Economy - overview This small landlocked economy is based largely on subsistence agriculture,which occupies more than 60% of the population. Manufacturing features a numberof agroprocessing factories. Mining has declined in importance in recent years;high-grade iron ore deposits were depleted by 1978, and health concerns havecut world demand for asbestos. Exports of soft drink concentrate, sugar andwood pulp are the main earners of hard currency. Surrounded by South Africa,except for a short border with Mozambique, Swaziland is heavily dependenton South Africa from which it receives nearly 90% of its imports and to whichit sends more than half of its exports. Remittances from Swazi workers inSouth African mines supplement domestically earned income by as much as 20%.The government is trying to improve the atmosphere for foreign investment.Overgrazing, soil depletion, and drought persist as problems for the future.

GDP purchasing power parity - $3.8 billion (1996 est.)

GDP - real growth rate 2.9% (1996 est.)

GDP - per capita purchasing power parity - $3,800 (1996 est.)

GDP - composition by sector
agriculture: 12%
industry: 43%
services: 45% (1994 est.)

Inflation rate - consumer price index 14.7% (1995)

Labor force
total: 160,355 (1986 est.)
by occupation: private sector about 65%, public sector 35%

Unemployment rate 15% (1992 est.)

Budget
revenues: $397 million
expenditures: $413 million, including capital expenditures of $78 million (1995/96)

Industries mining (coal and asbestos), wood pulp, sugar, soft drink concentrates

Industrial production growth rate 4.2% (1993 est.)

Electricity - capacity 50,000 kW (1993)

Electricity - production 84 million kWh (1993)
note: imports 90% of its electricity from South Africa

Electricity - consumption per capita 612 kWh (1993)

Agriculture - products sugarcane, cotton, maize, tobacco, rice, citrus, pineapples, corn, sorghum,peanuts; cattle, goats, sheep

Exports
total value : $700 million (f.o.b., 1996)
commodities: soft drink concentrates, sugar, wood pulp, cotton yarn
partners : South Africa 58%, EU 20%, Mozambique 6% (1994)

Imports
total value: $831 million (f.o.b., 1996)
commodities: motor vehicles, machinery, transport equipment, petroleum products,foodstuffs, chemicals
partners : South Africa 88%, Japan, UK, US (FY94/95)

Debt - external $175 million (1995 est.)

Economic aid
recipient: ODA, $NA

Currency 1 lilangeni (E) = 100 cents

Exchange rates emalangeni (E) per US$1 - 4.6410 (January 1997), 4.2706 (1996), 3.6266(1995), 3.5490 (1994), 3.2636 (1993), 2.8497 (1992); note - the Swazi emalangeniare at par with the South African rand

Fiscal year 1 April - 31 March

NOTE: The information regarding Swaziland on this page is re-published from the 1997 World Fact Book of the United States Central Intelligence Agency. No claims are made regarding the accuracy of Swaziland Economy 1997 information contained here. All suggestions for corrections of any errors about Swaziland Economy 1997 should be addressed to the CIA.