Tunisia’s five-year development plan 2016-2020 eyes a 5% growth in the next five years, against an average of 1.5% a year between 2011 and 2015, said Minister of Development, Investment and International Cooperation Yassine Brahim.
“The broad lines of Tunisia’s development plan provide for a series of bold reforms, a gradual recovery of economic growth for a sustained growth and a noticeable reduction of unemployment,” the minister noted in his remarks at the opening of the 2nd edition of the Tunisian-German economic forum held under the theme “Germany and Tunisia for a successful economic co-operation.”
Germany, as a privileged partner of Tunisia, will certainly be a major player in this approach which is likely to encourage the country’s partners to strengthen and diversify co-operation with Tunisia, said the minister.
Brahim added that the government is relying, as part of this approach, on a gradual recovery of investment to raise the investment rate from 18.5% of GDP in 2015 to 25% in 2020, seeing that the development of investment is an essential condition for the recovery of the national economy.
The objective is to reach an overall investment volume of 125 billion dinars in the period 2016-2020, including 45 billion dinars for public investment, 62 billion dinars for local private investment and 18 billion dinars for foreign direct investment, he said.
Regarding the reduction of unemployment, Brahim pointed out that this rate should stand at 11% in 2020, against 15.2% now, emphasising the government’s commitment to increase the per capita income to 12,400 dinars against 8,283 dinars now.
For this purpose, it is necessary to control financial balances, by bringing down the current deficit to 6.8% of GDP from 8.5% in 2015 and control inflation not to exceed 3.6% in 2020 against 5.4% expected in 2015, he noted.
The minister highlighted the importance of effectively improving the business environment, making progress in the implementation of major reforms, especially those related to the modernisation of the administration, review the public procurement system, promulgate the new investment code and adopt a proactive policy to boost public-private partnership.
