Speech and voice:
48kHz WAV, 16-bit, delivered with transcript, timing, and speaker metadata.
AI Training Data Collection in the Dominican Republic
Hope Research Group collects speech, video, image, and text data in the Dominican Republic for machine learning teams needing genuine regional coverage. We coordinate DR field work through our office in Santo Domingo. We collect for enterprise ML teams, frontier AI labs, vendor-network aggregators, and regional AI programs, including the Latam-GPT partner network (the Dominican Republic is a formal Latam-GPT partner country per CENIA's February 2026 announcement).
Real participantsConsent recordsField-verified recruitmentDocumented chain of custody
Why Dominican Republic matters for AI training data
The Dominican Republic has a population of roughly 11 million, per the Oficina Nacional de Estadística (ONE). It is one of the largest Spanish-speaking populations in the Caribbean and a strategically important market for regional AI training data collection.
Two features make DR disproportionately valuable.
First, Dominican Spanish is a distinct dialect within Caribbean Spanish, characterised by features that differ from Mexican, Rioplatense, Andean, or Peninsular Spanish. Voice AI and LLM systems built on bundled "LatAm Spanish" training data under-perform for Dominican users at rates measurable in production. ML teams pursuing regional accuracy for the Caribbean Spanish-speaking market benefit from Dominican-specific collection rather than pan-Latin American Spanish generalisation.
Second, the DR's demographic composition is predominantly mixed-heritage, with significant Afro-Dominican and European-descended populations, plus a substantial Haitian-Dominican community. For facial computer vision training data seeking mixed-race sample diversity in Caribbean populations, DR provides a distinct contribution complementary to Jamaica's predominantly Afro-Caribbean sample and Trinidad's Indo-Caribbean-plus-Afro-Caribbean mix.
Languages we collect
Dominican Spanish. Read speech, spontaneous speech, dialogue, conversational, and telephony-conditioned audio. Text data including social media, transcribed speech, and translation pairs. Distinctive Dominican Spanish features (aspiration or elision of syllable-final /s/, yeísmo patterns, vocabulary items specific to the Dominican context) are preserved in the audio and flagged in metadata where the client specification requires it.
Standard Spanish and Caribbean Spanish bundling. For briefs requiring Standard Spanish alongside Dominican-specific data, or Caribbean Spanish variants grouped with the Dominican sample, we can source both configurations.
Modalities and specifications
Video and computer vision:
720p or higher, 30fps, .mp4 or .mov, delivered with per-participant demographic metadata.
Image:
Static image capture for object recognition, scene classification, and biometric-adjacent computer vision.
Text:
Written data including prompts, dialogues, translations, and evaluation traces.
No synthetic data. Every record has a real Dominican participant behind it, an informed consent record attached, and a full chain of custody.
How the fieldwork runs in Dominican Republic
Our DR coordinator team recruits through community networks across Santo Domingo (the capital and Distrito Nacional), Santiago (the second-largest city and centre of the Cibao region), and other population centres including La Vega, San Pedro de Macorís, Puerto Plata, and San Cristóbal. Recruitment channels include universities (Universidad Autónoma de Santo Domingo, Pontificia Universidad Católica Madre y Maestra, INTEC), community-based organisations, and vetted online recruitment channels.
For self-record briefs, we over-recruit against target by 30 to 40 percent to absorb drop-off inherent in remote self-reporting. For on-site collection, over-recruitment sits at 15 to 20 percent.
QA runs first-pass against brief specifications before submission goes to the client. Rejected submissions cycle back for re-record where possible, or are replaced from the over-recruited pool. Our five-stage workflow is documented on the main AI training data services page.
Consent, data protection, and provenance
The Dominican Republic's Ley 172-13 (Data Protection Law, 2013) establishes the framework for personal data processing, participant rights, and data controller obligations. Every participant signs a project-specific consent form naming the collector (HRG), the data controller (the client), the intended use of the data, the retention period, and the participant's right of withdrawal.
Consent forms are archived by HRG for the contract-specified retention period, with a separate consent-record ledger cross-referencing each participant identifier to their signed form. Audit trails are producible on request.
Timeline and capacity
Typical timelines from HRG's DR infrastructure:
- 500 to 1,500 accepted participants across single-modality collection: 3 to 5 weeks.
- 5,000 to 10,000 accepted participants with balanced demographic quotas: 8 to 14 weeks.
- Sovereign, academic, or Latam-GPT-partnered collection with staged delivery: 3 to 12 months.
Scoping conversations are complimentary. On tight demographic quotas we return a DR-specific feasibility assessment within 48 to 72 hours of receiving the brief.
An honest limit
The DR is a substantial Spanish-speaking market, but it is not a substitute for Mexican, Rioplatense, or Andean Spanish coverage if a brief specifies those variants. Dominican Spanish is distinct enough that ML teams building for Mexican, Argentine, or Peruvian end-users should not conflate coverage. We will surface this at scoping and recommend the appropriate country or countries for the target variant.
Frequently asked questions
Can HRG collect Dominican Spanish speech data at volume?
Yes. The DR is HRG's primary Dominican Spanish field market. We can source at volumes from a few hundred to several thousand participants, subject to quota complexity and timeline.
How does Dominican Spanish differ from other Latin American Spanish variants?
Dominican Spanish is part of the Caribbean Spanish family and shows features distinct from Mexican, Rioplatense, or Andean Spanish, including syllable-final /s/ aspiration or elision, yeísmo, and vocabulary items specific to the Dominican context. For voice AI or LLM accuracy targeting the Dominican market, dedicated Dominican Spanish collection meaningfully outperforms bundled "LatAm Spanish" training data.
Where does HRG conduct on-site collection in the DR?
Primary fieldwork locations are in Santo Domingo and Santiago. On-site collection in La Vega, San Pedro de Macorís, Puerto Plata, and San Cristóbal is available with additional lead time.
What is Ley 172-13?
Ley 172-13 is the Dominican Republic's Data Protection Law, enacted in 2013. It establishes participant rights (including consent, access, correction, and deletion) and data controller obligations. HRG's DR field work operates in compliance with the Law.
Can HRG deliver an end-to-end training data pipeline in the DR?
HRG collects and delivers structured, consented field data. We do not run large-scale annotation pipelines. For projects needing collection plus annotation, we collect and hand off to your annotation partner.
Is the Dominican Republic part of the Latam-GPT partner network?
Yes. Per CENIA's February 2026 announcement, the Dominican Republic is a formal Latam-GPT partner country alongside Brazil, Peru, Costa Rica, Chile, and Panama. This creates specific pathways for academic, sovereign, and public-interest AI training data collaborations in the DR.
Talk to us
If you are scoping an AI training data project that needs Dominican Republic coverage, book a 60-minute strategic consultation with Kurt Wedderburn:
Book a consultationOr email direct: admin@hoperesearchgroup.com