources
- Ley N.° 8968, Protección de la Persona frente al Tratamiento de sus Datos Personales (Protection of the Person regarding the Processing of their Personal Data) — prodhab.go.cr; micitt.go.cr (accessed 18 Oct 2026)
- Ley N.° 10473, Ley del Sistema Nacional para la Calidad, in force from its publication (ECA's site records publication in La Gaceta No. 80, Alcance 88, on 7 May 2024). It names the Minister of MEIC as head of the system, creates the Laboratorio Costarricense de Metrología (Lacomet) and the Ente Costarricense de Acreditación (ECA), provides for the executive to designate a private non-profit Ente Nacional de Normalización for the development of voluntary technical standards, and requires public institutions to use conformity assessment bodies accredited or recognised by ECA. INTECO states that it holds the designation as national standardisation body under Acuerdo Ministerial N.° 018-MEIC-2022. — micitt.go.cr; eca.or.cr; inteco.org (accessed 18 Oct 2026)
- Acuerdo CONASSIF 5-24, Reglamento General de Gobierno y Gestión de la Tecnología de Información, published in Alcance 130 to La Gaceta 134 of 22 July 2024 (version 3 dated 15 July 2025 on SUGEF's site). It requires an information security management system, cyber security management and digital operational resilience, responsibility for IT services supplied by third parties, and, for cloud services, verification that the provider holds and keeps current at least an ISO 27001 certificate, with ISO 27017, ISO 27018 or Cloud Security Alliance practices checked as the service requires. — sugef.fi.cr (accessed 18 Oct 2026)
- SUGEF's current-regulation page lists SUGEF 13-19, Reglamento para la prevención del riesgo de legitimación de capitales (risk-based responsibilities and obligations for each type of obliged entity), and Sugef 5-26, Reglamento sobre aspectos mínimos de control para prevenir y mitigar estafas informáticas en perjuicio de los usuarios financieros. Neither listing names a management system standard. — sugef.fi.cr (accessed 18 Oct 2026)
- SENASA operates the official food-safety inspection system for animal-origin products. It reports that an equivalence verification audit by the Food Safety and Inspection Service of the United States Department of Agriculture, held in February 2026, concluded favourably for Costa Rican beef exports, with no findings identified that posed a potential threat to public health. — senasa.go.cr (accessed 18 Oct 2026)
- The Ministry's regulation page states that products of sanitary interest — ministeriodesalud.go.cr (accessed 18 Oct 2026)
- SETENA states that the Ley Orgánica del Ambiente N.° 7554 of 13 November 1995 created it as a body of maximum decentralisation within MINAE, to harmonise environmental impact with productive processes and to analyse and resolve environmental impact assessments. Its online procedures cover environmental viability for projects of low, moderate and high impact. — setena.go.cr (accessed 18 Oct 2026)
- CSO states that Article 274 of the Código de Trabajo defines its functions as steward and coordinator of State occupational health policy. Its site says that, between 2016 and 2024, CSO and INTECO updated or created 162 voluntary national occupational safety and health standards, covering management systems, ergonomics, construction, noise, personal protective equipment and psychosocial risks among other topics. — cso.go.cr (accessed 18 Oct 2026)
- MICITT's cyber security page lists the national incident response team CSIRT-CR, the National Cybersecurity Strategy 2023–2027 and Decreto N.° 45061-MICITT, Reglamento para la Gobernanza en Ciberseguridad y la Resiliencia Cibernética de las Instituciones Gubernamentales. — micitt.go.cr (accessed 18 Oct 2026)
- MICITT publishes the National Artificial Intelligence Strategy 2024–2027, which aims to promote the ethical, safe and responsible use, adoption and development of artificial intelligence, together with an action plan. It is a strategy, not a certification requirement. — micitt.go.cr (accessed 18 Oct 2026)
- Ente Costarricense de Acreditación (ECA) — eca.or.cr; global-aci.org; micitt.go.cr (accessed 18 Oct 2026)
- Purchases of conformity assessment services by public institutions — micitt.go.cr (accessed 18 Oct 2026)
- General Public Procurement Law and its unified digital procurement system — cgrfiles.cgr.go.cr (accessed 18 Oct 2026)
- Régimen de Zonas Francas (free-zone regime) and its parks — procomer.com
- Régimen de Perfeccionamiento Activo and Régimen Devolutivo de Derechos (inward-processing and duty drawback regimes) — procomer.com
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