Vanuatu

Vanuatu

Vanuatu , officially the Republic of Vanuatu , is an island nation located in the South Pacific Ocean. The archipelago, which is of volcanic origin, is some east of northern Australia, northeast of New Caledonia, west of Fiji, and southeast of the Solomon Islands, near New Guinea.Vanuatu was...

's economy

Economics

Economics is the social science that analyzes the production, distribution, and consumption of goods and services. The term economics comes from the Ancient Greek from + , hence "rules of the house"...

 is primarily agricultur

Agriculture

Agriculture is the cultivation of animals, plants, fungi and other life forms for food, fiber, and other products used to sustain life. Agriculture was the key implement in the rise of sedentary human civilization, whereby farming of domesticated species created food surpluses that nurtured the...

al; 80% of the population is engaged in agricultural activities that range from subsistence farming

Subsistence agriculture

Subsistence agriculture is self-sufficiency farming in which the farmers focus on growing enough food to feed their families. The typical subsistence farm has a range of crops and animals needed by the family to eat and clothe themselves during the year. Planting decisions are made with an eye...

 to smallholder farming of coconut

Coconut

The coconut palm, Cocos nucifera, is a member of the family Arecaceae . It is the only accepted species in the genus Cocos. The term coconut can refer to the entire coconut palm, the seed, or the fruit, which is not a botanical nut. The spelling cocoanut is an old-fashioned form of the word...

s and other cash crop

Cash crop

In agriculture, a cash crop is a crop which is grown for profit.The term is used to differentiate from subsistence crops, which are those fed to the producer's own livestock or grown as food for the producer's family...

s. Copra

Copra

Copra is the dried meat, or kernel, of the coconut. Coconut oil extracted from it has made copra an important agricultural commodity for many coconut-producing countries. It also yields coconut cake which is mainly used as feed for livestock.-Production:...

 is by far the most important cash crop (making up more than 35% of the country's exports), followed by timber

Timber

Timber may refer to:* Timber, a term common in the United Kingdom and Australia for wood materials * Timber, Oregon, an unincorporated community in the U.S...

, beef

Beef

Beef is the culinary name for meat from bovines, especially domestic cattle. Beef can be harvested from cows, bulls, heifers or steers. It is one of the principal meats used in the cuisine of the Middle East , Australia, Argentina, Brazil, Europe and the United States, and is also important in...

, and cocoa. Kava

Kava

Kava or kava-kava is a crop of the western Pacific....

 root extract exports also have become important. In addition, the government has maintained Vanuatu's pre-independence status as a tax haven and international financial center. About 2,000 registered institutions offer a wide range of offshore bank

Offshore bank

An offshore bank is a bank located outside the country of residence of the depositor, typically in a low tax jurisdiction that provides financial and legal advantages. These advantages typically include:...

ing, investment, legal, accounting, and insurance and trust company

Trust company

A trust company is a corporation, especially a commercial bank, organized to perform the fiduciary of trusts and agencies. It is normally owned by one of three types of structures: an independent partnership, a bank, or a law firm, each of which specializes in being a trustee of various kinds of...

 services. Vanuatu also maintains an international shipping register in New York City

New York City

New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...

.

Copra

Copra

Copra is the dried meat, or kernel, of the coconut. Coconut oil extracted from it has made copra an important agricultural commodity for many coconut-producing countries. It also yields coconut cake which is mainly used as feed for livestock.-Production:...

, cocoa, kava

Kava

Kava or kava-kava is a crop of the western Pacific....

 and beef

Beef

Beef is the culinary name for meat from bovines, especially domestic cattle. Beef can be harvested from cows, bulls, heifers or steers. It is one of the principal meats used in the cuisine of the Middle East , Australia, Argentina, Brazil, Europe and the United States, and is also important in...

 account for more than 60% of Vanuatu's total exports by value and agriculture accounts for 20% of GDP

Gross domestic product

Gross domestic product refers to the market value of all final goods and services produced within a country in a given period. GDP per capita is often considered an indicator of a country's standard of living....

. Tourism

Tourism

Tourism is travel for recreational, leisure or business purposes. The World Tourism Organization defines tourists as people "traveling to and staying in places outside their usual environment for not more than one consecutive year for leisure, business and other purposes".Tourism has become a...

 is Vanuatu's fastest-growing sector, having comprised 40% of GDP in 2000. Industry's portion of GDP declined from 15% to 10% between 1990 and 2000. Government consumption accounted for about 27% of GDP.

Vanuatu has commodities, mostly agricultural, produced for export

Export

The term export is derived from the conceptual meaning as to ship the goods and services out of the port of a country. The seller of such goods and services is referred to as an "exporter" who is based in the country of export whereas the overseas based buyer is referred to as an "importer"...

. In 2000, imports exceeded exports by a ratio of nearly 4 to 1. This was offset by high services income from tourism, which kept the current account balance fairly even. After a downturn in 2001 and 2002 due to a decrease in tourism funding, the economy was expected to grow by 3.9%, increasing to 4.3% in 2007.

Vanuatu claims an exclusive economic zone of 680000 square kilometres (262,549.5 sq mi) and possesses marine resource

Sustainable fisheries

Sustainability in fisheries combines theoretical disciplines, such as the population dynamics of fisheries, with practical strategies, such as avoiding overfishing through techniques such as individual fishing quotas, curtailing destructive and illegal fishing practices by lobbying for appropriate...

s. Some ni-Vanuatu are involved in fishing

Fishing

Fishing is the activity of trying to catch wild fish. Fish are normally caught in the wild. Techniques for catching fish include hand gathering, spearing, netting, angling and trapping....

, along with foreign fleets.

Luganville

Luganville

Luganville, called "Santo" by people from Vanuatu's northern islands who use Luganville as their big city, and called "Kanal" by rural residents of the large island of Espiritu Santo, is the second largest city in Vanuatu. The population is .Luganville is one of Vanuatu's busiest ports,...

, the second largest city, is a hub for exports with 64.3% of domestic exports leaving it compared to 35.7% for the capital of Port Vila

Port Vila

Port Vila is the capital and largest city of Vanuatu. Situated on the south coast of the island of Efate, in Shefa Province, the city population at last was 29,356, an increase of 55% on the previous census result . This suggests a 2007 population of about 40,000 or around 65% of the province's...

, whereas imports show the opposite trend with 86.9% entering through the capital and 13.1% through Luganville.

In 1997 the government, with the aid of the Asian Development Bank

Asian Development Bank

The Asian Development Bank is a regional development bank established on 22 August 1966 to facilitate economic development of countries in Asia...

, committed itself to a 3-year comprehensive reform program. During the first year of the program the government has adopted a value-added tax, consolidated and reformed government-owned banks, and started a 10% downsizing in the public service. The program was derailed when Barak Sope

Barak Sopé

Barak Tame Sopé Mautamata is a politician from Vanuatu. He is the leader of the Melanesian Progressive Party and was, until 2008, a member of the ni-Vanuatu parliament from the island of Efate...

 became Prime Minister. Under Prime Minister

Prime minister

A prime minister is the most senior minister of cabinet in the executive branch of government in a parliamentary system. In many systems, the prime minister selects and may dismiss other members of the cabinet, and allocates posts to members within the government. In most systems, the prime...

 Edward Natapei

Edward Natapei

Edward Nipake Natapei Tuta Fanua`araki is a politician from Vanuatu. He was elected Prime Minister of Vanuatu on two separate terms, and was previously the Minister of Foreign Affairs briefly in 1991, the acting President of Vanuatu from 2 March 1999 to 24 March 1999 , and Deputy Prime Minister...

, reform programs have been reintroduced.

The government declared 2007 to be "the Year of the Traditional Economy" , encouraging the trade of sea shells and pig tusks and discouraging cash transfers. By the end of the year, they extended the experiment in to 2008. The establishing of the Tari Bunia Bank, to deal in customary wealth, was part of this initiative.

Vanuatu was ranked the 173rd safest investment destination in the world in the March 2011 Euromoney Country Risk rankings.

GDP:
purchasing power parity

Purchasing power parity

In economics, purchasing power parity is a condition between countries where an amount of money has the same purchasing power in different countries. The prices of the goods between the countries would only reflect the exchange rates...

 - $580 million (2003 est.)

GDP - real growth rate:
1,1% (2003 estimate)

GDP - per capita:
purchasing power parity - $2 900 (1999 est.)

GDP - composition by sector:

agriculture:
20%

industry:
17%

services:
63% (2010 est.)

Population below poverty line:
NA%

Household income or consumption by percentage share:

lowest 10%:
NA%

highest 10%:
NA%

Inflation rate (consumer prices):
3,1% (2003 est.)

Labor force:
NA

Labor force - by occupation:
agriculture

Agriculture

Agriculture is the cultivation of animals, plants, fungi and other life forms for food, fiber, and other products used to sustain life. Agriculture was the key implement in the rise of sedentary human civilization, whereby farming of domesticated species created food surpluses that nurtured the...

 59%,
industry

Industry

Industry refers to the production of an economic good or service within an economy.-Industrial sectors:There are four key industrial economic sectors: the primary sector, largely raw material extraction industries such as mining and farming; the secondary sector, involving refining, construction,...

 9%,
services 32% (2010 est.)

Unemployment rate:
NA%

Ease of Doing Business Rank: 60th

Budget:

revenues:
$52,6 million

expenditures:
$54,3 million, including capital expenditures of $700 000 (2003 est.)

Industries:
food and fish freezing, wood processing, meat canning

Industrial production growth rate:
6% (2007 est.)

Electricity - production:
41 GWh (2003)

Electricity - production by source:

fossil fuel:
97%

hydro:
0%

nuclear:
0%

other:
3% (2008)

Electricity - consumption:
38,13 GWh (2003)

Electricity - exports:
200 kWh (2003)

Electricity - imports:
0 kWh (2003)

Agriculture - products:
copra

Copra

Copra is the dried meat, or kernel, of the coconut. Coconut oil extracted from it has made copra an important agricultural commodity for many coconut-producing countries. It also yields coconut cake which is mainly used as feed for livestock.-Production:...

, coconut

Coconut

The coconut palm, Cocos nucifera, is a member of the family Arecaceae . It is the only accepted species in the genus Cocos. The term coconut can refer to the entire coconut palm, the seed, or the fruit, which is not a botanical nut. The spelling cocoanut is an old-fashioned form of the word...

s, cocoa, coffee

Coffee

Coffee is a brewed beverage with a dark,init brooo acidic flavor prepared from the roasted seeds of the coffee plant, colloquially called coffee beans. The beans are found in coffee cherries, which grow on trees cultivated in over 70 countries, primarily in equatorial Latin America, Southeast Asia,...

, kava

Kava

Kava or kava-kava is a crop of the western Pacific....

, taro

Taro

Taro is a common name for the corms and tubers of several plants in the family Araceae . Of these, Colocasia esculenta is the most widely cultivated, and is the subject of this article. More specifically, this article describes the 'dasheen' form of taro; another variety is called eddoe.Taro is...

, yams

Yam (vegetable)

Yam is the common name for some species in the genus Dioscorea . These are perennial herbaceous vines cultivated for the consumption of their starchy tubers in Africa, Asia, Latin America and Oceania...

, coconut

Coconut

The coconut palm, Cocos nucifera, is a member of the family Arecaceae . It is the only accepted species in the genus Cocos. The term coconut can refer to the entire coconut palm, the seed, or the fruit, which is not a botanical nut. The spelling cocoanut is an old-fashioned form of the word...

s, fruit

Fruit

In broad terms, a fruit is a structure of a plant that contains its seeds.The term has different meanings dependent on context. In non-technical usage, such as food preparation, fruit normally means the fleshy seed-associated structures of certain plants that are sweet and edible in the raw state,...

s, vegetable

Vegetable

The noun vegetable usually means an edible plant or part of a plant other than a sweet fruit or seed. This typically means the leaf, stem, or root of a plant....

s, fish

Fish

Fish are a paraphyletic group of organisms that consist of all gill-bearing aquatic vertebrate animals that lack limbs with digits. Included in this definition are the living hagfish, lampreys, and cartilaginous and bony fish, as well as various extinct related groups...

, beef

Beef

Beef is the culinary name for meat from bovines, especially domestic cattle. Beef can be harvested from cows, bulls, heifers or steers. It is one of the principal meats used in the cuisine of the Middle East , Australia, Argentina, Brazil, Europe and the United States, and is also important in...

Exports:
$228 million (f.o.b., 2010 est.)

Exports - commodities:
copra

Copra

Copra is the dried meat, or kernel, of the coconut. Coconut oil extracted from it has made copra an important agricultural commodity for many coconut-producing countries. It also yields coconut cake which is mainly used as feed for livestock.-Production:...

, beef

Beef

Beef is the culinary name for meat from bovines, especially domestic cattle. Beef can be harvested from cows, bulls, heifers or steers. It is one of the principal meats used in the cuisine of the Middle East , Australia, Argentina, Brazil, Europe and the United States, and is also important in...

, cocoa, timber

Timber

Timber may refer to:* Timber, a term common in the United Kingdom and Australia for wood materials * Timber, Oregon, an unincorporated community in the U.S...

, kava

Kava

Kava or kava-kava is a crop of the western Pacific....

, coffee

Coffee

Coffee is a brewed beverage with a dark,init brooo acidic flavor prepared from the roasted seeds of the coffee plant, colloquially called coffee beans. The beans are found in coffee cherries, which grow on trees cultivated in over 70 countries, primarily in equatorial Latin America, Southeast Asia,...

Exports - partners:
Thailand

Thailand

Thailand , officially the Kingdom of Thailand , formerly known as Siam , is a country located at the centre of the Indochina peninsula and Southeast Asia. It is bordered to the north by Burma and Laos, to the east by Laos and Cambodia, to the south by the Gulf of Thailand and Malaysia, and to the...

 46,1%, Malaysia 19,1%, Poland

Poland

Poland , officially the Republic of Poland , is a country in Central Europe bordered by Germany to the west; the Czech Republic and Slovakia to the south; Ukraine, Belarus and Lithuania to the east; and the Baltic Sea and Kaliningrad Oblast, a Russian exclave, to the north...

 8,1%, Japan

Japan

Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...

 7,6% (2005)

Imports:
$225 million (f.o.b., 2010)

Imports - commodities:
machinery and equipment, foodstuffs, fuels

Imports - partners:
Taiwan

Taiwan

Taiwan , also known, especially in the past, as Formosa , is the largest island of the same-named island group of East Asia in the western Pacific Ocean and located off the southeastern coast of mainland China. The island forms over 99% of the current territory of the Republic of China following...

 20,2%, Australia

Australia

Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...

 14,7%, Japan

Japan

Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...

 13,5%, Singapore

Singapore

Singapore , officially the Republic of Singapore, is a Southeast Asian city-state off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, north of the equator. An island country made up of 63 islands, it is separated from Malaysia by the Straits of Johor to its north and from Indonesia's Riau Islands by the...

 11,9%, New Caledonia

New Caledonia

New Caledonia is a special collectivity of France located in the southwest Pacific Ocean, east of Australia and about from Metropolitan France. The archipelago, part of the Melanesia subregion, includes the main island of Grande Terre, the Loyalty Islands, the Belep archipelago, the Isle of...

, Poland

Poland

Poland , officially the Republic of Poland , is a country in Central Europe bordered by Germany to the west; the Czech Republic and Slovakia to the south; Ukraine, Belarus and Lithuania to the east; and the Baltic Sea and Kaliningrad Oblast, a Russian exclave, to the north...

 7,1%, New Zealand

New Zealand

New Zealand is an island country in the south-western Pacific Ocean comprising two main landmasses and numerous smaller islands. The country is situated some east of Australia across the Tasman Sea, and roughly south of the Pacific island nations of New Caledonia, Fiji, and Tonga...

 5,6%, Fiji

Fiji

Fiji , officially the Republic of Fiji , is an island nation in Melanesia in the South Pacific Ocean about northeast of New Zealand's North Island...

5,3% (2005)

Debt - external:
$69,8 million (2010)

Economic aid - recipient:
$27,5 million (2002)

Currency:
1 vatu (VT) = 100 centimes

Exchange rates:
vatu (VT) per US$1 – 111,79 (2004), 122,19 (2003), 139,2 (2002), 145,31 (2001), 129,76 (December 1999), 129,08 (1999), 127,52 (1998), 115,87 (1997), 111,72 (1996), 112,11 (1995)

Fiscal year:
calendar year