The Chamber of Deputies passed a bill on the 12th Development Plan, during a plenary session held on Wednesday.
The plan is instrument for the general orientation of the development policy and a framework to achieve programmes and projects at national and regional levels in different areas and sectors during the next five years.
Under the two-article law, the Government will submit to the Chambers of Deputies and Advisers as of 2011 an annual report including an assessment of the progress of implementation of the 12th Development Plan and prospects for its further implementation, while proposing necessary amendments in light of new factors that might occur and changes in the economic situation.
This plan, which is a five-year roadmap for the Government and instrument to implement the 2009-2014 presidential programme, will be translated in a migration of the national economy to a model driven by innovation and knowledge.
Several reforms will be carried out to this effect and they are to revolve around six major axes: development of the economic structure toward an eco-friendly economy with high technological component (creation of competitiveness poles); improvement of business environment and attractiveness of the Tunisia-site; consolidation of the national economy’s integration in the globalised economy (intensifying liberalisation of exchanges and drive to the total convertibility of the dinar); and preservation of financial balances (a decisive factor to ensure the sustainability of the development process).
As for the development scheme picked for the next five-year period, it predicts the achievement of an annual growth rate of 5.5%.
The sectors’ contribution to this growth will be the following: 4.9% for agriculture, 18.6% for manufactured industries, 6.5% for non-manufactured industries and 70% for services.
The aim also consists in raising the per capita income to 8,363 dinars by 2014, creating 425,000 jobs and reducing by one point and a half per cent the unemployment rate which will be brought down to 11.6% in 2014, from 13.3% in 2009. The rate of unemployed university graduates will be lowered during the same period from 21.7% to 13.6%.
Regarding investment, the Plan provides for an 11.2%-rise to reach 98.321 million Tunisian dinars (MTD), i.e., 26% of the GDP.
The private sector’s share in investment will be raised up to 60.8% by the end of the five-year period.
Foreign direct investments (FDIs) will follow the upward trend, to reach 17.200 MTD, including 905 MTD of portfolio investments.
Moreover, the Plan’s development scheme provides for increasing savings to 23.6% of the GDP, while the budget deficit will be kept within the limit of 2.7% of the GDP. The public and private consumption rate is set at 4.8% (11,015.8 MDT) and at 5.4% (40,250 MDT), respectively.
Exports will increase by 6.5% (28,337.9 MDT). Imports will rise by 7% (30,323 MDT). The coaching rate will increase from 15.5% in the 2007-2009 period to 21.5% in the 2010-2014 period.
Development resources will be ensured at 23% by labour productivity, at 28.4% by capital output and 48.6% by global yield of production factors.
