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The Salvadoran HRI sector is having a better performance in 2022 as the tourism sector is recovering. Euromonitor reports that Salvadorans spent about $2.1 billion in the Hotels/Catering category during 2021. According to recent reports by the Ministry of Tourism, El Salvador received 1.1 million foreign visitors in the first half of 2022, representing a 92 percent recovery compared to the same period in 2019.

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.

U.S. exporters can find ample opportunities in the Iberian Peninsula. Spain is the third-largest European Union (EU) destination for U.S. agricultural products, with Portugal ranking 11th. In 2021, the United States exported $1.6 billion of agricultural products to Spain, or 15 percent of total U.S. agricultural exports to the EU. The United States held a 4 percent market share of Spain’s agricultural imports and 2 percent market share in Portugal, behind other EU member states as a group and Brazil.

El Salvador’s coffee production is expected to reach 639,000 sixty-kg bags in marketing year (MY) 2021/22. The Salvadoran coffee sector continues to struggle mainly due to low international prices, climate change, continued coffee leaf rust, and a lack of a long-term strategy that has hindered investment at the farm level. The MY2022/23 crop is forecast to slightly decrease to 619,000 sixty-kg bags.

Improving international prices have eased the financial pressure exerted by the COVID-19 pandemic on the sugar sector, but inflationary concerns have led the government to include sugar among the products with import duties reduced to zero percent for a one-year period.

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.

This report provides initial analysis and a courtesy translation of El Salvador’s Transitory Law to Combat Price Inflation in Basic Products, published March 11, 2022, with an import duties comparison added for reference.

In 2021, Portugal imported $244 million worth of agricultural, fish, and forestry products from the United States. Outside the European Union Member States, the United States was the third main origin of Portuguese agricultural and related imports.

Portuguese cattle and swine sectors are currently restructuring to increase their domestic beef and pork production to meet domestic and export market demands. The meat sector is also working to open new strategic export markets, especially in the pork market.

Despite the social and economic impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic, Salvadorans have increased purchases of specialty food products and continue seeking new flavors and increased variety, demonstrated by the opening of new specialty food stores and new registrations of U.S. products during these unprecedented times.

In the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, FAS El Salvador identified an opportunity to seek market access for U.S. table-eggs. In February 2021, FAS obtained the equivalence needed to allow imports of fresh table-eggs from the United States, and the first shipment arrived in El Salvador on October 20th, 2021.

During 2020, El Salvador imported a little over $632 million of agricultural products, which is a drop of 8 percent compared to 2019.