Data-center law in El Salvador

National jurisdiction · as of 2026-09-05

El Salvador has no data-center-specific siting, permitting or utility statute; a data-center or cloud-computing project instead qualifies for one of several parallel fiscal-incentive regimes.

The Ley de Fomento a la Innovación y Manufactura de Tecnologías (Decreto Legislativo No. 722 of 2023) names the development and commercialization of cloud-computing and data-flow services among its incentivized activities and grants income-tax, municipal-tax, capital-gains and import-duty exemptions to a qualifying investor, but expressly excludes anyone already benefiting from the separate Zonas Francas Industriales y de Comercialización or Servicios Internacionales regimes, so the three regimes are alternatives rather than stackable benefits.

Neither the Ley de Zonas Francas Industriales y de Comercialización nor the Ley de Servicios Internacionales (Decreto Legislativo No. 431 of 2007) is described here beyond its existence and title, and no provision addressing electricity grid interconnection, water use, environmental review or air emissions specific to a data center has been located.

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Instruments on record

1 instrument on record, grouped by the family of approval each one governs.

Public agreements

What fiscal agreements attach a data center to its host jurisdiction?

Ley de Fomento a la Innovación y Manufactura de Tecnologías

In force

Decreto Legislativo No. 722, 18 de abril de 2023

Effective 2023-06-03 · Applies to both

Article 6(b) names the development and commercialization of cloud-computing and data-flow services, alongside artificial intelligence, mass data analysis, distributed-ledger technology, cybersecurity solutions and quantum computing, among the productive-sector activities eligible for this law's benefits.

Article 7 grants a qualifying beneficiary, under a Ministry of Economy Acuerdo de Calificación, total exemption from income tax and its withholdings on the incentivized activity, total exemption from municipal tax on declared net assets, exemption from capital-gains tax, and total exemption from import duties and taxes on goods, inputs, machinery, equipment and tools the incentivized activity requires.

Article 5 excludes from these benefits anyone already benefiting from another special tax regime, naming specifically the rules governing Zonas Francas Industriales y de Comercialización and Parques y Centros de Servicio Internacionales, so a project cannot combine this law's incentives with those regimes.

Article 14 fines an infraction two to five monthly minimum wages of the commerce-and-services sector if minor, six to fifteen if serious, and fifteen to twenty if very serious, administered by the Ministry of Economy.

Source: Full text of law

Every entry cites the instrument it describes. None of it is legal advice: verify a citation before relying on it. Full sourcing: read the methodology. The rest of the record: all jurisdictions.