Currency | US dollar (USD) and East Timor centavos [1] |
---|---|
Calendar year | |
Trade organisations | G77 |
Country group |
|
Statistics | |
GDP | [4] |
GDP growth | |
GDP per capita | [4] |
GDP by sector |
|
0.96% (2019 est.) | |
Population below poverty line | 49.9% [6] (2007 est.) |
28.7 (2014 est.) | |
Labour force | 581,000 (2022 est.) |
Unemployment | 1.79% (2022 est.) |
Main industries | printing, soap manufacturing, handicrafts, woven cloth |
External | |
Exports | $60 million (2020 est.) |
Export goods | crude petroleum, natural gas, coffee, various vegetables, scrap iron |
Main export partners | |
Imports | $850 million (2020 est.) |
Import goods | refined petroleum, cars, cement, delivery trucks, motorcycles |
Main import partners | |
Gross external debt | |
Public finances | |
$279,000,000 (December 2013) | |
All values, unless otherwise stated, are in US dollars. |
The economy of Timor-Leste is a low-income economy as ranked by the World Bank. [15] It is placed 140th on the Human Development Index, indicating a medium level of human development. [16] 20% of the population is unemployed, [1] and 52.9% live on less than $1.25 a day. [16] About half of the population is illiterate. [16] At 27%, East Timor's urbanisation rate is one of the lowest in the world.
In 2007, a bad harvest caused a "major food crisis" in East Timor. By November, eleven sub-districts still needed food supplied by international aid. [17]
According to data gathered in the 2010 census, 87.7% of urban and 18.9% of rural households have electricity, for an overall average of 36.7%. [18]
Prior to and during colonisation, the island of Timor was best known for its sandalwood. The Portuguese colonial administration also granted concessions to Oceanic Exploration Corporation to develop oil and gas deposits. However, this was curtailed by the Indonesian invasion in 1976.
Petrochemical resources were divided between Indonesia and Australia with the Timor Gap Treaty in 1989. [19] The treaty established guidelines for joint exploitation of seabed resources in the area of the "gap" left by then-Portuguese Timor in the maritime boundary agreed between the two countries in 1972. [20] Revenues from the "joint" area were to be divided 50-50. Woodside Petroleum and ConocoPhillips began development of some resources in the Timor Gap on behalf of the two governments in 1992.
In late 1999, about 70% of the economic infrastructure of East Timor was destroyed by Indonesian troops and anti-independence militias, [1] and 260,000 people fled westward. From 2002 to 2005, an international program led by the United Nations, manned by civilian advisers, 5,000 peacekeepers (8,000 at peak) and 1,300 police officers, substantially reconstructed the infrastructure. By mid-2002, all but about 50,000 of the refugees had returned.
The economy grew by about 10% in 2011 and at a similar rate in 2012. [21]
While East Timor gained revenue from offshore oil and gas reserves, little of it has been spent on the development of villages, which still rely on subsistence farming. [22] As of 2012 [update] , nearly half the East Timorese population was living in extreme poverty. [22]
Year | GDP (in bil. US$ PPP) | GDP (in bil. US$ nominal) | GDP per capita (in US$ nominal) | GDP growth (real) | GDP per capita growth (real) | Inflation rate (in %) | Government debt (in % of GDP) |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
1993 | 0.36 | 480 | |||||
1994 | 0.43 | 561 | |||||
1995 | 0.50 | 658 | |||||
1996 | 0.61 | 801 | |||||
1997 | 0.71 | 926 | |||||
1998 | 0.25 | 328 | |||||
1999 | 0.25 | 328 | |||||
2000 | 1.1 | 0.37 | 415 | ||||
2001 | 1.3 | 0.48 | 530 | ||||
2002 | 1.2 | 0.47 | 508 | ||||
2003 | 1.2 | 0.49 | 517 | ||||
2004 | 1.3 | 0.44 | 453 | ||||
2005 | 1.4 | 0.46 | 464 | ||||
2006 | 1.3 | 0.45 | 446 | ||||
2007 | 1.5 | 0.54 | 523 | ||||
2008 | 1.7 | 0.65 | 614 | ||||
2009 | 1.9 | 0.73 | 676 | ||||
2010 | 2.1 | 0.88 | 806 | ||||
2011 | 2.3 | 1.04 | 936 | ||||
2012 | 2.7 | 1.16 | 1,024 | ||||
2013 | 2.9 | 1.40 | 1,210 | ||||
2014 | 3.2 | 1.45 | 1,232 | ||||
2015 | 3.5 | 1.59 | 1,332 | ||||
2016 | 3.8 | 1.65 | 1,353 | ||||
2017 | 3.9 | 1.62 | 1,299 | ||||
2018 | 4.0 | 1.58 | 1,249 | ||||
2019 | 5.0 | 2.05 | 1,583 | ||||
2020 | 6.7 | 1.90 | 1,442 | ||||
2021 | 7.3 | 1.90 | 1,442 | ||||
2022 | 9.4 | 2.45 | 1,793 | ||||
2023 | 5.1 | 1.99 | 1,425 |
In the Doing Business 2013 report by the World Bank, East Timor was ranked 169th overall and last in the East Asia and Pacific region. The country fared particularly poorly in the "registering property", "enforcing contracts", and "resolving insolvency" categories, ranking last worldwide in all three. [23] In 2020 it ranked 181st. [24] : 20 There are no patent laws in East Timor. [25]
Regarding telecommunications infrastructure, East Timor is the second to last ranked Asian country in the World Economic Forum's Network Readiness Index (NRI), with only Myanmar falling behind it in Southeast Asia. In the 2014 NRI ranking, East Timor ranked number 141 overall, down from 134 in 2013. [26]
East Timor is part of the Timor Leste–Indonesia–Australia Growth Triangle (TIA-GT). [27]
The agriculture sector employs 80% of East Timor's active population. [28] In 2009, about 67,000 households grew coffee in East Timor, with a large proportion of those households being poor. [28] Currently, the gross margins are about $120 per hectare, with returns per labour-day of about $3.70. [28] There were 11,000 households growing mung beans as of 2009, most of them by subsistence farming. [28] 94% of domestic fish catch comes from the ocean, especially coastal fisheries. [29] : 17 66% of families are in part supported by these subsistence activities, however the country as a whole does not produce enough food to be self-sustaining, and thus relies on imports. [29] : 16 Coffee, rice, maize, coconuts, cassava, soybeans, bananas, mango, and sweet potatoes are cultivated here. With 5,014 Metric Tons in 2019, the country was ranked number 42 among other countries in Avocados Production. [30]
After petroleum, the second largest export is coffee, which generates about $10 million a year. [31] 9,000 tonnes of coffee, 108 tonnes of cinnamon, and 161 tonnes of cocoa were harvested in 2012 making the country the 40th ranked producer of coffee, the 6th ranked producer of cinnamon and the 50th ranked producer of cocoa worldwide. [32] In 2019, 186 Metric Tons of cocoa beans were produced and the country was number 48. [33]
The Portuguese colonial administration granted concessions to the Australia-bound Oceanic Exploration Corporation to develop petroleum and natural gas deposits in the waters southeast of Timor. However, this was curtailed by the Indonesian invasion in 1976.[ citation needed ] The resources were divided between Indonesia and Australia with the Timor Gap Treaty in 1989. [34] East Timor inherited no permanent maritime boundaries when it attained independence.[ citation needed ] A provisional agreement (the Timor Sea Treaty, signed when East Timor became independent on 20 May 2002) defined a Joint Petroleum Development Area (JPDA) and awarded 90% of revenues from existing projects in that area to East Timor and 10% to Australia. [35] An agreement in 2005 between the governments of East Timor and Australia mandated that both countries put aside their dispute over maritime boundaries and that East Timor would receive 50% of the revenues from the resource exploitation in the area (estimated at A$26 billion, or about US$20 billion over the lifetime of the project) [36] from the Greater Sunrise development. [37] In 2013, East Timor launched a case at the Permanent Court of Arbitration in The Hague to pull out of a gas treaty that it had signed with Australia, accusing the Australian Secret Intelligence Service (ASIS) of bugging the East Timorese cabinet room in Dili in 2004. [38]
At the time of independence East Timor had per capita natural wealth equivalent to the wealth of an upper-middle income country. Over half of this was in oil, and over a quarter natural gas. The Timor-Leste Petroleum Fund was established in 2005 to turn these non-renewable resources into a more sustainable form of wealth. By 2009 it had a value of US$4.8 billion, [39] : 4–6 and by 2011 it had reached a worth of US$8.7 billion. [40] East Timor is labelled by the International Monetary Fund as the "most oil-dependent economy in the world". [41] The Petroleum Fund pays for nearly all of the government's annual budget, which increased from $70 million in 2004 to $1.3 billion in 2011, with a $1.8 billion proposal for 2012. [40] East-Timor's income from oil and gas stands to increase significantly after its cancellation of a controversial agreement with Australia, which gave Australia half of the income from oil and gas from 2006. [42] From 2005 to 2021, $23 billion earned from oil sales has entered the fund. $8 billion has been generated from investments, while $12 billion has been spent. [24] : 30 A decrease in oil and gas reserves led to decreasing HDI beginning in 2010. [24] : 18–19 80% of government spending comes from this fund, which as of 2021 had $19 billion, 10 times greater than the size of the national budget. As oil income has decreased, the fund is at risk of being exhausted. Withdrawals have exceeded sustainable levels almost every year since 2009. [24] : 23
Electricidade De Timor-Leste (EDTL) is the vertically integrated monopoly generator and distributor of electric power within the on-grid areas.
In 2017, the country was visited by 75,000 tourists. [43] Since the later 2010s, tourism has been increasing and the number of hotels and resorts has increased. The government decided to invest in the expansion of the international airport in Dili.
One promising long-term project is the joint development with Australia of petroleum and natural gas resources in the waters southeast of East Timor.
East Timor inherited no permanent maritime boundaries when it gained independence, repudiating the Timor Gap Treaty as illegal. A provisional agreement (the Timor Sea Treaty, signed when East Timor became independent in 2002) defined a Joint Petroleum Development Area (JPDA), and awarded 90% of revenues from existing projects in that area to East Timor and 10% to Australia. [44] The first significant new development in the JPDA since East Timorese independence is the largest petroleum resource in the Timor Sea, the Greater Sunrise gas field. Its exploitation was the subject of separate agreements in 2003 and 2005. Only 20% of the field lies within the JPDA and the rest in waters not subject to the treaty (though claimed by both countries). The initial, temporary agreement gave 82% of revenues to Australia and only 18% to East Timor. [45]
The government of East Timor has sought to negotiate a definite boundary with Australia at the halfway line between the countries, in accordance with the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea. The government of Australia preferred to establish the boundary at the end of the wide Australian continental shelf, as agreed with Indonesia in 1972 and 1991. Normally a dispute such as this would be referred to the International Court of Justice or the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea for an impartial decision, [46] but the Australian government had withdrawn from these international jurisdictions (solely on matters relating to maritime boundaries) shortly before East Timorese independence. [47]
Nevertheless, under public and diplomatic pressure, the Australian government offered instead a last-minute concession solely on royalties from the Greater Sunrise gas field. [48] An agreement was signed in 2005 under which both countries would set aside the dispute over the maritime boundary, and East Timor would receive 50% of the revenues (estimated at A$26 billion or about US$20 billion over the lifetime of the project) [49] from the Greater Sunrise development. Other developments within waters claimed by East Timor but outside the JPDA (Laminaria-Corallina and Buffalo) continue to be exploited unilaterally by Australia, however. [50]
Some proceeds from East Timor's petroleum royalties are directed to the country's sovereign wealth fund, the Timor-Leste Petroleum Fund.
The economy of Brunei, a small and wealthy country, is a mixture of foreign and domestic entrepreneurship, government regulation and welfare measures, and village traditions. It is almost entirely supported by exports of crude oil and natural gas, with revenues from the petroleum sector accounting for over half of GDP. Per capita GDP is high, and substantial income from overseas investment supplements income from domestic production. The government provides for all medical services and subsidizes food and housing. The government has shown progress in its basic policy of diversifying the economy away from oil and gas. Brunei's leaders are concerned that steadily increased integration in the world economy will undermine internal social cohesion although it has taken steps to become a more prominent player by serving as chairman for the 2000 APEC forum. Growth in 1999 was estimated at 2.5% due to higher oil prices in the second half.
The economy of the Republic of the Congo is a mixture of subsistence hunting and agriculture, an industrial sector based largely on petroleum extraction and support services. Government spending is characterized by budget problems and overstaffing. Petroleum has supplanted forestry as the mainstay of the economy, providing a major share of government revenues and exports. Nowadays the Republic of the Congo is increasingly converting natural gas to electricity rather than burning it, greatly improving energy prospects.
Timor is an island at the southern end of Maritime Southeast Asia, in the north of the Timor Sea. The island is divided between the sovereign states of East Timor in the eastern part and Indonesia in the western part. The Indonesian part, known as West Timor, constitutes part of the province of East Nusa Tenggara. Within West Timor lies an exclave of East Timor called Oecusse District. The island covers an area of 30,777 square kilometres. The name is a variant of timur, Malay for "east"; it is so called because it lies at the eastern end of the Lesser Sunda Islands. Mainland Australia is less than 500 km away, separated by the Timor Sea.
East Timor, officially the Democratic Republic of Timor-Leste, is a country in Southeast Asia and Oceania. The country comprises the eastern half of the island of Timor and the nearby islands of Atauro and Jaco. The first inhabitants are thought to be descendant of Australoid and Melanesian peoples. The Portuguese began to trade with Timor by the early 16th century and colonised it throughout the mid-century. Skirmishing with the Dutch in the region eventually resulted in an 1859 treaty for which Portugal ceded the western half of the island. Imperial Japan occupied East Timor during World War II, but Portugal resumed colonial authority after the Japanese surrender.
The Timor Sea is a relatively shallow sea in the Indian Ocean bounded to the north by the island of Timor with Timor-Leste to the north, Indonesia to the northwest, Arafura Sea to the east, and to the south by Australia. The Sunda Trench marks the deepest point of the Timor Sea with a depth of more than 3300 metres, separating the continents of Oceania in the southeast and Asia to the northwest and north. The Timor sea is prone to earthquakes and tsunamis north of the Sunda Trench, due to its location on the Ring of Fire as well as volcanic activity and can experience major cyclones, due to the proximity from the Equator.
The Timor Gap is an area of the Timor Sea between Australia and Timor Island. The island is divided between independent East Timor and West Timor province of Indonesia.
The Timor Gap Treaty was formally known as the Treaty between Australia and the Republic of Indonesia on the zone of cooperation in an area between the Indonesian province of East Timor and Northern Australia. It was a bilateral treaty between the governments of Australia and Indonesia, which provided for the joint exploitation of petroleum and hydrocarbon resources in a part of the Timor Sea Seabed. The treaty was signed on 11 December 1989 and came into force on 9 February 1991. The signatories to the treaty were then Australian Foreign Affairs Minister Gareth Evans and then Indonesian Foreign Minister Ali Alatas.
Formally known as the Timor Sea Treaty between the Government of East Timor and the Government of Australia was signed between Australia and East Timor in Dili, East Timor on 20 May 2002, the day East Timor attained its independence from United Nations rule, for joint petroleum exploration of the Timor Sea by the two countries. The signatories of the treaty were then Australian prime minister John Howard and his East Timorese counterpart at that time Mari Alkatiri.
East Timor, also known as Timor-Leste, officially the Democratic Republic of Timor-Leste, is a country in Southeast Asia. It comprises the eastern half of the island of Timor, the exclave of Oecusse on the island's north-western half, and the minor islands of Atauro and Jaco. The western half of the island of Timor is administered by Indonesia. Australia is the country's southern neighbour, separated by the Timor Sea. The country's size is 14,950 square kilometres (5,770 sq mi). Dili, on the north coast of Timor, is its capital and largest city.
The Australia–Indonesia border is a maritime boundary running west from the two countries' tripoint maritime boundary with Papua New Guinea in the western entrance to the Torres Straits, through the Arafura Sea and Timor Sea, and terminating in the Indian Ocean. The boundary is, however, broken by the Timor Gap, where Australian and East Timorese territorial waters meet and where the two countries have overlapping claims to the seabed.
Officially called the Treaty between Australia and the Democratic Republic of Timor-Leste on Certain Maritime Arrangements in the Timor Sea (CMATS), the treaty provides for the equal distribution of revenue derived from the disputed Greater Sunrise oil and gas field between Australia and East Timor. The field is located in the Timor Gap where Australia and East Timor have overlapping claims over the continental shelf or seabed. Prior to the treaty, East Timor would only have received about 18% of the revenue from the field.
This agreement is officially known as the Agreement between the Government of Australia and the Government of the Democratic Republic of Timor-Leste relating to the Unitisation of the Sunrise and Troubadour Fields.
The accession of East Timor to the Association of Southeast Asian Nations is a process that started following the independence of the country in 2002 when its leaders stated that it had made a "strategic decision" to become a member state of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) in the future. The country officially applied for membership in 2011.
Bilateral relations exist between Australia and East Timor. The two countries are near neighbours with close political and trade ties. East Timor, the youngest and one of the poorest countries in Asia, lies about 610 kilometres northwest of the Australian city of Darwin and Australia has played a prominent role in the young republic's history.
The Timor-Leste Petroleum Fund is a sovereign wealth fund into which the surplus wealth produced by East Timor petroleum and gas income is deposited by the East Timorese government.
Suai Airport, officially Commander in Chief of FALINTIL, Kay Rala Xanana Gusmão, International Airport, and also known as Covalima Airport, is an airport serving Suai, in Cova Lima Municipality, East Timor.
The Australia–East Timor spying scandal began in 2004 when the Australian Secret Intelligence Service (ASIS) clandestinely planted covert listening devices in a room adjacent to the East Timor (Timor-Leste) Prime Minister's Office at Dili, to obtain information in order to ensure Australia held the upper hand in negotiations with East Timor over the rich oil and gas fields in the Timor Gap. Even though the East Timor government was unaware of the espionage operation undertaken by Australia, negotiations were hostile. The first Prime Minister of East Timor, Mari Alkatiri, bluntly accused the Howard government of plundering the oil and gas in the Timor Sea, stating:
"Timor-Leste loses $1 million a day due to Australia's unlawful exploitation of resources in the disputed area. Timor-Leste cannot be deprived of its rights or territory because of a crime."
East Timor–India relations are the international relations that exist between East Timor and India. The Embassy of India in Jakarta, Indonesia is concurrently accredited to East Timor. East Timor has no diplomatic representation in India. On 7 September 2023, India announced that it would open an embassy in Dili.
La'o Hamutuk, or the Timor-Leste Institute for Development Monitoring and Analysis, is an East Timorese non-governmental organisation (NGO). It is based on Avenida Dom Ricardo da Silva, Vila Verde, in the national capital, Dili.
Corruption in East Timor has been described as a critical and alarming problem because it has been institutionalized in the country. It undermines the governance of the nascent state, which only obtained its independence in 2002. Corruption affects East Timorese socio-economic development and public trust in government institutions.
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