He dominican gold it represents close to a third of the exports of national products. However, in recent years they have been declining, marking a 17% drop after closing with an amount of US$1,322.4 million last year, which indicates around US$268.6 million less compared to 2021, which reported US$1,591.1 million. This is indicated by a statistical report from the Export and Investment Center of the Dominican Republic (ProDominican).
The decrease in gold is more attenuating (-21%) when comparing the amount of 2022 with the total reported by the Dominican Central Bank (BC) and the National Statistics Office (ONE) establish an exported amount of US$1,610.3 million in 2021.
Data from ProDominicana indicate that the export of Dominican gold has two years, 2021 and 2022, decreasing consecutively. What was registered in the past year is less than the amount reported in 2019, which was US$1,480 million, and also the amount of 2018, which was US$1,387 million, i.e. -10.6% and -4.6%, respectively.
Of the last five years, 2020 is the most notable with US$1,692 million. In this period, an accumulated amount of US$7,472 million is registered, with an annual average of US$1,494 million.
The decrease is attributed to a reduction in extraction volumes, and has not been greater, due to the fact that the price of the product in the international market it has increased in the last two years, which has partly offset the impact of the drop in export values.
Low volume of Dominican gold
This trend not only reflects a decrease in the FOB value of exports, but also in terms of mineral extraction. The BC records that production went from 1,161,249 troy ounces (OT) in 2017 to 896,638 OT in 2021, which indicates a 23% reduction, which is equivalent to 264,611 less OT.
During this period, the production of the golden metal, which has a proven reserve of 26 million OT in the country, accumulated around 5.2 million OT with an annual average of 1,040,458 OT. The year with the highest weighting was in 2017, reflecting 1,161,249 OT.
While the value of the gold deposit proven by the authorities amounts to US$50.440 million, if its current price of US$1,940 per ounce is considered.
When looking at gold and the extraction of other minerals in metric tons (MT), the main ones (gold, silver, copper, nickel, zinc and bauxite) report around 255,450 metric tons (MT), between the period 2017 and 2021. The gold exhibits the lowest amount with 152.2 MT, which is equivalent to less than 0.1%.
In addition, its production decreased by about 28%, going from 35 MT in 2017 to 25.4 MT in 2021, according to data from the ONE.
He nickel It is the mineral with the highest extraction in that cycle, since it registered 44.2%, which is equivalent to 113,119 MT. After the exploitation permit was granted again in 2020, bauxite has the second amount with 89,533 MT, that is, 35%. It is followed by copper, reporting around 31,220 MT, equivalent to 12.2%.
Another important source that records the performance of the extractive industry, as has been observed, is the BC. This maintains that minerals went from US$2,149.7 million in 2021 to US$1,328.8 million in 2022, that is, US$197.5 million less were contracted last year, especially by -24.5 for silver, followed by gold with -17.5 % and copper that reported -11.9%.
more minerals
Between 2017 and 2021, the country accumulated by mineral exports US$9,728.8 million. During that lustrum, the ferronickel It is the second most exported mineral behind gold (79%), since it reported US$1,394.6 million, that is, 14.3% of the total.
The silver it continues with an amount of US$347.3 million, which is equivalent to 3.5%. Meanwhile, the copper reflects an accumulated amount of US$202.2 million, which represents 2%. The other minerals extracted from local soil show an amount below US$100 million.