More about Libya

Hult International Business School

Country Prospectus – Libya

Completed byZeid Basyouni March 2015

Table of ContentsExecutive summary.........................................3Societal/cultural.........................................4Economic..................................................4Technology................................................7Political and Legal.......................................7Geography and natural resources...........................8References...............................................11

Executive summary

Libya is a country located in North Africa the crossroads of

Europe and Asia with a population of about 6 million people.

The capital called Tripoli and the second city is Benghazi.

Libya is large like 7 times of UK. The country seems to be

experiencing with high growth in the past couple of years. ,

Libya has 6 neighboring countries and has utilized its

strategic location and established free trade agreements

with more than 30 countries all of which are critical to its

economy and it’s considered as a leader country in the

energy sector. Libya has proven crude oil reserves of 48

billion barrel, which is the largest in Africa and the tenth

globally; this sector can play a major rule in the growth

and the development of the country. However, the country is

still unstable with uncertain political and economic

transactions, which give an image to foreign economic, and

investors to take a step back. All the economic indicators

are encouraging and some remain unknown.

Societal/Cultural

Libya is the third largest country in the world and

considered by the UNISCO as one of the countries that have a

different kind of cultures. The population was estimated in

2012 by Mundi index as 6,244,174 (12% of the population is

made up of immigrants) From the 6 million people, about 1.08

are male(s)/female sex ratio with total under-18 populations

are 2,258000.The major cities in Libya are Tripoli, which is

the capital with 1.127 million people and Benghazi with

650.629 thousand people. The Life Expectancy in Libya is

about 72 years for males and 77 for females while the

working economic age between 15 and 64 years old.

The Libyan culture basically has ben based on the Libyan

cultural heritage along 2000 years ago, which is effected by

the people who lived in the Mediterranean sea countries and

left a marks of The Barber, Phoenicians ، Fatimid ،Roman, Greek, Bedouin civilzations, from the 16th century to the

19th century. Libya was ruled by the Ottomans Empire and

then was occupied by Italians, British and French forces.

All this movements played a major affect in the forming of

the present country culture. Arabic is the country official

language as the country considers as part of the Arab world

however there is the Berber and Tuareg groups still speak

their own language, which some families using it as part of

their culture and heritage. The Bedouin character seems

overcomes the majority of cities . In Tripoli the capital

based a number of museums like Government Library, the

Ethnographic Museum, the Archaeological Museum, the National

Archives, the Epigraphy Museum and the Islamic Museum. The

Libyan Museum was built by UNESCO it’s one of the most

famous places to visit.

The traditional dress of Libya is very distinctive in

detailed. It is usually similar in the eastern and western

region and consists of a long gown and trousers for the

lower body. Then a white Cloak White covers the entire body

with a cap on the head usully in the east part people used

to dark red cap and in the west a black one. Nowadays its

very rare to see people waering the traditinal dress in the

everyday life unless there is spacif clebratuon or event.

The women dress is almost the same with dark read cloak and

sometimes white covers the whole body from the head with

heavy gold jewerlies. In the south still the people strict

with the babers dress wearing haik and larg cloth warpped

around the boday with their heads. The Barber womens dress

is very bueatifll and colorful. Libya seems to be islamic

society and the people and the families are very close to

each other which mean the community realtions are very

strong.most of the libyans lives in single homes with

ectened family to be more closed to each other. Acording to

the islamic socitly the religion considered an important

issue and the people are very strict about it, more than 99%

of the populations are Muslims. The religion is taking a big

part the culture like celebrations like days of Eid and

Moulud Nabawie “ the day of prophet Mohamed PUHP born.”

Another religion celebrations is called Muhram the begging

of the Islamic calendar people used to eat at breakfast dish

called “ Asseda” . The holy month of Ramadan” is one of the

important months for Libyans. Most the country stop working

in this month and people give most of their time to doing

great things to each other and remembering the poor people

and help them and visiting the relatives. Each of these

celebrations has different style and different kind of food

served during that days and special activities are taken.

The famous traditional dishes are Mathrouda, Bazeen and

kusskisi beside the many kind of Pasta and macaroni. Libyan

people are very influenced by the Italian culture which is

still till now many people speaks Italian and also there are

some Italian words in the typical Libyan dialect.

EconomicLibya economically was a poor country with a very bad

agriculture until the exploration of the oil in 1961 and

this first exported oil in 1961. Since that time and Libya

income has been increased dramatically to reach one of the

richest countries in the world regarding to the World Bank

report; The oil exports generates about more than 99% of the

government budget and earning 25% of the country GDP and now

Libya is considered as an upper middle-income economy with a

growth rate of 12.06 percent per year (2013 est.) the major

exports are the natural gas gypsum, salt, and limestone. In

addition in years before the revolution Libya has increased

the industry production liked refining petroleum and

liquefied natural gas, petrochemicals and construction

materials. The Unemployment rate is the numbers of people

who are in the labor market but without jobs has rate

average about 17.73 % estimated from 2005 to 2011, which

gives Libya the lowest unemployment rate in North Africa. It

is estimated that 1.3 million people are employed in Libya

presenting 79.26% of the labor force according to Oea

newspaper. However, the unemployment rate has slightly

decreased from 20.70 % in 2009 to 19.50 % in 2011. This

significance does not mean that the market is creating more

jobs as long as the country is one step to recession after

the uncertain security situation inside the country.

Industries such as agriculture, manufacturing and other

types of industries and services give employment at 17%, 23%

and 59%, respectively (Mundi Index 2004). When compared to

OCED countries in 2011 where the average employment between

ages 15 to 65 is 8.7%, Libya has 8.1%, which is a good

thing. The World Bank indicated in 2012 that some 93.7% of

men are in paid work, compared with 88.5% of women. The

youth unemployment rate is also increasing in 2012

estimating at about 23.9% compared to 21.79 % in 1992.

The current inflation rate is at 2.40% measured in September

2014 by Trading Economics. In addition, the average from

2004 until 2014 is 4.98%. The highest rate recorded during

the Libyan revolution in September 2011 was around 29.60%

and that was in response of decreasing the money supply by

the Central Bank of Libya. This recent decrease of inflation

has affected the prices of food, hotels, cafes and

restaurants. Furthermore, the price of consumer goods has

decreased by 3.7% in 2014.

The Libyan government budget does not depend highly on the

taxes income in the tax rate for Libya has been fixed for a

while as 10% for the personal income and 20% for

corporations, which is a total of 30%. However, taxation

issues in Libya are very important, especially to the

foreign investors. And the liability to pay the tax based on

the income for the non-Libyan nationals is not as much as

the Libyans; therefore, residency is not generally a key

factor in determining tax liability in Libya. Based on this

the taxation system in Libya, it can be divided into five

main principles: Revenue Duties, Corporate tax, Salaries and

Wages tax, Jehad and withholding taxes. The Libyan

government running surplus budget for long time ago and the

credit goes for the oil industry, which covers more than 99%

of Libya revenue. The total amount of exports from Libya is

49.1 billion of dollars. On the other hand, the imports of

goods and services are 18.1 billion of dollars and that

makes the country always in surplus budget. In 2011/2012

during the revolution, the exports decreased to 19 billion

dollars, but now they have recovered to the normal trade

budget. It is worth mentioning that Libya depends only on

oil production and its derivatives. Libya importing about

more than 80% of its food so Libya considered and importing

country as well. Nonetheless Libya has free trade agreements

with more than 30 countries around the world most of them

Arab countries and African nations also have strong trade

relationship with the Europe countries like France and

Italy. Libya expected to be more open in the coming years to

the investors however the current regulation is still

complicated to the foreign investors for example they are

forced to have 51% Libyan partner in any business runes.

TechnologyLibya considered one of the third world countries. The

technology is still in the begging of the stage of

development. Despite that the Internet is available in the

most of the country region but still a poor connection and

slow speed. And there is only one company provider under The

Ministry of Communications, nonetheless the prices for users

still high. Mobile providers are only two local company

owned also to the government during the last regime it was

prohibit to start a company in this sector but now after the

new regulations Libya will be open for new competitive

companies, and the connection still rare in some areas in

the country. The banking system sill not developed yet there

are no credit cards, the electronic cards are not used yet

only cash used in the daily life. The education system still

undeveloped starting from the public school and universities

they are far from the using the technology in the teaching

system one of the reasons is the limited access to the

Internet.

Libya today is looking for better life. The government now

is working on plans to build the new infrastructure and

concentrating in the telecommunication so there is a big

market will be open for the provider companies to enter this

huge market. Recently QNB “Qatar National Bank” entered the

market as partner of one of the privet banks in Libya trying

to develop the banking system. The government still working

with the population in the traditional way there are a

project for the E-government but still under developing,

just last year 2014 the government started to issue the

social security numbers to the people and electronic

passports.

Political and Legal

The Colonel Mummer Gadhafi ruled Libya for more than 40

years when he came in the head of the country he stopped

working with the constitution. Nowadays after the revolution

Libya is heading to be more open and democracy country last

year in 2014 there were two national elections to elect the

new parliament and elect the people who will write the new

constitution. The situation still uncertain because of the

militias exploited the situation for their own gain after

the revelation and is preventing the parliament from

working. However the parliament is taking strict decisions

to stop these militias. And rebuild the national army. All

the international indicators and the United Nations gave

indicators that politically still uncertain and dangerous

situation if the govenment had not extended its control over

this these militias. Until after four years from the change

still no rules and laws sets the system inside the country,

all the people are witting for the new constitution to see

how the country will be.

Geography and Natural Resources

Libya is located in North Africa along the Mediterranean

Sea. It is considered the fourth in size among the countries

in Africa and the seventeenth in the world. Libya lies

along a coastline between Egypt and Tunisia. The other most

important prominent natural feature in Libya is the Sahara

dessert. Libya rests on a very strategic tremendous location

not only because it is located along the Mediterranean Sea

1200 km, but because of its immediate surroundings. The

Mediterranean Sea from the north can be a door to Europe.

Bordered by neighboring countries, which are Egypt 1,115 km,

Tunis 459 km, Algeria 982 km, Sudan 383 km, Chad 1,055 km

Niger 354 km, Libya can be compared in size with the United

Kingdom as 7 times the UK area

The important location of Libya is considered as the hub of

the world; it sits on a very strategic location, the

northern coast lies around 1600 km (1000 miles) along the

Mediterranean Sea. The Mediterranean is the landlocked sea

that lies between southern Europe, North Africa, and

southwest Asia. It links the Atlantic Ocean through the

Strait of Gibraltar to the Red Sea through the Suez Canal.

It also connects the Black Sea in the northeast through the

Dardanelles, the Sea of Marmara, and the Bosporus. Also

Libya sits on an incredible number of neutral resources,

which include natural gas, petroleum, gypsum, iron and

ammonia. According to official energy statistics from the US

government (EIA), Libya holds the largest proven oil

reserves in Africa, estimated in 2007 about 41.5 billion

barrels and the 8th largest in the world of Oil production

was 1.8 million barrels per day and this is expected to rise

to 3 million barrels per day. In the coming years, the

amount of natural gas produced in 2010 about 30.6 billion m3

with 1.5 trillion m3 of natural gas as reserves. Finally,

the forest in accordance with the (UNFAO), Libya has 217,000

ha of planted forest that contains 6 million metric tons of

carbon in living forest biomass with biodiversity and

protected areas that contains 486 known species of

amphibians, birds, mammals and reptiles according to the

(World Conservation Monitoring Centre). In fact, 1.2 % of

these species are endemic, and 3.1% are threatened. Libya

is considered as a home country of at least 1825 species of

vascular plants, of which 7.3% are endemic (UNFAO).

References

WPR (Libya Population 2015)

http://worldpopulationreview.com/countries/libya-population/

Population density (people per sq. km) in Libya (Populationdensity (people per sq. km) in Libya)

http://www.tradingeconomics.com/libya/population-density-people-per-sq-km-wb-data.html

Libya GDP Annual Growth Rate | 2000-2015 | Data | Chart | Calendar (Libya GDP Annual Growth Rate | 2000-2015 | Data | Chart | Calendar)

http://www.tradingeconomics.com/libya/gdp-growth-annual

City (town): Benghazi: map, population, location (City (town) Benghazi: map, population, location)

http://www.tiptopglobe.com/city?n=Benghazi&p=650629

Unicef, Libya Profilehttp://www.unicef.org/gender/files/Libya-Gender-Eqaulity-Profile-2011.pdf

Libya Death rate (- Demographics)

http://www.indexmundi.com/libya/death_rate.html

Libya Literacy (- Demographics)

http://www.indexmundi.com/libya/literacy.html

Arable land (% of land area) in Libya (Arable land (% of land area) in Libya)

http://www.tradingeconomics.com/libya/arable-land-percent-of-land-area-wb-data.html

Encyclopedia of the Nations (Libya)

http://www.nationsencyclopedia.com/geography/Indonesia-to-Mongolia/Libya.html#ixzz3Mehaum5m

Oil & Natural Gas

https://www.temehu.com/oil-gas.htm

Libya (: Economy)

http://www.factmonster.com/encyclopedia/world/libya-economy.html

the encyclopedic entry of libya (Reference.com)

http://www.reference.com/browse/libya

Everything You Need To Know About The Libyan Oil Industry (Business Insider)

By: Drum, The.

http://www.businessinsider.com/libya-oil-exports-2011-2

Everything You Need To Know About The Libyan Oil Industry (Business Insider)

By: Drum, The.

http://www.businessinsider.com/libya-oil-exports-2011-2#ixzz3PILn6Jp5

Libya - Lonely Planet (Lonely Planet)

http://www.lonelyplanet.com/libya#ixzz3PIWaNzWY

The Lovely Planet (The Lovely Planet)

http://www.thelovelyplanet.net/traditional-dress-of-libya/

The Culture of Libya (Culture)

http://www.hilalplaza.com/islamic-culture/Libya/Libya_Muslim_culture.html