The leafcutter ants, best known in Costa Rica as "zompopas" are social insects that agriculture practiced for millions of years.The zompopas cut the leaves of trees and carry them to their nests to prepare a paste on which grow a fungus which depend for survival. 

The zompopas are very important part of the ecosystem since being very numerous agencies and their colonies very large these are responsible for removing large amounts of land and literally prune large trees of the forest. This added to that recently has shown that the colonies play a big role in fixing atmospheric nitrogen so it can be used by them and later by other animals.

 But now they have become a major pest to farmers for their immense appetite and destroy large crops causing huge losses and have also attacked archaeological sites such as the monument to Guayabo jeopardizing their integrity. 

For these and other reasons the zompopas are considered a major object of study among insects as its great complexity of these new things are discovered every day. Among the species found in Costa Rica but are Atta cephalotes and Atta colombica.