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Oil, aluminium boost Bahrain GDP

Manama, November 23, 2011

The oil and aluminium are still the biggest contributor to Bahrain's gross domestic product (GDP), and form most of the kingdom's exports, according to the Economic Development Board's (EDB) third quarter economic report.

Despite little or no gains in Bahrain's oil production, higher prices have maintained the sector's share of GDP at around 25 per cent over the past decade, the report stated.

Oil and aluminium contributed 31 per cent of total GDP or BD2.5 billion ($6.6 billion) to nominal GDP in 2010.

'Bahrain has a relatively large trade to GDP ratio at 140 per cent as of 2010,' the report said.

'This high ratio is largely due to oil, which made up half of all trade in 2010. The contribution of oil and aluminium to trade is much larger, with at least half of foreign currency earned from trade in these sectors.'

'By including the contribution of oil to GDP, trade and indirect contributions, the total contribution of these sectors are estimated to be at least BD3.7 billion or 44 per cent of GDP in 2010,' the report said.

'Future plans to expand aluminium and oil production is likely to grow the kingdom's dependence on these sectors to finance Bahrain's capital account, remittances and net income from investments which have all been historically negative.'

'Alba intends to introduce a sixth production line and increase the output of the current five lines. Bapco is planning to build a new refinery and Tatweer is aiming to increase crude oil production by digging 3,600 wells in the coming 15 years,' it added.

Several sectors saw positive year-on-year growth in the second quarter of 2011 including electricity and water which grew by 17 per cent, social and personal services by 13 per cent, transport and communications by 8.6 per cent, government services by around 5 per cent, manufacturing by almost 3 per cent and mining and quarrying by around one per cent.

The finance sector, which makes up around a quarter of Bahrain's GDP, grew by 1.7 per cent compared with the same quarter last year.

The relative poverty line for Bahraini households, defined as 50 per cent of the median income, is BD463 per month ($1228) in 2010 prices.

The percentage of households earning an income below the poverty line is 21.9 per cent, equivalent to 27,177 households in 2010 and this does not take into account subsidised food, fuel and utilities.-TradeArabia News Service




Tags: Oil | aluminium | poverty | Bahrain GDP |

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