South Africa is a middle-income, developing
country with an abundant supply of resources, well-developed
financial, legal, communications, energy, and transport sectors, a
stock exchange that ranks among the 10 largest in the world, and a
modern infrastructure supporting an efficient distribution of goods to
major urban centers throughout the region. However, growth has not
been strong enough to cut into the 30% unemployment, and daunting
economic problems remain from the apartheid era, especially the
problems of poverty and lack of economic empowerment among the
disadvantaged groups. Other problems are crime, corruption, and
HIV/AIDS. At the start of 2000, President MBEKI vowed to promote
economic growth and foreign investment by relaxing restrictive labor
laws, stepping up the pace of privatization, and cutting unneeded
governmental spending. His policies face strong opposition from
organized labor.

purchasing power parity - $296.1 billion (1999 est.)

0.6% (1999 est.)

purchasing power parity - $6,900 (1999 est.)

agriculture: 5%
industry: 35%
services: 60% (1999 est.)

NA%

lowest 10%: 1.4%
highest 10%: 47.3% (1993)

5.5% (1999 est.)

15 million economically active (1997)

agriculture 30%, industry 25%, services
45% (1999 est.)

30% (1999 est.)

revenues: $30.5 billion
expenditures: $38 billion, including capital expenditures of $2.6
billion (FY94/95 est.)

mining (world's largest producer of platinum, gold,
chromium), automobile assembly, metalworking, machinery, textile, iron
and steel, chemicals, fertilizer, foodstuffs

-5% (1998 est.)

192.015 billion kWh (1998)

fossil fuel: 92.09%
hydro: 0.83%
nuclear: 7.08%
other: 0% (1998)

174.486 billion kWh (1998)

4.093 billion kWh (1998)

5 million kWh (1998)

corn, wheat, sugarcane, fruits, vegetables;
beef, poultry, mutton, wool, dairy products

$28 billion (f.o.b., 1999 est.)

gold, diamonds, other metals and minerals,
machinery and equipment

UK, Italy, Japan, US, Germany (1997)

$26 billion (f.o.b., 1999 est.)

machinery, foodstuffs and equipment, chemicals,
petroleum products, scientific instruments

Germany, US, UK, Japan

$25.7 billion (1998 est.)

$676.3 million

1 rand (R) = 100 cents

rand (R) per US$1 - 6.12439 (January 2000), 6.10948
(1999), 5.52828 (1998), 4.60796 (1997), 4.29935 (1996), 3.62709 (1995)

1 April - 31 March