Over the past 30 years, Sub Saharan Africa’s GDP growth has generally trended with the World. However, rates were higher from 2001-2015, including a large spike in 2004. The Financial Crisis of 2008 affected the region much less.
Source: World Bank Indicator NY.GDP.MKTP.KD.ZG
Created with: R, ggplot
Source: World Bank Indicator NY.GDP.MKTP.KD.ZG
Created with: R, ggplot
Today, GDP growth across Sub Saharan Africa is diverging. Most countries experienced positive growth rates in 2016, while others declined. Eastern African countries, including Ethiopia (7.6%), Kenya (5.9%) and Tanzania (7.0%) are growing at high rates. However, the highest growth is in Guinea, at 10.5%.
Source: World Bank Indicator NY.GDP.MKTP.KD.ZG
Created with: Tableau
Source: World Bank Indicator NY.GDP.MKTP.KD.ZG
Created with: Tableau
Countries are also grouped throughout this project by their Income Level, as designated by the World Bank. Most countries (27 out of 47) in Sub-Saharan Africa fall into the Low income category. Geographically, countries in southern Africa are Upper middle income. The lone country designated as High income is Seychelles, a small island country known for its tourism.
Source: World Bank
Created with: Tableau (map), Matplotlib (pie chart)
Source: World Bank
Created with: Tableau (map), Matplotlib (pie chart)
There are two ways to measure inflation -- by Consumer Price Index (CPI) or by GDP Deflator. At first it may seem that the CPI and the GDP Deflator version of inflation measure the same metric, but there are a few key differences. Firstly, the GDP Deflator includes only domestic goods, not any imports. The CPI includes anything bought by consumers, including foreign goods. Secondly, the GDP Deflator measures the prices of all goods and services while CPI measures only goods bought by consumers.
In this exploratory stage of the project, both measures are considered.
Source: World Bank Indicator FP.CPI.TOTL.ZG
Created with: R, ggplot
In this exploratory stage of the project, both measures are considered.
Source: World Bank Indicator FP.CPI.TOTL.ZG
Created with: R, ggplot
Averaging inflation since 1990 shows a similar trend to the previous plot. Most countries fall within a healthy, low range (<10%). However, the outlier countries are Somalia, Democratic Republic of Congo and Angola, which all experienced hyperinflation at some point throughout the past thirty years.
Source: World Bank indicator NY.GDP.DEFL.KD.ZG
Created with: Python, matplotlib
Source: World Bank indicator NY.GDP.DEFL.KD.ZG
Created with: Python, matplotlib
Next, the distribution of country-level employment is compared for Sub Saharan Africa against the World. African countries skew to the right, indicating their higher rates of employment. Employment rates in Africa have a tighter range than the World.
Source: World Bank indicator SL.EMP.TOTL.SP.ZS, modeled ILO estimate
Created with: R, ggplot
Source: World Bank indicator SL.EMP.TOTL.SP.ZS, modeled ILO estimate
Created with: R, ggplot
Though Africa has higher rates of employment, most of that employment is vulnerable.
Vulnerable employment includes those who are own account workers and contributing family workers. Vulnerable employment is associated with lesser wages, difficult working conditions, and less stability. These types of workers would not be likely to have benefits or union representation. This presents a challenge for Africa as it seeks sustainable economic growth.
Although vulnerable employment across the World has decreased, especially in the past 15 years, it has not decreased in Sub-Saharan Africa.
Source: World Bank indicator SL.EMP.VULN.ZS, modeled ILO estimate
Created with: Tableau
Vulnerable employment includes those who are own account workers and contributing family workers. Vulnerable employment is associated with lesser wages, difficult working conditions, and less stability. These types of workers would not be likely to have benefits or union representation. This presents a challenge for Africa as it seeks sustainable economic growth.
Although vulnerable employment across the World has decreased, especially in the past 15 years, it has not decreased in Sub-Saharan Africa.
Source: World Bank indicator SL.EMP.VULN.ZS, modeled ILO estimate
Created with: Tableau