Analysis: Ranking the Caribbean on Foreign Investment

By the Caribbean Journal staff

How much foreign direct investment did Caribbean countries receive last year?

To find out, Caribbean Journal looked at data from the recently-released Foreign Direct Investment in Latin America and the Caribbean report from the United Nations’ Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean.

ECLAC released data on foreign direct investment inflows for sovereign Caribbean countries in 2013 and 2012.

So which country received the most foreign direct investment?

It was the Dominican Republic, which took in $1.991 billion USD in FDI inflows last year, although that represented a 37 percent decrease from its FDI intake in 2012.

On a per capita basis, St Kitts and Nevis easily led the Caribbean, with a total of $2,090 in foreign direct investment inflows per capita, the highest in the region by a wide margin.

And on a year-over-year basis, it was Grenada that saw the largest improvement in foreign investment, with a 129 percent increase in gross FDI in 2013 compared to 2012.

Overall, the Caribbean region brought in $6.052 billion in FDI, although that represented a 19 percent decrease compared to 2012.

See the full data below, which only includes sovereign Caribbean countries, (except Barbados, for which the ECLAC data did not have reporting).