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专业地理学论文essa代写范文
下面为大家整理一篇优秀的essay代写范文 -- Guinea-Bissau，文章讲述几内亚比绍共和国是非洲西海岸的一个国家，国土面积为36125千平方公里，其中包括28000平方公里的土地和81200平方公里的海洋。该国人口超过154万，人口密度为每平方米42人。几内亚比绍是前葡萄牙殖民地。长期的掠夺和殖民统治使该国的工业基础非常薄弱，矿产资源尚未得到开发。
Guinea-Bissau
Republic of Guinea-Bissau is a country in the west coast of Africa with the national territory area of 36.125 thousand square kilometers, including 28 thousand square kilometers of land and 8.12 thousand square kilometers of ocean. The country has a population of more than 1.54 million and the density of population is 42 persons per square meter. Guinea-Bissau is a former Portuguese colony. The long period of depredations and colonization left the country a very weak foundation of industry, and the mineral resources have not yet been explored. The economy in the country is dominated by agriculture, upon which more than 80 percent of the population depends. The total area of land suitable for farming is 900 thousand hectares, of which only 29 percent is utilized. Besides, the fishery resources in Guinea-Bissau are fairly rich. Sending fishing permits and the export of fish and other seafood are the main sources of Foreign exchange earnings. In the year of 1981, Guinea-Bissau was listed as one of the least developed countries by the United Nations.
Key Words: Guinea-Bissau; economy; analysis
Contents
Ⅰ. Introduction 3
Ⅱ. History and Geography 3
A. Historical Characteristics 4
B. Geographical Conditions 4
Ⅲ. Economy of Guinea-Bissau 5
A. Weakness of Industry 6
B. Domination of Agriculture 7
C. External Economic Relation 8
Ⅳ. Prospects and Direction of Development 9
A. Challenges and Opportunities 9
B. Tourism-A New Industry 10
Ⅴ. Conclusion 11
Analysis of Economic Development of Guinea-Bissau
I. Introduction
Guinea-Bissau is an agricultural country with a very weak foundation of industry. It is one of the least developed countries published by the United Nations. According to the statistics announced by the World Bank, Guinea-Bissau is listed the sixteenth of the least developed countries.
Guinea-Bissau is a former Portuguese colony. In the year of 1973, Guinea-Bissau declared independence. At the beginning period of its independence, there were only a dozen small-sized processing factories over the country. Because of a continuing war during that time, food shortage was extreme serious and could not be self-sufficient and the growth rate of real per capita output was only 110 dollars (White 12).
With great difficulty and challenge, the government of Guinea-Bissau is trying to find a way to develop the economy of the country. However, there are many factors lying in the way of its development, and the way forward also seems to be harsh and difficult. Meanwhile, there is also opportunity hidden behind the challenges.
II. History and Geography of Guinea-Bissau
Guinea-Bissau is a tropical country located in the west coast of Western Europe. The territory of this country is mainly on the main land, with a long winding coastal line. Guinea-Bissau experienced a long time of fighting for national independence. Being a former colonial country of Portage, the people of the country fought a long way to build their own nation. Finally in the year of 1973, Guinea-Bissau ushered her day of independence.
A. Historical Characteristics
Guinea-Bissau, like other countries of Africa, was not an independent country from ancient time till the fifteenth century. In the year of 1446, Portuguese colonists invaded the land, which stirred the local people to continuous resistance.
In 1908, a large uprising, which lasted for an amazing nine years, was exploded in the country. Following that, a serious of smaller uprisings were continuously started in the year of 1920, 1932 and 1939. Till the twentieth century, the resistance experienced a new progress.
In November of 1973, the first National People’s Parliament was opened and the Republic of Guinea-Bissau was formally declared independence. Soon after its independence, Guinea-Bissau accepted the admission from more than eighty countries and organizations, including the United Nations. In the beginning period of its foundation, the industrial development was faced with a harsh circumstance with only a few factories over the country due to the destruction of years of wars. What was even worse was that the food could not be self-sufficient. The government paid great efforts in rebuilding the nation, and restored its economy to some extend. However, Guinea-Bissau still had a long way to go before getting rid of extreme poverty.
B. Geographical Conditions
Guinea-Bissau has a typical subordinate savanna climate. The country is in the season of summer throughout the year. The temperature of the mainland is rather high all the year round, with the average environment temperature reaching 27 degrees centigrade. In normal years, the rainfall of the north area is around 1500 millimeters, and that of the coastal area of the south is up to 3000 millimeters, which is far more than the mainland. With the influence of the Sahara Dessert, the evaporation is increasing and surpassing the rainfall, causing serious drought in this country. The tropical soil “are easily leached” (Bohannan 172), adding difficulty to agriculture.
Guinea-Bissau is rich in natural a variety of resources. What is more, there is abundant petroleum in coastal area. However, it is a pity that such bounty of the resources in the country is not fully utilized.
It is worth mentioning that the forestry resource in Guinea-Bissau is so rich that about 56 percent of the land there is covered by forest. The reservoir of wood is nearly 50 million cubit meters, the deforestation of which is about 55 thousand cubic meters per year (Snoek 2004). The wood, which is also in good quality, becomes one of the most important exports in Guinea-Bissau.
As a coastal country with a long coastal line, Guinea-Bissau has rich fishery resources. According to relevant research, the annual overall harvest reaches 250 thousand to 350 thousand tons. Because of there are no domestic large fishing ships within the country, the government gives away permits to foreigners as a main resource of foreign currency. Besides, seafood export is also a major channel through which people in Guinea-Bissau get foreign exchange.
III. Economy of Guinea-Bissau
“West Africa was in the news during the months of March and April as coups pushed the region to the brink of chaos” (Mutambo 2012). In the mid to late 1990s to now, the economic development in Guinea-Bissau experienced an unstable process. The reason that caused this problem is that the political situation in that period is turbulent, which directly restricted the development of domestic economy, especially during the years of coup. In a rather long period after the independence, the state leaders stepped on a wrong way of economic construction. Ignoring the weak foundation the lack of technology and talented managers, the government took extreme reform measures, which even worsened the economic conditions.
A. Weakness of Industry
The industrial in Guinea-Bissau, whose base is feeble, mainly depends on agricultural products and food processing. The processing industry shares 75 percent of the total industrial output. After independence from Portugal, the government paid great attention to attracting foreign capital and set up some joint factories with other countries like Portugal, such as juice factories, car assembly plants, beer factories and so on. However, these factories all finished up in failure one after another as a result of poor management. During the time of the industrial development, several civil wars were broken out, the country “was destroyed and hundreds of thousands fled into the countryside”(Massey 2012), which deeply destroyed the newly developing industries.
Guinea-Bissau has rich but unexplored mineral resources, and the mining industry is still waiting to be developed. The country knows little about its mineral resources. At present, there are only a few building materials known by the nation, including bauxite and phosphate. The construction industry in Guinea-Bissau is mainly state-operated. For instance, eighty percent of the national construction work is accomplished by public project and the supporting organization of construction and economic department.
The overall situation of industry is still not optimistic in Guinea-Bissau. Because of economic difficulties at present, the government does not own enough fund to build more industrial factories and infrastructure.
B. Domination of Agriculture
The landscape in Guinea-Bissau is flat and smooth with many rivers flowing in the mainland, which offers naturally suitable conditions for agricultural irrigation. With its appropriate climate and abundant rainfall during the rainy season, Guinea-Bissau owns a natural environment for the development of agriculture. Therefore, it develops into a typical agricultural country.
Agriculture, the main part of national economy, takes up about half of the whole economy. More than 80 percent of the population and three quarters of the labor force work on agriculture and grassland farming. The main grain crops are rice, beans, corns and so on, among which rice occupies the largest planting area. Thus rice serves the people of Guinea-Bissau as their staple food. In the years of good harvests, the export of rice can even earn foreign currency for the country. Agriculture, therefore, grows into the dominant position of this country.
However, in spite of the good geographical and climate conditions, the development of agriculture is still seriously restricted due to a serious of factors. “Most of the cultivation is by hand” (White 13). The mode of production, which still depends on human force, is outdated. At the same time, the lack of modern ways of production limits the speed and degree of further agricultural development. Besides, the country is utterly lacking in funds thus does not have enough financial resource to deal with various natural disasters like drought and insect outbreaks. Meanwhile, there is an increasing number of people giving up agriculture and setting out in business. All the above-mentioned factors greatly influenced and restricted the development of agriculture in Guinea-Bissau.
In the plans made by government, to become self-sufficient on food is set as a goal. After all, there are still bright prospects in Guinea-Bissau. To begin with, there is vast land with relatively few people in the rural area. The landscape is flat and smooth with fertile soil suitable for agricultural cultivation. Besides, the latitude location provides sufficient sunlight, which makes it possible that grains, vegetables and other kinds of crops can grow through both dry and rainy seasons. What is more, since rice is the staple food not only in Guinea-Bissau but also in its neighboring countries, it is not unlikely that in the future, when rice can be self-sufficient within Guinea-Bissau, it can be exported to surrounding nations.
Fishery industry is another essential part of agriculture in Guinea-Bissau. With the coastal-line reaching 220 kilometers and about 60 islands, Guinea-Bissau is gifted natural conditions for fishery industrial development. The government carries out strict managing policy to protect juvenile fish, thus ensuring the sustainable development of fishery. From the 1970s, fishery industry began to develop rapidly. Nevertheless, the shortage of modern fishing tools, to a great extend, restricts the progress and slows down the speed of development.
C. External Economic Relation
There is a serious imbalance in the foreign trade between Guinea-Bissau and other countries. Trade deficit exists almost each year. Meanwhile, the demand for manufactured goods, mechanical equipment, fuel and food is on an increasing trend with the time passing. The sluggish economy makes Guinea-Bissau deeply depend on foreign aids. Guinea-Bissau is a high incidence area of bird flu and other infectious diseases. In the year of 2006, the United Nations and other nations donated 3.1 million euros. This sum of money greatly relieved the dilemma in Guinea-Bissau, and improved the living conditions of local people.
VI. Prospects and Direction of development
Guinea-Bissau is a member state of World Trade Organization and Economic Community of West African States. Thus there is no overmuch restriction of trade, especially of export. Although there is a variety of difficulties and challenges ahead in the way of economic development in Guinea-Bissau, there are still many opportunities and bright prospects.
A. Challenges and Opportunities
To look into the future trade, there are many challenges that need to be conquered. The most obvious one is that the purchasing power of people is low with limited per capita income. Guinea-Bissau is a heavily indebted nation, 80 percent of the population is living in the rural area, with daily expense less than 0.5 dollars. In addition, the financial system in Guinea-Bissau is not sound. At present, the only bank in Guinea-Bissau is Bank of West Africa, which was just established not long ago. With restricted capital, the bank charges high fees for financial transaction. The safety of finance is difficult to guarantee. Moreover, the construction of export goods, which is in small number, is single. It is the same within the country. For the goods like computers, vehicles and electric generators, which are high in command but hard to be scaled due to limited purchasing capacity. Furthermore, powerful companies and businessmen in Guinea-Bissau are only a few. Debt disputes exist between the companies. Merchants, who are not to be dependent on to drive the domestic demand, are low in paying capacity.
Nevertheless, opportunities also exist in the forward way of development. Although there are a variety of difficulties and even great risk to open the commodity market of Guinea-Bissau, both the inside and outside environment is developing to better directions. Compared with the situation in the war years, the political situation is becoming stable in resent years, providing some prerequisites for the economic activities in Guinea-Bissau. With the improvements of domestic and foreign situations, the international community is going to continue to provide aids for Guinea-Bissau. Some infrastructures may be soon to be constructed, which will help to increase the demand for various building materials to some extent.
B. Tourism—A New Industry
In spite of the restrictions of economic conditions, the government in Guinea-Bissau is trying hard to take measures to develop is tourism with fully taking advantage of its superior natural environment.
Bissau, the capital city, is located beside the Atlantic Ocean with beautiful sceneries. Flowers are blooming and trees are green through out the year. The city is located in the center of the coastal-line with convenient transportation. Bissau is the biggest city and port, and the national political, economic and cultural center.
V. Conclusion
There are manifold difficulties impeding the development of economy in Guinea-Bissau. To begin with, political stability is essential in the way of development. The influence of wars and political disorders, which cannot offer a suitable environment for economic development, was the biggest obstruction before and after its independence, greatly restricting the improvement of economy and the living standard of its citizens. Then, the weak foundation of this agricultural country makes it extremely hashing to develop its trade with other countries in the world. With low purchasing capacity of people, single export goods structure and lack of advanced technology, there is still a long way to go to promote the economy of Guinea-Bissau. Finally, the policy of management is not complete, and the government is still in great debt and deeply depends on international aids, which is not a reliable way in the long term.
However, although there are many elements blocking the way of progress, there are still favorable conditions and bright prospects. With the political enjoinment getting more stable than war years, Guinea-Bissau is stepping into an enabling environment with less harm and death. The government is also trying to find new measures for economic development and paying more attention to economic construction. Moreover, the international is offering more assistance to Guinea-Bissau, which will as well increase the international connection with other countries. Still, there are many new industries rising. The development of tourism is a new opportunity to open the market, drive economic growth, and welcome new things from all over the world into Guinea-Bissau. With such promising opportunities and prospects, there is a lot of work that the government and people can do to develop the economy in Guinea-Bissau.
Bibliography
Bohannan, Paul. Africa and Africans. New York: The National History Press, 1971.
Massey, Simon. “Multi-Faceted Mediation In the Guinea-Bissau Civil War”. Scientia Militaria : South African Journal of Military Studies, 2012(1): 78.
Mutambo, Aggrey. “Taking Charge”. CHINAFRICA, 2012(4): 54-55.
Snoek, Hurry. Guinea-Bissau: Selected Issues and Statistical Appendix. Washington D.C.: International Monetary Fund, 2004.
White, Richard. Africa. London: Heinemann Educational Books Ltd, 1978.
