The economy of Niue is heavily dependent on aid from New Zealand. Government expenditures regularly exceed revenues, and the shortfall is made up by grants from New Zealand which are used to pay wages to public employees. Niue has cut government expenditures by reducing the public service by almost half.
The agricultural sector consists mainly of subsistence gardening, although some cash crops are grown for export. Industry consists primarily of small factories to process passion fruit, lime oil, honey, and coconut cream. The sale of postage stamps to foreign collectors is an important source of revenue.
The island in recent years has suffered a serious loss of population because of migration of Niueans to New Zealand. Efforts to increase GDP include the promotion of tourism and a financial services industry. Another source of income lately has been the sale of Internet domain names under the NU top level domain, which are particularly popular in Scandinavia, Belgium and the Netherlands, since nu means "now" in the Scandinavian languages and Dutch.
GDP: purchasing power parity - $4.5 million (1994 est.)
GDP - real growth rate: NA%
GDP - per capita: purchasing power parity - $2,250 (1994 est.)
GDP - composition by sector:
agriculture: NA%
industry: NA%
services: NA%
Population below poverty line: NA%
Household income or consumption by percentage share:
lowest 10%: NA%
highest 10%: NA%
Inflation rate (consumer prices): 1% (1995)
Labor force: 450 (1992 est.)
Labor force - by occupation: most work on family plantations; paid work exists only in government service, small industry, and the Niue Development Board
Unemployment rate: NA%
Budget:
revenues: $NA
expenditures: $NA, including capital expenditures of $NA
Industries: tourism, handicrafts, food processing
Industrial production growth rate: NA%
Electricity - production: 3 GWh (1998)
Electricity - production by source:
fossil fuel: 100%
hydro: 0%
nuclear: 0%
other: 0% (1998)
Electricity - consumption: 3 GWh (1998)
Electricity - exports: 0 kWh (1998)
Electricity - imports: 0 kWh (1998)
Agriculture - products: coconuts, passion fruit, honey, limes, taro, yams, cassava (tapioca), sweet potatoes; pigs, poultry, beef cattle
Exports: $117,500 (f.o.b., 1989)
Exports - commodities: canned coconut cream, copra, honey, passion fruit products, pawpaws, root crops, limes, footballs, stamps, handicrafts
Exports - partners: New Zealand 89%, Fiji, Cook Islands, Australia
Imports: $4.1 million (c.i.f., 1989)
Imports - commodities: food, live animals, manufactured goods, machinery, fuels, lubricants, chemicals, drugs
Imports - partners: New Zealand 59%, Fiji 20%, Japan 13%, Samoa, Australia, United States
Debt - external: $NA
Economic aid - recipient: $8.3 million (1995)
Currency: 1 New Zealand dollar (NZ$) = 100 cents
Exchange rates: New Zealand dollars (NZ$) per US$1 – 1.9451 (January 2000), 1.8889 (1999), 1.8629 (1998), 1.5082 (1997), 1.4543 (1996), 1.5235 (1995)
Fiscal year: 1 April - 31 March
Famous quotes containing the words economy of and/or economy:
“Quidquid luce fuit tenebris agit: but also the other way around. What we experience in dreams, so long as we experience it frequently, is in the end just as much a part of the total economy of our soul as anything we “really” experience: because of it we are richer or poorer, are sensitive to one need more or less, and are eventually guided a little by our dream-habits in broad daylight and even in the most cheerful moments occupying our waking spirit.”
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“Even the poor student studies and is taught only political economy, while that economy of living which is synonymous with philosophy is not even sincerely professed in our colleges. The consequence is, that while he is reading Adam Smith, Ricardo, and Say, he runs his father in debt irretrievably.”
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