The Central Bank says the Monthly Indicator of Economic Activity (IMAE) registered an average expansion of 6% in the first two months of 2022 compared to January and February in 2021. The Central Bank says the country is prepared to deal with adverse external shocks. The external shocks brought by the Covid-19 pandemic and exacerbated by the Russia-Ukraine military conflict include rising oil prices, higher prices of inputs and commodities and persistent disruptions in the supply chains that have substantially increased transportation costs. The Central Bank downgraded the year’s end growth rate to 5% after the war erupted.
The Central Bank says that growth is driven by the services industries — tourism (37.1%), other services (11.2%), free zone manufacturing (10.2%), transportation and storage (9.3%, commerce (9.6%), financial services (7.7%), energy and water (7.5%), communications (6.9%) and health (6.3%).
The Central Bank highlights the favorable performance of free zone exports and national exports. In the first two months of the year, total exports reached US$2,016.4 million. The Central Bank projects that total exports will exceed the US$12.46 billion reported in 2021.
Remittances have been at record levels, resulting in US$14.85 billion at the end of February 2022, equivalent to 13.9% of GDP and 7.3 months of imports, beyond the IMF recommendation.
The Central Bank concludes that the Dominican economy has strong macroeconomic fundamentals and proven resilience to face challenging international conditions.
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Central Bank
5 April 2022