After the assassination of dictator Rafael Leonidas Trujillo on May 30, 1961, the assets of the Corporación Dominicana de Centrales Azucareras (CDCA), the holding company controlled by the dictator that owned twelve sugar mills and whose interest represented 63% of the total sugar industry, became the property of the Dominican State by virtue of Law No. 6106 of November 14, 1962. This law created the Corporación Azucarera Dominicana (CAD) and assigned it with the responsibility for the administration of the twelve sugar mills from the date of its creation in 1962. On August 19, 1966, President Joaquín Balaguer promulgated Law No. 7, which dissolved the CAD and created the Consejo Estatal del Azúcar (CEA), a decentralized autonomous body to succeed the Corporación Azucarera Dominicana with the objective to coordinate and efficiently operate the sugar mills, lands and other interests acquired by the State from the CDCA in 1962.

During the 1960s and 1970s, the CEA was a dominant player in the Dominican sugar industry. It ran the twelve state owned sugar mills and produced around 60% of the country’s sugar. It also managed and supervised all the small to medium sugar cane growers or “colonos” who sold cane to the state mills and operated the Duquesa Experimental Station and CEAGANA, the division of livestock/animal husbandry. In the 1980s the CEA began to experience operational, financial, and management challenges with many of its mills becoming inefficient, financially unviable, or underutilized. It closed down Ingenios Catarey and Esperanza in 1987 and continued to operate the other ten sugar mills, but through the years its operations eventually created a condition of insolvency.  The financial crisis of the CEA was of such magnitude that by 1998 it had accumulated a capital deficit of approximately US$200 million while its capital accounts totaled only some US$76 million.  Its operations were subsidized by the Dominican Government to the tune of RD$700 million (±US$88.7 million) for the 1996-97 grinding season and RD$955 million (±US$104.3 million) for the 1998-99 grinding season.

In the 1990s, many Dominican state-owned enterprises including electric utilities, ports, airports and the sugar mills run by the CEA were operating inefficiently, with high losses and poor infrastructure. The government, under President Leonel Fernández pursued structural reforms to modernize the economy, align with international financial institutions, and attract foreign investment. In April 1997 the Dominican legislature passed the Public Companies Capitalization Law to modernize and restructure state-owned enterprises and to capitalize them by opening their ownership and management to private investors, while the State retained a share. The law provided for the disposition of government properties owned by several companies including the Corporación Dominicana de Empresas Electricas Estatales (CDEEE), the Corporación de Fomento de la Industria Hotelera y Desarrollo del Turismo (CORPHOTELS) and the CEA. By virtue of this law, the CEA decided to lease the ten sugar mills and their related assets it had operated since 1966 .

On December 13, 1999 the CEA entered into a thirty-year lease with Consorcio Azucarero Central (CAC) for one of the sugar mills. On December 15, 1999 entered into two thirty-year leases, one with Consorcio Azucarero del Caribe S A for five of its sugar mills and the other with Central Azucarera del Este for two of its mills. On February 29, 2000 a thirty-year lease agreement was entered with the Consorcio Agroindustrial Cañabrava C x A for the remaining two additional sugar mills.

• Consorcio Azucarero Central (CAC) - the CAC was granted rights to lease and operate one sugar mill.  The CAC was originally 49% local capital and 51% owned by the Consorcio Dominicano Franco Americano comprised of Consorcio Azucarero Central, Sucden, Amerop, Angel Alfonzo Casasnovas Guidecelli, Nivoni Juan Santoni and Nicomar, S. A.  According to their website www.cac.com.do, since 2000 it is owned by a group of Dominican and Guatemalan investors. ​

  • Ingenio Barahona - It is the only sugar mill that has operated uninterruptedly since 1999 when the CEA decided to lease its sugar mills in a recapitalization effort.

• Consorcio Azucarero del Caribe S A - was organized by Mexican enterprise ZUCARMEX to acquire by public tender five of the twelve sugar mills owned by the CEA with total daily milling capacity of 19,777 short tons or approximately 60% capacity of the CEA owned mills and 31% of all sugar mills in the country.  The mills awarded the Consorcio Azucarero del Caribe SA were:​​

  • Ingenio Consuelo - had a milling capacity of 4,600 tons per day.  Its last production year was 2006.  In 2011, it was dismantled and sold in China for scrap.  Its facilities were donated by the CEA to the ONG Fundación Pringamosa who today operates a metallurgical industry where the shop used to be.

  • Ingenio Quisqueya - its last production year was 1995-1996, it never resumed operations after being leased, all that is left is the chimney.

  • Ingenio Boca Chica - operated until 2007, it has since been demolished and all that is left is the chimney and a Baldwin steam locomotive on a plinth inside a children playground.

  • Ingenio Rio Haina - it had ceased to operate by 2007.

  • Ingenio Ozama - operated until 1988, its only remains are the chimney and an administrative block now part of Liceo Calixta Reyes.

• Central Azucarera del Este C por A - the original Lease Agreement signed 12/1/1999 was between the CEA, Central Azucarera de Este C. por A. and Central Pringamosa C. por A.  Subsequent to Pringamosa winning the initial bid, it organized as its succesor Central Azucarera del Este C. por A. of which it owned 93%.  The principal owner of Pringamosa was Miguel Chinchilla Varona.  The additional owners brought in to form Central Azucarera del Este C. por A. were Nelson Aybar Aponte, Hacienda Luisita C. por A., Nelson Aybar C. por A., Ricardo Aybar Dionisio, Diego Casasnovas C. por A., Pringamosa C. por A., Agropecuaria Linnat S A, Juan Antonio Giraldez Casasnovas and Nicolás Casasnovas.

  • Ingenio Porvenir - Its last milling season under the Central Azucarera del Este was 2006-2007.  On September 22, 2010 after cancelling its lease to Central Azucarera del Este, the CEA entered into a 30-year lease agreement of Ingenio Porvenir with Azucarera Porvenir S. R. L., owned by the Spanish firm Azucarera del Gualdafeo.  On May 30, 2011 Azucarera del Gualdafeo filed a complaint alleging the CEA leased to third parties land included in the 2010 lease agreement. On October 12, 2012 the Court of Arbitration ruled in favor of Azucarera Porvenir S. R. L. and awarded payment of US$1 million for damages. On January 9, 2014 the CEA began managing Ingenio Porvenir as a court appointed provisional administrator. On December 12, 2014 Azucarera Porvenir S. R. L. filed action requesting the CEA return the administration of the sugar mill which request was denied on March 17, 2015. On December 19, 2017 the court upheld a decision of January, 2019 which in turn upheld the decision of December 12, 2014. On February 15, 2022 the Dominican Supreme Court known as the “Tribunal Constitucional de la Republic Dominicana” upheld the decision of the lower court of December 19, 2017 but despite same the sugar mill continues to be operated by the CEA and there is no information regarding damages paid. ​The government under President Luis Abinader has made efforts to reactivate state sugar mills, including Ingenio Porvenir. The CEA plus the Dirección General de Bienes Nacionales have allocated resources for its rehabilitation after a period of inactivity. For the 2023-2024 harvest season, Ingenio Porvenir was planned to process ±200,000 tonnes of sugar cane of which 100,000 were to be grown internally by the mill and 100,000 by colonos and produce ±15,000 m.t. of sugar plus ±1,800,000 gallons of molasses but the actual output was far lower. For the 2024-2025 harvest season, the mill processed 98,183 tonnes of sugar cane and produced only 926 m.t. of raw sugar.

  • Ingenio Santa Fé - see Central Romana, it was closed down in 2010, sugarcane grown on lands formerly of Ingenio Santa Fé are being processed at Ingenio Porvenir.

• Consorcio Agroindustrial Cañabrava C por A - was established in 2000 to acquire two mills in the northern part of the country with a milling capacity of 2,721 m. t. daily which represented 9% of the public mills capacity and 4% of capacity at National level.  Its principal shareholder was Venezualan born Julio Hazim, a local doctor, businessman, sports promoter and local professional baseball team owner and TV producer.  Cañabrava had substantial loans with Banco Internacional (Baninter) which failed in 2003.  In 2006, the Central Bank of the Dominican Republic as liquidator of Baninter, assumed all the assets of Consorcio Agroindustrial Cañabrava.​

  • Ingenio Monte Llano - its last year of operation was 2005 in 2012 the sugar mill was leased to US based Consorcio Azucarero & Biocombustible Quisqueya (Cabioqui) who promised to invest RD$40 million and resume operations in a year’s time, but that never happened.  It was acquired back by the CEA in 2015 as the result of a court action against Consorcio Agroindustrial Cañabrava C por A and Consorcio Azucarero & Biocombustible Quisqueya  (Cabioqui).

  • Ingenio Amistad - its last milling season was 1999, never operated while in the ownership of Cañabrava.  Baninter liquidators agreed in 2011 to sell Amistad facilities and machinery as scrap to a private company, move that means the sugar mill will never operate again.

In all, the 1999 recapitalization effort did not accomplish its intended purpose. Only the agreement with Consorcio Azucarero Central to operate Ingenio Barahona worked out as expected. Of the other nine sugar mills, only Ingenio Porvenir is still in operation under the direct administration of the CEA. Despite the number of sugar mills no longer in operation, in 2024 the Dominican Republic continues to be the beneficiary of the largest assigned tariff-rate quota established by the USDA of 189,343 m. t., allowing Dominican sugar to enter the US, its main market, under a low tariff.