The economy in Belarus has been growing at a slow pace.  The country’s major trading partner is Russia accounting for almost 50% of imports and exports.

Gross Domestic Product

The country’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP) is continuously increasing. The GDP at current prices for 2010 amounted to BYR 162,963.6 billion, increasing by 18.56% over the previous year.  The GDP growth rate for 2010 registered at 7.6%, as compared to 0.2% in the previous year. The CAGR of GDP is 33.4% from 2000 to 2010.

(Source:nbrb.by, nbrb.by)

The nation’s GDP per capita for the year 2009 amounted to USD 5,075, a decrease compared to USD 6,277 in 2008.

(Source:World Bank)

GNI per capita at Purchasing Power Parity (PPP)

GNI per capita at PPP for 2010 is registered at USD 12,926, an increase of 39.74% compared to USD 9,250 in 2005.

(Source: UNDP)

Income tax

Income tax on individual incomes in Belarus was 12% in 2010.

(Source: Taxrates.cc)

Corporate tax

Standard corporate tax in Belarus is 24% and Value Added Tax (VAT) levied across the country is 20%.

(Source: Taxrates.cc)

Inflation Rate

According to IMF estimates, the inflation rate registered at 10.03%, compared to 10.11% in the previous year. From 2008 to 2010 E, it declined to 10.03% from 13.3%.

(Source: IMF)

FDI Inflow

The Foreign Direct Investment inflow in the country increased steadily from 2001 to 2010. In 2010, FDI inflow registered at USD 8,423.8 million, increasing by 27.10% compared to the previous year.

 

(Source:nbrb.by)

Portfolio Investment

The portfolio investment in January 2010 amounted to USD 32.2 million, a decrease of 10.3% compared to USD 35.9 million in January 2009.

 

Portfolio Investment (USD million)
	January - 2010	January - 2009
Equity securities	24.4	29.2
Debt securities	7.8	6.7
Total	32.2	35.9

(Source:nbrb.by)

Central Bank Assets

The assets of the Central bank of Belarus are

Currency Unit: Belarusian Ruble (BYR)

Assets of Central bank of Belarus (BYR billion)
	January 2010	January 2009
Claims on residents of the Republic of Belarus	58,830.0	76,631.1
Claims on non-residents	4,108.2	2,820.8
Other assets	2,203.6	1,729.0
Total assets	82,943.0	63,379.8

(Source:nbrb.by)

Consumer Price Index

The consumer price index in Belarus for 2010 registered at 107.8, a decrease of 4.60% compared to the previous year.

(Source: nbrb.by, nbrb.by)

Producer Price Index (PPI)

In 2010, the Producer Price Index (PPI) registered at 113.6, a decrease 0.78% compared to the previous year.

 

(Source: nbrb.by, nbrb.by)

Interest rates

The Banks offer around 7.0% interest rate on deposits in Belarus.

(Source: nbrb.by)

Money supply (Currency in Circulation)

Money in circulation in 2010 registered at BYR 38,107.1 billion, an increase of 23.8% over the previous year.

 

(Source: nbrb.by)

Government Expenditure

In 2010, total expenditure recorded at BYR 52,970.7 billion, a decrease of 16.92%, compared to BYR 63,765.9 billion in 2009.

(Source: nbrb.by, nbrb.by)

Official exchange rate

BYR per USD for 2010 is registered at 2,978.10, an increase of 6.64% over the previous year.

(Source: nbrb.by, nbrb.by)

 

Government finances

Fiscal balance

The country’s fiscal balance registered a deficit of BYR 4,205.3 billion in 2010, compared to the deficit of BYR 958.3 billion in 2009.

 (Source: nbrb.by pg no.13, nbrb.by pg no.14)

Total Revenue

The country's revenue in 2010 recorded at BYR 48,765.4 billion, a decrease of about 22.35% from the 2009 amount of BYR 62,807.6 billion.

(Source: nbrb.by, nbrb.by)

 

(Source: nbrb.by pg no.13, nbrb.by pg no.14)

Current Account Balance

The current account balance showed a surplus of USD 435.5 million in 2005. In September 2010, the current account balance registered a deficit of USD 5,371.7 million, a decrease from 2009 a deficit of USD 6,401.9 million.

(Source:nbrb.by pg no.35, nbrb.by pg no.20)

Balance of Payments

In September 2010, the balance of payments registered a surplus of USD 210.2 million.

Balance of Payments (USD Million)
	2010 (Jan. to Sept.)	2009 (Jan. to Sept.)
Current Account	-5 371.7	-4 382.3
Capital and financial account	4 728.6	4 794.2
Net errors and omissions	853.3	321.5
Total	210.2	733.4

(Source: nbrb.by pg no.20)

The labour force in Belarus recorded at 46.93 million people in 2010, an increase of about 0.14% from the previous year’s 46.86 million labour population. 

(Source:belstat.gov.by)

Unemployment Rate

The unemployment rate in the country decreased from 3.1% of the total labour force in 2003 to 0.7% in 2010.

(Source: belstat.gov.by)

Average wage

The average monthly wages increased steadily from 2000 to 2010. In 2010, the average wage registered at BYR 1,238,000, an increase of 26.12% compared to the previous year.

 

 

 (Source: belstat.gov.by)

Level of Unionisation

Unions in Belarus have been dominant and the labour force has been heavily unionized. About 96.4% of workers account to the unionisation in the country. The major labour union in the country is the Federation of Trade Unions constituting 28 branches. There are about 4 million members of the Federation of Trade Unions of Belarus.

(Source: fpb.by)

Belarus has a Presidential Republic of government, that is democratic, social state and unitary based on the rule of law. The government of Belarus includes legislature, executive and judiciary powers.

The country’s Parliament structure includes two chambers, the House of Representatives including 110 deputies and the Council of the Republic constituting 64 members.

Currently, Alexander Grigoryevich Lukashenko is the President and Sergei Sidorsky is the Prime Minister of the country. Major political parties in the country are:

•          Agrarian Party (AP)
•          Belarusian Labour Party (BLP)
•          Belarusian Popular Front (BPF)
•          Belarusian Social Democratic Party 'Hramada' (BSDP)
•          Communist Party of Belarus (CPB);
•          Conservative Christian Party (CCP)
•          Party of Communists of Belarus
•          United Civic Party (UCP)

(Source: president.gov.by, fco.gov)

Regulatory Environment in Belarus

In Belarus, the expenses for setting up a new venture are low compared to the average expenses across the world.

The country’s economic freedom score is 47.9, making its economy the 155^th freest in the 2010 Index. Belarus ranks 42^nd out of 43 countries in the Europe region. The overall score for Belarus declined by 0.8 points compared to the previous year.

Source: (Heritage.org)

Corruption perception

The Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI) is a survey that measured the perceived level of corruption across countries worldwide in 2010. Belarus ranked 127^th on this list indicating that the corruption levels in the public departments in the country are fairly high.

Belarus slipped on the CPI rankings since 2009 – it was ranked 139^th with a score of 2.4 which indicates the perceived levels of corruption have increased in the country.

(Source:transparency.org)

Freedom of Information

The freedom of media in Belarus is restricted. The country’s press Television is the major source for information. 

(Source: BBC)

The World Press Freedom Index 2010 ranks Belarus at 154 with a score of 57.00 which indicates that media in Belarus is restricted.

(Source: rsf.org)

Newspapers

 

•          Sovetskaya Belorussiya
•          Respublika
•          Narodnaya Hazeta
•          Zvyazda
•          BDG Delovaya Gazeta
•          Narodnaya Volya
•          BelGazeta

Judicial system

The judiciary in Belarus consists of

•          Constitutional Court
•          General court
•          Economic courts

The Constitutional Courtis the specialized body formed by 12 judges. Out of those, six judges are appointed by the President of Belarus and the remaining six are appointed by the National Assembly.

General courts include District courts, Regional courts and the Supreme Court. In the General courts, Supreme Court is the highest court of justice which has control over civil, criminal cases and administrative offences. The Supreme Courts are sub divided by Plenum of the Supreme Court, Presidium of the Supreme Court, judicial board on civil cases of the Supreme Court, judicial board on criminal cases of the Supreme Court, judicial board on the cases of intellectual property, and Military board of the Supreme Court.

Economic courts include economic courts of regions and the Supreme Economic Court. The Supreme economic court is the highest court of justice in economic courts and deals with bankruptcy, land and tax related cases.

(Source: kc.gov.by, kc.gov.by, kc.gov.by, kc.gov.by)

According to preliminary estimates, the total population of Belarus for 2011 is 9.481 million. In 2010, the total population registered at 9,500,000, decreasing at a rate of about 0.14% over the previous year.

(Source: belstat.gov.by)

The gender ratio in the country is unbalanced i.e. there are about 86.9 males for every 100 females in the country.

 (Source: UN)

The mortality rate (per 1,000 live births) of the country is registered at 16 for males and 12.7 for females in 2009. The infant mortality rate (per 1,000 live births) is recorded at 4 for women and 5.4 for male in 2009. In 2009, the birth rate (per 1,000) for men was 12.7 and for women was 10.4.

The average life expectancy at birth in Belarus for men is 64.7 years and for women is 76.4 years (2009).

(Source: belstat.gov.by)

The population below 14 years of age in the country was 0.66%, aged 15 to 59 years was 25.69% and aged above 60 was 73.66% of the total population for the year 2009.

(Source: belstat.gov.by)

In 2009, the total number of immigrants were 19,892 out of which females accounted for 8,943 and males, 10,949. The total number of emigrants were 7,643 out of which females accounted for 3,939 and males accounted for 3,704.

(Source: belstat.gov.by)

Ethnic groups in Belarus are:

•          Belarusian
•          Russian
•          Polish
•          Ukrainian
•          Jewish

A large proportion of the population in Belarus is Belarusian. Nearly 83.7% people are Belarusian followed by Russian 8.3%, Polish 3.1%, Ukrainian 1.7%, Jewish 0.1% and others accounting for 3.1%.

(Source: belstat.gov.by)

The country ranks 61^st out of 182 countries on the Human Development index 2010 conducted by the United Nations. The HDI provides a composite measure of three dimensions of human development: living a long and healthy life (measured by life expectancy), being educated (measured by adult literacy and gross enrolment in education) and having a decent standard of living (measured by purchasing power parity, PPP, income). 

(Source: UNDP)

The country’s literacy rate for the year 2005 to 2008 has been estimated at 100%.

(Source: UNICEF)

The education system in Belarus consists of Pre-school education, School education and higher education system. The basic education of the country is from 6 years to 15 years. The official language of Belarus within the education system is Russian and Belarusian.

In 2010, there were 3,654 institutions providing general secondary education, 214 institutions providing secondary specialized and 55 institutions providing higher education.

(Source: belarus.by, belstat.gov.by)

Health care

In Belarus, the healthcare system is controlled by the Ministry of Health giving all the people in the country the right to free health care in state-funded institutions. According to the ministry of health and finance, some percentage of tax revenue should be given to healthcare sector.

The country has almost 41,700 doctors and nearly 111,000 junior medical staff. There are 511 outpatient clinics, out of which 372 are rural polyclinics and also have 32 outpatient departments in a hospital which includes 422 rural hospitals.

According to national statistics, there are 661 hospital organisations and 107,000 hospital beds in 2009. There are 49,400 physicians of all specialties and 51,100 per ten thousand populations. 122,200 are paramedical personnel and 126,500 per ten thousand populations.

The total health expenditure as a percentage of GDP in 2008 was 6.5%.

(Source:belstat.gov.by, WHO, europe-cities, europe-cities)

The mass public transport in the country is through buses, trolley buses, trams, taxis/ cabs and air transport.  Railways are operated by Belarusian Railways.

(Source:mapsofworld)

Roadways

A total of 5,826 routes constitute to the passenger road transport, of which 1,435 are urban routes and 3,467 are rural routes. Roadways also inter-city linked to neighbouring international destinations.

(Source:mintrans.by)

Ports:  In Belarus, there is a single port i.e. Port of Mazyr.

(Source:worldportsource)

Airports

(Source: Air charter world)

Telecommunications networks

The number of fixed telephone lines in Belarus has increased from 3,175,900 in 2004 to 3,969,300 in 2009 registering a CAGR of 4.6%. The usage of fixed telephone lines has increased from 32.20 per 100 inhabitants in 2004 to 41.20 per 100 inhabitants in 2009.

(Source: ITU)

The number of mobile cellular subscriptions rose from 2,239,300 in 2004 to 9,686,200. The ratio of mobile cellular subscriptions to fixed telephone lines was 2.4:1, indicating that the amount of mobile cellular usage in the country is low compared to the fixed telephone line usage.  

(Source: ITU) 

In 2010, 4.4 million people i.e. 77.8% of the total population were users of internet services.

(Source:internetworldstats.com)