01Key Takeaways
- The Dominican Republic exported $11.93 billion worth of goods in 2023, up 21.30% from $9.84 billion in 2022, a new high across the five-year window.
- The USA bought 60.02% of total exports, worth $7.16 billion, more than every other destination combined.
- Precious stones, metals, and jewelry led every export category at 15.91% ($1.90 billion), narrowly ahead of medical and optical instruments at 13.07% ($1.56 billion).
- The Dominican Republic's top three destinations, the USA, Haiti, and Switzerland, made up 73.97% of total export value in 2023.
025-Year Trend
| Year | 2019 | 2020 | 2021 | 2022 | 2023 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Value | $11.3B | $9.8B | $11.6B | $9.8B | $11.9B |
03Top Export Markets (2023)
| Rank | Partner | Value | Share |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | United States | $7.2B | 60.0% |
| 2 | Haiti | $856.5M | 7.2% |
| 3 | Switzerland | $807.8M | 6.8% |
| 4 | India | $367.1M | 3.1% |
| 5 | Netherlands | $350.5M | 2.9% |
| 6 | China | $290.4M | 2.4% |
| 7 | South Korea | $236.2M | 2.0% |
| 8 | Germany | $144.1M | 1.2% |
| 9 | Jamaica | $110.9M | 0.9% |
| 10 | Belgium | $106.4M | 0.9% |
04Top Export Categories (2023)
| Rank | Category | Value | Share |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Natural or Cultured Pearls, Precious or Semi-Precious Stones, Precious Metals, Metals Clad with Precious Metal, and Articles thereof; Imitation Jewellery; Coin | $1.9B | 15.9% |
| 2 | Optical, Photographic, Cinematographic, Measuring, Checking, Precision, Medical or Surgical Instruments and Apparatus; Parts and Accessories thereof | $1.6B | 13.1% |
| 3 | Electrical Machinery and Equipment and parts thereof; Sound Recorders and Reproducers, Television Image and Sound Recorders and Reproducers, and Parts and Accessories of such Articles | $1.2B | 10.4% |
| 4 | Tobacco and Manufactured Tobacco Substitutes | $1.2B | 10.2% |
| 5 | Plastics and Articles thereof | $675.8M | 5.7% |
| 6 | Articles of Apparel and Clothing Accessories, Knitted or Crocheted | $658.0M | 5.5% |
| 7 | Pharmaceutical Products | $605.4M | 5.1% |
| 8 | Iron and Steel | $491.2M | 4.1% |
| 9 | Edible Fruit and Nuts; Peel of Citrus Fruit or Melons | $362.4M | 3.0% |
| 10 | Cocoa and Cocoa Preparations | $210.9M | 1.8% |
05Trade Partner Map
06Analysis
The USA Buys Six Out of Every Ten Export Dollars
The Dominican Republic exported $11.93 billion worth of goods in 2023, up 21.30% from $9.84 billion the year before, a new high across the five years of data available here. The United States bought 60.02% of that total, worth $7.16 billion, more than every other destination on the list combined. That concentration traces back to CAFTA-DR, the free trade agreement linking the Dominican Republic and Central America to the US market, which has anchored decades of export-oriented manufacturing built around duty-free access north.
Haiti ranked second at 7.18% ($856.49 million). The two countries share the island of Hispaniola, and cross-border trade runs deep despite the wide economic gap between them. Switzerland followed at 6.77% ($807.83 million), an unusually large share for a country with no major regional presence, and one that lines up closely with Switzerland's role as a global hub for refining and trading precious metals. Combined, the USA, Haiti, and Switzerland made up 73.97% of total export value in 2023.
India added 3.08% ($367.08 million), another market tied to gold and jewelry trade. Netherlands contributed 2.94% ($350.51 million), and China took 2.43% ($290.37 million). South Korea added 1.98% ($236.22 million), Germany contributed 1.21% ($144.12 million), Jamaica added 0.93% ($110.86 million), and Belgium closed out the top ten at 0.89% ($106.41 million).
Jewelry, Medical Devices, and Cigars Top an Export List Built on Free Zones
Precious stones, precious metals, and jewelry led every export category, worth $1.90 billion, or 15.91% of the total. That reflects decades of jewelry assembly and precious-metal processing built up inside the country's free trade zones, where imported gold, silver, and gemstones get finished into jewelry before shipping onward, often to Switzerland's refining and trading houses before reaching final buyers. Medical, optical, and measuring instruments followed close behind at 13.07% ($1.56 billion).
Dominican free zones export over $2 billion in medical instruments and devices annually, primarily to the USA, backed by more than 30 years of medical device manufacturing history and ISO 13485 regulatory compliance. That figure covers device exports specifically, a large piece of the broader "medical, optical, and measuring instruments" category tracked here, which also includes lab and diagnostic equipment sold under the same free-zone model. Electrical machinery added 10.37% ($1.24 billion), a category that often shares the same free-zone factories and export logistics as medical devices.
Tobacco products ranked fourth at 10.18% ($1.21 billion). Annual cigar exports surpassed $1.34 billion, with cigars accounting for roughly 10% of the country's total exports and the industry supporting more than 110,000 jobs nationwide. That makes tobacco second only to gold among Dominican export earners, and unlike jewelry or medical devices, cigar production here traces back to tobacco actually grown on Dominican soil rather than imported raw material. Plastics added 5.66% ($675.83 million), and knitted apparel contributed 5.51% ($658.04 million), another long-standing free-zone export line.
Pharmaceutical products took 5.07% ($605.39 million), and iron and steel added 4.12% ($491.19 million). Fruit and nuts contributed 3.04% ($362.39 million), and cocoa and cocoa preparations closed out the top ten at 1.77% ($210.93 million), a smaller category but one built on the country's reputation for high-quality organic cocoa. Nearly every category on this list traces back to the same export-processing-zone model that has shaped the Dominican economy for decades. Raw materials or components arrive, get assembled or finished domestically, then ship back out, mostly to the USA.
A New High After Two Years of Whiplash
The Dominican Republic's export total moved in a jagged pattern across the five years covered here. It stood at $11.29 billion in 2019, then fell to $9.84 billion in 2020 as the pandemic disrupted global trade. It rebounded to $11.64 billion in 2021, then fell again to $9.84 billion in 2022, landing within a few million dollars of the 2020 pandemic low despite the world having mostly reopened by then.
That 2022 dip makes the 21.30% jump to $11.93 billion in 2023 look even sharper by comparison. The total didn't just recover. It set a new high for the five-year window, surpassing both the pre-pandemic 2019 level and the 2021 rebound. Given how heavily this export base leans on free-zone manufacturing tied to US demand, that swing likely tracks US consumer and healthcare demand as much as anything happening inside the Dominican Republic itself.