Economy of Bucaramanga

The city has Chimitá Industrial Zone located west of the city near the town of Giron, many companies from different specialties like Terpel have production plants there. Also in the city there's one of the main production plants of Bavaria Brewery. The city is planning to build the Free port of Santander to be located within the metropolitan area of Bucaramanga.

The 2005 census conducted by the DANE presents the following figures, 16.5% of establishments are engaged in industrial activities, 52.1% are engaged in trade activities, 29.8% are engaged in the services sector and 1.6% are engaged in other activities. 3.7% of Bucaramanga's households develop an economic activity in their homes. Establishments which have between 0 and 10 employees are the mos common in the trade sector account for 54.4% of it. and business which have between 10 and 50 employees account for 41.7% of the services sector. As for the rural sector of the city, DANE figures showed that 75.9% of rural homes are occupied by farmers. Of these homes, 70.1% is devoted to agriculture, 94.1% to raise livestock, and 5.6 to fish farming. 5.6% work. These data concludes that most houses simultaneously develop 2 or 3 of these activities.

Thanks to the commercial and business development that has been taking over the city, Bucaramanga has positioned itself as a city of congresses and events, having infrastructure like Fair and Exhibition Centre - CENFER, many fairs and exhibitions in all branches of the national economic sectors are performed there annually .

The City also has a poly functional center for events and shows, which gives a space for performing great shows,