Economía - descripción: Despite sustained domestic and international efforts to improve economic and demographic prospects, Bangladesh remains one of the world's poorest, most densely populated, and least developed nations. The economy is largely agricultural, with the cultivation of rice the single most important activity in the economy. Major impediments to growth include frequent cyclones and floods, the inefficiency of state-owned enterprises, a rapidly growing labor force that cannot be absorbed by agriculture, delays in exploiting energy resources (natural gas), inadequate power supplies, and slow implementation of economic reforms. Prime Minister Sheikh HASINA Wajed's Awami League government has made some headway improving the climate for foreign investors and liberalizing the capital markets; for example, it has negotiated with foreign firms for oil and gas exploration, better countrywide distribution of cooking gas, and the construction of natural gas pipelines and power plants. Progress on other economic reforms has been halting because of opposition from the bureaucracy, public sector unions, and other vested interest groups. The especially severe floods of 1998 increased the country's reliance on large-scale international aid. So far the East Asian financial crisis has not had major impact on the economy.

Producto Bruto Interno (PBI): purchasing power parity - $187 billion (1999 est.)

PBI - Indice de Incremento real: 5.2% (1999 est.)

PBI - por capital: purchasing power parity - $1,470 (1999 est.)

PBI - Composición por Sector:
agriculture: 30%
industry: 17%
services: 53% (1999 est.)

Población bajo linea de pobertad: 35.6% (FY95/96 est.)

Ingreso en casa o porcentage de consumción:
lowest 10%: 4.1%
highest 10%: 23.7% (1992)

Indice de Inflación (precios del consumidor): 9% (FY98/99 est.)

Fuerza Laboral: 56 million (1995-96)
note: extensive export of labor to Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, UAE, Oman, Qatar, Malaysia, and Singapore

Fuerza Laboral - por ocupación: agriculture 63%, services 26%, industry 11% (FY95/96)

Indice de desempleo: 35.2% (1996)

Presupuesto:
revenues: $4.3 billion
expenditures: $6.5 billion, including capital expenditures of $NA (1997)

Industrias: cotton textiles, jute, garments, tea processing, paper newsprint, cement, chemical fertilizer, light engineering, sugar

Industrial production growth rate: 2.5% (1997 est.)

Electricidad - Producción: 12.5 billion kWh (1999 est.)

Electricidad - producción por fuente:
fossil fuel: 98%
hydro: 2%
nuclear: 0%
other: 0% (1999)

Electricidad - consumción: 11.039 billion kWh (1998)

Electricidad - exportaciones: 0 kWh (1999)

Electricidad - importaciones: 0 kWh (1999)

Agricultura - productos: rice, jute, tea, wheat, sugarcane, potatoes; beef, milk, poultry, tobacco, pulses, oilseeds, spices, fruit

Exportaciones: $5.1 billion (1998)

Exporationes - comodidades: garments, jute and jute goods, leather, frozen fish and seafood

Exportaciones - socios: US 33%, Germany 10%, UK 9%, France 6%, Italy 5% (1997)

Importaciones: $8.01 billion (1998)

Importaciones - comodidades: machinery and equipment, chemicals, iron and steel, textiles, raw cotton, food, crude oil and petroleum products, cement

Importaciones - socios: India 12%, China 9%, Japan 7%, Hong Kong 6%, South Korea 6% (1997)

Deuda - externa: $16.5 billion (1998)

Ayuda economica - recipiente: $1.475 billion (FY96/97)

Moneda: 1 taka (Tk) = 100 poisha

Indice de intercambio: taka (Tk) per US$1 - 51.000 (January 2000), 49.085 (1999), 46.906 (1998), 43.892 (1997), 41.794 (1996), 40.278 (1995)

Año Fiscal: 1 July - 30 June