Gabon Economic Outlook
- The growth rate of real Gross Domestic Product (GDP) should slow in 2012 and 2013.
- The country needs to improve its fiscal sustainability and its external competitiveness, given the prospect of declining oil reserves.
- The overall unemployment rate is 16% but that of young people is 30 %.
Economic activity was intense in 2011, supported by a rise in public investment for the building and repair of the road infrastructure and of stadiums in preparation for the 2012 football African Cup of Nations competition, hosted by Gabon and Equatorial Guinea. The outlook for 2012, and to a lesser degree 2013, appears favourable. Prices for the country’s exports (oil, manganese, wood) are holding up. Oil companies are maximising production from old wells. The Nkok special economic zone will start operations. But the country’s macroeconomic situation remains dependent on the price of oil, which accounts for more than 60% of state revenues and 75% of its exports. Gabon will need to improve its fiscal sustainability and its external competitiveness given the prospect of a decline in oil reserves.
Economic management displays a determination to raise Gabon to the status of emerging nation by 2035 with a diversification of the economy and an improvement in the business climate.
Inequalities of income and poverty persist. Unemployment among young people is double the national average. The government has set aside specific funds to support the reforms undertaken by the national jobs agency and an “e-employment” project, working with the Economic Commission for Africa (ECA) and the Economic Community of Central African States (ECCAS). These activities need to be backed up by the direct creation of jobs through foreign direct investment (FDI) in the special economic zones and the non-oil extractive sector (manganese and iron).
