Browse Data and Analysis

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.

The United States is a major trading partner with the Dominican Republic (DR). The DR is the largest economy in the Caribbean and the seventh-largest economy in Latin America. Since the Dominican Republic-Central America Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA-DR) went into effect for the DR in 2007, U.S. agricultural exports to the DR have increased from $1 billion in 2007 to $2 billion in 2024.

In the Caribbean region, sales value in the retail grocery sector increased by 3 percent in 2023. This is due in part to the rise in tourism in many markets, which is boosting economic growth. The largest grocery retail markets are Trinidad and Tobago, Guadeloupe, and the Bahamas.

Sales in the Caribbean retail grocery sector decreased by 1.7 percent in 2022, primarily as the result of closing retail outlets in the French West Indies.

The Caribbean retail grocery sector continued on the upswing in 2021. The region increased its imports of consumer-oriented agricultural products by 14 percent in 2021, reaching an estimated $2.45 billion. The outlook calls for moderate growth as the region continues on the path to recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic and markets such as Guyana and Turks and Caicos Islands emerge as larger players in the regional context.

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.

The Cayman Islands tourism industry has experienced tremendous growth during the past several years.

The Bahamas is the second largest market for U.S. consumer-oriented products in the Caribbean.

U.S. exports of consumer-oriented products to Trinidad and Tobago have experienced ten percent average annual growth over the past five years, reaching an all-time-high of $237.7 million in 2015.

The Food Marketing Consultants, Inc. with the help of FAS and its partner commodity organizations, penetrated seven Caribbean markets and tripled its exports sales...