In 1910, the South Porto Rico Sugar Co. (SPRSC) expansion plans looked outside of Puerto Rico to the Dominican Republic which at the time was enjoying a time of relative political stability.  The SPRSC was looking outside of Puerto Rico due to the large capacity of its sugar mill and the limits of available sugar lands due to the small size of the island and the ever increasing cost of available land.

The SPRSC initiative was opposed by sugar interests both in the Dominican Republic and Puerto Rico who even lobbied in Washington against it.  Despite the opposition, extensive negotiations with the Dominican Government were carried out that culminated with the passing on June 26, 1911 of the Agricultural Franchises Law.  The law was drafter by the SPRSC attorneys and adopted by the Dominican Government as its own. 

On January 7, 1911, the SPRSC took a risk and acquired two thousand six hundred acres from Pedro Marin north of the town of La Romana under the name Central Romana, Inc., incorporated in Connecticut in 1910.  On May 13, 1912 Central Romana, Inc. received permission from the Dominican Government to operate under the Agricultural Franchise Law.  Its first harvest began late in 1913 when a total of 28,134 tons of cane were shipped to Guanica Centrale in Ensenada, Puerto Rico to be processed.  At that time, the SPRSC had no immediate plans to build a sugar mill in La Romana.

By 1917, Central Romana Inc. had increased its land used to grow sugarcane to some twenty thousand acres.  Tonnage cultivated also had increased about fifteen fold to a level where it exceeded the milling capacity of Guanica Centrale.  So that year the South Porto Rico sugar Co. started to build a sugar mill with a daily milling capacity of 2,000 tons of sugarcane.  In its first grinding season of 1918-19, La Romana produced 22,552 m.t. of raw sugar which was second only to Ingenio Consuelo.  The next grinding season, La Romana was already the top producing sugar mill in the Dominican Republic with 28, 588 m.t.  It continued to dominate as the major sugar producer with roughly 20% of lands owned by sugar estates and 20% of Dominican sugar production.

Ingenio Santa Fé was established in 1885 by the firm Vazquez, Rousset & Cia. with Cuban immigrant Salvador Ross as administrator.  It was later acquired by Ross in partnership with Bartram Bros. (some say William Bass) who sold it to the South Porto Rico Sugar Co. in 1925.  In 1956 the South Porto Rico Sugar Co. sold Ingenio Santa Fé to the Rafael Leonidas Trujillo interests, proceeds which were used to increase the milling capacity of La Romana which in 1957 reached 20,000 tons of sugarcane daily.

In 1967 the South Porto Rico Sugar Co. sold Central Romana Corporation, Ltd. to Gulf+Western Industries and in 1984 Gulf+Western sold it to the Fanjul Brothers of Palm Beach, FL, its current owners.  The Fanjul brothers made large investments in different areas including a sugar refinery with capacity of over 125,000 tons of white sugar.  Today, Central Romana Corporation Ltd. owns over 200,000 acres of land of which more than half are dedicated to the cultivation of sugarcane.

Currently, it is the largest mill in the Dominican Republic and one of the largest mills in the world with a grinding capacity of 20,000 tons of sugar per day.  For its agricultural, industrial, tourist and other operations, the Central Romana Corporation Ltd. employs about twenty five thousand people, the largest private employer in the Dominican Republic.