Survey of economic and social conditions in Africa 1978 - 1979 - Part I

Abstract

According io preliminary estimates of ECA, African developing countries as a whole grew at an average annual rate of about 5.5 per cent in 1979 compared with an average growth of 4.6 per cent in 1978. However, most of the increase is attributed to the oil exporting countries of Africa, while the non-oil-exporting countries suffered a deceleration in their GDP growth rate. Indeed, there were wide disparities in performance. The major oil-exporting countries achieved some 7 per cent in 1979 against a mere 4.7 percent in 1978, over 7 percent in 1977 and some 12 per cent in 1976 giving an average rate of over 7 percent during the period 1970 to 1978. In the non-oil-exporting African countries and worse still in the least developed African countries, the position continued to be serious, if not to deteriorate, with the GDP annual growth rate in 1979 being around the dismal figure of 3 per cent which is even lower than the average of 3 to 4 per cent achieved during the years 1970 to 1978.