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This report highlights the food processing industry, its drivers, key players, and market landscape in the Caribbean Basin. The region relies heavily on imports, and the United States is the largest supplier of food ingredients.

U.S. Consumer Oriented products continue to feature prominently in Salvadoran retail outlets, registering a new record-high of $281.5 million of imports in 2022.

El Salvador’s food manufacturing sector has been able to successfully adapt to a challenging environment and has provided signals of a rapid recovery, despite facing a continuous crisis generated by the COVID-19 pandemic and the supply chain shortages that increased the costs of raw materials and other inputs needed to produce food.

The retail sector in El Salvador has remained strong and stable, with new outlets opening and new online shopping options. Super Selectos is the largest supermarket chain, followed by Walmart which in January 2022 announced it is considering the sale of its outlet stores in El Salvador. Imports of U.S. consumer-oriented products reached a record-high of $267 million in 2021.

El Salvador’s food manufacturing sector has kept a fast pace in terms of increasing production levels. Food manufacturers took the challenging environment caused by the pandemic as an opportunity to evolve and add new items to their food lines.

The Salvadoran retail sector has remained strong and stable amidst the pandemic of COVID-19.

Caribbean imports of consumer-oriented products shrunk from $2.3 billion in 2019 to $2.1 billion in 2020 as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, yet Caribbean retail grocery sales grew by an estimated 6 percent during the same period.

El Salvador has been dependent on food imports for many years, and food ingredients are no exception.

During 2020, FAS El Salvador contracted a market research study to update Salvadoran consumer preferences in the Consumer-Oriented food/beverages category.

Two key free trade agreements – the Dominican Republic-Central America Free Trade Agreement (or CAFTA-DR) and the U.S.-Panama Trade Promotion Agreement – have stimulated U.S. agricultural exports...

The Salvadoran retail sector, valued at approximately $4.5 billion, continues to show positive signs of growth as supermarkets and discount stores have expanded.

El Salvador continues to depend heavily on imports for many of the ingredients needed by the food manufacturing industry.