The Economic Awakening of Latin America

The following article is an excerpt from ESOMAR’s Global Market Research 2024. This flagship report of ESOMAR, often dubbed as the “Bible of Market Research”, provides you with the most comprehensive overview of the state of the insights industry and the market research sector around the world using data collected by national research associations, leading companies, independent analysts, and ESOMAR representatives.

The industry in the Rest of the Americas (a US-centric division of the continent that includes Latin America and Canada) continued apace with positive growth in all its industry sectors and an aggregated 8.7% in absolute terms. Persistent inflation, however, managed to moderate this growth to a more modest 1.1% in net terms.

Like for the rest of the world’s regions, the engine behind this satisfactory growth level was the research software sector, with an absolute growth of 14.2%. The market research sector followed with 6.0% absolute growth and reached a turnover of US$2.2 billion, and lastly, the comparatively smaller reporting sector grew a limited 2.7% and remained flat with respect to 2022 at US$0.7 billion.

As for Europe and Asia Pacific, improvements in the global survey resulted in the reallocation of a portion of the turnover from the research software and reporting sectors back to the market research one. Consequently, the estimation for the market research sector for 2022 increased from US$1.6 billion in last year’s report to US$2.1 billion this year.

The top 10 fastest-growing markets in Latin America showed the region's continued recovery after the pandemic and included only positive values. Of these, more than half of the entries surpassed the regional growth level, which was 6.0% in absolute terms.

While Argentina grew a staggering 83.1%, it is important to note that this growth was calculated in local currency, which saw a substantial depreciation throughout 2023. When translated to US dollars, the country’s turnover fluctuated from US$87 million in 2022 to US$71 million in 2023. As a result, Argentina lost its position as the fifth­-largest market in Latin America, surpassed for a second time since 2019 by Peru, which grew 10.7% to a level of US$77 million. The estimated turnover for 2024 assumes linear exchange rates, which is the reason the expected 2024 turnover for Argentina is at US$185 million. In reality, currency market pressures may continue to correct the exchange rate to a more realistic output level.

The Caribbean region continued to grow quite substantially, primarily thanks to the excellent growth of the two main countries with available data for this industry study: Guyana and Jamaica. Colombia presented a similar growth rate of 15.1%, leveraging the benefits of its industry’s international expansion.

With a similar growth rate, sit Chile, Uruguay, and Peru, which continue to push the advancement of the market research sector in their respective countries as well as regionally.

The industry in the Rest of Americas is projected to expand significantly, with an expected growth rate of 10.3% throughout 2024, culminating in an estimated market size of approximately US$5.5 billion!

Are you interested in knowing how Mexico, Colombia and Chile view the performance of their insights industry? Download the latest edition of Global Market Research now!