President Luis Abinader with Minister Víctor -Ito- Bisonó and the president of Adozona, Claudia Pellerano.
The free zone sector reached its historic most of 200,134 direct jobs in October of this 12 months, consolidating itself as one of many primary engines of financial and social progress within the nation.
The announcement was made throughout a ceremony led by the President of the Republic, Luis Abinader; the Minister of Trade, Commerce, and Mipymes, Ito Bisonó; the president of Adozona, Claudia Pellerano, and the director of the Nationwide Council of Free Zones, Daniel Liranzo, along with representatives of the private and non-private sectors, academia, and worldwide organizations.
The occasion highlighted that between April 2020, the bottom level of employment as a result of pandemic, and October 2025, employment in free zones elevated from 119,974 to 200,134 jobs, for an accrued progress of 67% in 5 years.
President Luis Abinader highlighted the significance of this milestone by indicating that “it is a figure that represents decent work, real opportunities and renewed confidence in the Dominican Republic,” whereas reiterating that “this is the result of a sustained strategy, the commitment of workers, the drive of the private sector and public policies aimed at generating quality jobs, attracting new investments and strengthening the country’s competitiveness.”
“Since 2020 we have been working to bring jobs where there were none before. We reopened parks that had been closed for more than 15 years and built new productive spaces such as the one in San Juan de la Maguana. All this effort translates today into more than 200,000 jobs and an economy that moves forward with people at the center,” emphasised Minister Ito Bisonó.All that is generated in a context of growth of commercial parks, productive diversification, and strengthening of the technical capabilities of our human expertise.
Minister Bisonó highlighted that “as of November 2025, the value of exports from the free zone sector amounts to US$7,936.1 million, being led by subsectors such as medical devices, tobacco and its derivatives, as well as electrical and electronic products.”
Whereas Claudia Pellerano, president of Adozona, stated, “The sector has evolved from traditional manufacturing to knowledge-intensive productive ecosystems, where activities such as services, medical devices, electrical, electronic and logistics add up to tens of thousands of specialized jobs. In October 2025, services registered 45,460 jobs, an increase of 6.03% compared to October last year. This diversification is supported by training: between 2020 and October 2025, 24,494 training actions were developed, accumulating 606,292 hours of technical training, in coordination with Infotep and the companies of the sector, which allows increasing productivity and the salary trajectory of the collaborators.”
Technification of employment within the ZF sectorThe MICM highlighted that the free commerce zone mannequin has undergone a profound transformation in its labor composition. Between 2004 and 2024, operator participation dropped from 86% to 63.4%, leading to greater than 39,000 fewer positions in conventional capabilities. In parallel, technical jobs elevated from 9.1% to 25.3%, tripling in 20 years, whereas administrative positions doubled from 4.9% to 11.3%. This variation displays the transition in direction of higher-value-added actions, together with medical manufacturing, electronics, world providers, and logistics.
Girls’s participation and investmentWomen, accounting for greater than 106,000 staff, occupy 54% of the employment generated in free commerce zones. As well as, there’s a sturdy productive linkage with native trade: native purchases from free zones elevated from RD$83 billion in 2020 to greater than RD$155.4 billion in 2024, a 87% improve. By way of funding, the accrued funding within the regime reached US$7,735.7 million in 2024, a rise of 49% from 2020.