Publication: Guinea-Bissau Economic Update, Spring 2025: Unpacking Tax Performance in Guinea-Bissau
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2025-06-17
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2025-06-17
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Guinea-Bissau’s economy remained resilient in 2024, despite a challenging cashew campaign, with GDP growth reaching 4.8 percent. Activity in the primary sector was affected by a reduction in cashew production due to adverse weather conditions and lingering effects from the poor 2023 marketing campaign. However, this was partially offset by a more than doubling in farmgate prices for cashews producers and improved subsistence agriculture output. The secondary sector output showed positive signs as well, growing by 8 percent between 2023 and 2024, driven by a rise in the manufacturing sector (particularly in the agri-food industry) and construction activities linked to major infrastructure projects. Growth in the services sector was strong (+4.2 percent y/y) driven by retail and hospitality activities.
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“World Bank. 2025. Guinea-Bissau Economic Update, Spring 2025: Unpacking Tax Performance in Guinea-Bissau. © World Bank. http://hdl.handle.net/10986/43346 License: CC BY-NC 3.0 IGO.”
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Publication Guinea-Bissau Economic Update, Spring 2024(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2024-05-13)The Guinea-Bissau Economic Update monitors significant recent economic developments in the country, highlighting the key structural challenges Guinea-Bissau faces in its pursuit of inclusive and sustained growth.Publication Guinea-Bissau - Cashew and Beyond : Diversification Through Trade(World Bank, 2010-05-01)Guinea-Bissau is highly dependent on international trade even when compared to other nations of its size and income level. However, it is equally clear that the country could derive far more benefit from its international trade opportunities than it does at the present time. This study examines how to do this, looking not only at trade policy, the investment climate, and infrastructure, but also five key sectors where specific opportunities exist. There are three recommendations which stand out as having a particularly important and pervasive effect on trade and its potential role in raising incomes and reducing poverty. Indeed, they can be regarded as preconditions for significant progress. It is of primary importance that the job of formulating and implementing economic policy be put on a more stable and long term basis The extreme instability in Guinea-Bissau's government has meant that cabinet ministers and lower officials change on an annual or even more frequent basis. This situation makes long term planning and sustained implementation virtually impossible and the formulation of coherent policy equally difficult. To these, one might add the illegal drug trade which can undermine the best economic policies through an escalation of crime, corruption and addiction, as already observed in some other countries. However, this important issue has not been addressed in this report.Publication Guinea-Bissau - Cashew and Beyond : Diversification Through Trade - Diagnostic Trade Integration Study for the Enhanced Integrated Framework for Trade-related Technical Assistance(World Bank, 2010-05-01)Guinea-Bissau is highly dependent on international trade even when compared to other nations of its size and income level. However, it is equally clear that the country could derive far more benefit from its international trade opportunities than it does at the present time. This study examines how to do this, looking not only at trade policy, the investment climate, and infrastructure, but also five key sectors where specific opportunities exist. There are three recommendations which stand out as having a particularly important and pervasive effect on trade and its potential role in raising incomes and reducing poverty. Indeed, they can be regarded as preconditions for significant progress. Eliminating the bureaucratic obstacles to doing business is a prerequisite for any growth in private investment in the country. Guinea-Bissau ranks near the bottom of the World Bank's annual Survey of Doing Business, reflecting the extremely difficult bureaucratic and legal maze that must be dealt with by any entrepreneur seeking to operate a business in the country. This situation not only militates against private investment in any but resource extraction industries, but also makes even the simplest import/export operation an exercise in bureaucratic navigation. It is of primary importance that the job of formulating and implementing economic policy be put on a more stable and long term basis The extreme instability in Guinea-Bissau's government has meant that cabinet ministers and lower officials change on an annual or even more frequent basis. This situation makes long term planning and sustained implementation virtually impossible and the formulation of coherent policy equally difficult.Publication Guinea-Bissau Country Economic Memorandum : Terra Ranca! A Fresh Start(Washington, DC, 2015-01-12)After decades of turmoil and instability, a period of calm and progress evolved in Guinea-Bissau in 2009. A military coup in April 2012 interrupted it. A fresh start is needed to alter the dynamics that kept Guinea-Bissau poor. In 2013, Gross National Income per capita was US$590. Average economic growth barely kept pace with population growth. In 2010, poverty at the national poverty line of US$2 a day was 70 percent; extreme poverty at US$1 a day was 33 percent. These numbers have increased from their 2002 levels and they are estimated to have increased further since 2010. It is time to make a fresh start and turn the page on anemic growth and poverty. Guinea-Bissau s elections of May and June 2014 are described by many observers as the freest and fairest in the country s history. Voter registration and turnout were at record-levels. The conditions for progress and stability are favorable. Guinea-Bissau is a rural economy, almost entirely dependent on a single cash crop: cashew. It is the main source of income for most of the country s poor. Cashew nuts are Guinea-Bissau s main export, accounting for 85 to 90 percent of the country s total exports. The balance of payments is dominated by cashew, on the export side, and food and fuel, among imports. The economy is open, with exports and imports by land and sea amounting to more than 70 percent of GDP. Shocks to cashew, rice and oil prices have a considerable effect on the current account balance. Official Development Assistance (ODA) makes a critical contribution to supporting the state budget. In 2011, Guinea-Bissau ranked 20th among the world s most aid dependent countries. Recently, policy mistakes aggravated an already dire situation. However, the 2014 cashew campaign was been better than the 2013 campaign, and the prospects for a pick-up in growth have improved.Publication Guinea-Bissau - Public Expenditure Review Update : Enhancing Growth and Fiscal Adjustment Through Civil Service Reform(World Bank, 2007-05-23)Guinea-Bissau's large public sector wage bill poses a major threat to the country's macroeconomic stability: it hampers growth, limits the government's ability to service the domestic and external debt, and crowds out private investments. For this reason, the government decided in early 2006 to retrench more than 2,800 civil servants in a first phase, and about 1,600 military later. The objectives of this public expenditure review (PER) update are to: (i) review progress in macroeconomic and fiscal management since the previous PER; (ii) analyze the issue of compensation benefits in the context of the ongoing civil service reform; and (ii) update the debt sustainability analysis for Guinea-Bissau. Besides this introduction, the report includes three main chapters on macroeconomic management, improving the fiscal situation, and debt sustainability. The report also gives a final conclusion and discusses the way forward.
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