It goes without saying that El Salvador is not generally the first destination on people’s lips when discussions of investment in Latin America arise, but the country offers some enticing opportunities.

Since emerging from a decade-long civil war at the beginning of the 1990s, the country witnessed five-fold growth in gross domestic product (GDP) between 1992 and 2019. That has seen a corresponding improvement in prosperity, with gross national income hitting $4,000 per capita in 2019 — seeing the country rise to the rank of ‘upper-middle income’ nation by standards set by the World Bank.

While the global pandemic of the past 18 months has undoubtedly undone some of the gains of recent years — as it has done in almost every economy around the world — the trajectory the country was on was positive, despite its well-known battle with high levels of crime.

For investors looking at El Salvador, it offers a diverse economy with a services sector that accounts for approximately 60% of GDP, and a large industrial base accounts for 26% of GDP. Both include a number of unsaturated markets and strong prospects for investment.