Sosúa

**Sosúa** is a Dominican municipality in the Puerto Plata province, on the north coast of the country.

_Sosúa_ is a taíno name of the small river (Sosúa River) that crosses the city and ends in the Atlantic Ocean, on the western part of the Sosúa Bay.

## Location

The municipality is surrounded by the Espaillat province to the east and to the south, the municipality of Puerto Plata to the west and the municipality of Villa Montellano to the northwest. The Atlantic Ocean is to the north of Sosúa.

## Population

The city had, in , a total population of 29,653: 14,796 men and 14,857 women. The urban population was  of the total population.

## Geography

Sosúa is along the Sosúa Bay, a small bay with two headlands: to the east is _Punta Sosúa_ ("punta" is a Spanish word that means, in this case, a headland) that was named as _Punta Seca_ ("Dry headland") by Columbus in his first visit to the island; and to the west is _Punta Payne_, in front of the Sosúa Beach.

The bay is divided in two smaller bays:
1. The western small bay, or _Puerto Chiquito_; it is the smaller of the two divisions of the bay and is where the Sosua River ends.
1. The eastern part, _Puerto Grande_ or commonly named _Puerto Sosúa_, is larger and it was used as a port in the past; the Sosúa beach is here.

Sosúa has a total area of , about  of the total area of the province of Puerto Plata . The city is about  from the Puerto Plata International Airport.

## History

At the beginning of the 20th Century, the United Fruit Company began to grow bananas around the present Sosúa to send the fruits to the United States. The company had over 1.5 million banana plants, and in the year 1900 they sent thousands of fruits to the United States alone. Many people came to live here and to work with the company. United Fruit later closed the Sosúa banana operations in 1916.

Seven hundred and fifty German and Austrian Jews refugees came to the Dominican Republic between 1940 and 1945 to live in Sosúa. Here they created a dairy and cheese factory named "Productos Sosúa" that is still working. When the World War II ended, some of this refugees went to live to United States but many of them stayed in Sosúa.

On March 27, 1958, Sosúa became a Municipal District and later, on August 12, 1978, a municipality.

With the development of tourism in the mid 1980s in the country, Sosúa came to be one of the most important places for tourism in the northern coast.

## Administrative division

The municipality of Sosúa has two municipal districts:

|Code|Municipal district|Population <small>(2010)</small>|
| --- | --- | --- |
|180702|Cabarete|14,606|
|180703|Sabaneta de Yásica|5,334|

## Economy

Even if agriculture and fishing were very important activities in the past, since the mid 1980s tourism has come to be most important economic activity, with several important hotels in the city and in places near Sosúa and Cabarete.

## Other websites

- Sosua Virtual Museum
- Tropical Zion: General Trujillo, FDR, and the Jews of Sosúa  by Allen Wells
- Sosúa, Dominican Republic
- Records of the Dominican Republic Settlement Association (DORSA) 1939-1977  American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee Archives

## Infobox (settlement)

- **name**: Sosúa
- **settlement type**: Municipality
- **image skyline**: City of Sosua, Dominican Republic, Aerial View.jpg
- **image alt**: View of Sosúa
- **image caption**: Aerial view of Sosúa
- **image seal**: Escudo del Municipio Sosúa.svg
- **seal size**: 85px
- **pushpin map**: Dominican Republic
- **pushpin relief**: 1
- **subdivision type**: Country
- **subdivision name**: Dominican Republic
- **subdivision type1**: Provinces of the Dominican Republic, Province
- **subdivision name1**: Puerto Plata Province, Puerto Plata
- **established title2**: Municipality since
- **established date2**: 1978
- **parts type**: Government of the Dominican Republic#Provincial and municipal government, Municipal districts
- **parts style**: para
- **p1**: Cabarete
- **p2**: Sabaneta de Yásica
- **area total km2**: 152.0
- **population total**: 29653
- **population as of**: 2010
- **total type**: Total
- **population urban**: 7713
- **population density km2**: auto
- **population demonym**: Sosuense
(in English, sosuan)
- **timezone**: Atlantic Standard Time Zone, AST
- **utc offset**: -4
- **timezone dst**: Atlantic Standard Time Zone, AST
- **utc offset dst**: -4
- **blank name sec1**: Distance
- **blank info sec1**: to San Felipe de Puerto Plata, Puerto Plata
- **website**: [http://www.sosua.gob.do Ayuntamiento de Sosúa]