Libya’s economic outlook relies heavily on the oil and gas sector, which constitutes a significant portion of its GDP, government revenue, and exports. With oil production expected to average 1.1 mbpd in 2024, GDP is anticipated to shrink by 2.7 percent this year
Libya Economic Monitor, Fall 2024: Stabilizing Growth and Boosting Productivity
World Bank
In order for Egypt to respond effectively to the alarming environmental threats it faces, it must bring the large number of military-managed projects and production in the civilian domain under a single, integrated national framework for climate change mitigation and adaptation planning, monitoring, and accountability.
Do No Harm: Toward an Environmental Audit of Military-Managed Civilian Projects in Egypt
Carnegie Middle East Center
Situated at the northwest borders of the continent, between the Atlantic Ocean and the Mediterranean Sea, Morocco has established itself as a stable and dynamic economy and a gateway to Africa. A part of the Maghreb and Arab world, the country has for many decades embraced a policy of economic and financial openness, aiming to integrate its economy into global markets
How Africas Youth Can Change Its Destiny - The Case of Morocco
Policy Center For The New South
The long-running feud between Libya’s competing authorities over the Central Bank has flared up again, threatening an economic crisis that could lead to unrest. The parties should press ahead with UN-backed mediation to achieve a resolution.
Getting past Libyas Central Bank standoff
International Crisis Group
The bilateral relationship between Morocco and India has passed through three distinct phases, culminating in the current stage of strategic partnership. Initially marked by diplomatic formalities and limited engagement, the relationship gradually transitioned into a period of economic and cultural exchange, laying the groundwork for more substantial collaboration.
This Policy Paper analyzes the historical trajectory of Morocco-India relations, tracing the development from these early interactions to the establishment of a comprehensive strategic partnership.
Morocco-India partnership: Field of strength to be explored
Policy Center For The New South
Absent rapid reform, Tunisia’s economic policies will plunge the country into an abyss. Already, a financial crisis is brewing. This is the worrisome outcome of the path the country has followed since President Kais Saied’s power grab in July 2021. The path is underpinned by two main aspects of economic policy.
Tunisias Economy in the Eye of the Storm
Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
Avec une croissance de 3,4% par an au cours de la période 1980-2019, la Mauritanie a enregistré de bonnes performances économiques au cours des quatre décennies précédant la période de Covid-19, qui l’ont fait passer au rang de pays à « revenu intermédiaire de la tranche inférieure ».
Impulser la transformation de la Mauritanie par la réforme de l'architecture financière mondiale
African Development Bank Group
One of Africa’s longest wars shifted toward a conclusion in July when France recognized Morocco’s claim of sovereignty over the Western Sahara. That action, alongside Morocco’s military advantage, effectively will leave the indigenous Sahrawi independence movement with no choice but to eventually settle for some form of autonomy within Morocco.
While this reality will be unsatisfactory for the estimated 173,000 Sahrawis living in refugee camps, their best option, and that of their backer, Algeria, is now to seize the opportunity to negotiate for best-possible peace terms with Morocco.
Western Saharas conflict is over. Negotiating the terms comes next
United States Institute Of Peace
In 2023, Tunisia emerged as the primary country of embarkation for irregular migrants seeking to reach Europe, eclipsing Libya, which had long been the main North African departure point. In total, some 97 306 migrants arrived in Italy from Tunisia, just over three times as many as in 2022.
Reading of the Week: Tunisia. Irregular Migration Reaches Unprecedented Levels
Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime
The prospect of Maghreb states’ unity in transforming the oil-rich North Africa, once the breadbasket of the Mediterranean, into a more integrated region of stability and growth was buried at the Carthage summit in April 2024 with the launch of a tripartite initiative bringing together Tunisia, Algeria and Libya, nicknamed the G3.
Reading Of The Week: Will the G3 of Maghreb states reshape the balance of power in North Africa?
Manara
Since the early 2000s, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has identified the Nile Delta as one of the parts of the world most vulnerable to climate change impacts, including sea-level rise and rising temperatures. The climate crisis is compounding an already difficult situation in the delta: Egypt is experiencing sustained demographic growth, gaining 1 million residents every seven months.
Reading of the Week: Sea-Level Rise in the Nile Delta: Promoting Adaptation Through Circular Migration
Baker Institute
At the end of 2023 Egyptian people, called to the polls, reconfirmed Abdel Fattah al-Sisi as President of Egypt, resulting in the beginning of his third, six-year term. People’s Republican Party’s candidate, Hazem Omar, only achieved 4.06% of the vote and other candidates haven’t strayed far from the same result.
Facing the Future: Navigating Egypts Deepening Socio-Economic Challenges
Beyond the Horizon
This human capital review assesses human capital outcomes in Mauritania and identifies actions to strengthen, utilize, and protect human capital.
Mauritania Human Capital Review
World Bank Group
The financing resources that are needed to face adaptation and mitigation to climate change in Tunisia are enormous. Tunisia’s climate finance gap is estimated at US$ 1.72 billion annually, which represents 3.5 percent of the countrys GDP. Under current trends, public and multilateral sources alone will not be sufficient to close this gap.
Country Focus Report 2023 - Tunisia - Mobilizing Private Sector Financing for Climate and Green Growth
African Development Bank Group
Recognizing the urgency of addressing humanitarian needs for all people affected and displaced by Storm Daniel including immediate needs of all vulnerable migrants, IOM is implementing all its operations ensuring respect for human rights and dignity on-the-ground. The Organization is supporting local authorities and is working closely with its partners, complementing and upscaling the relief and response efforts to alleviate the suffering of the affected population.
IOM Flash Appeal: Libya-Storm Daniel
International Organization for Migration
Africa has shown resilience in the face of the COVID-19 pandemic, reduced fiscal space, debt burdens, climate change, and economic headwinds. Over the past decade, we as a continent have continued to reduce poverty and grow the middle class. We are poised to embark on a transformation journey to help us reach our fullest economic potential. Now is the time for Africa to accelerate its evolution as a single market, a valuable player in value chains, and a destination for investment, particularly in the green economy.
Marrakech Framework: An African Agenda for Global Financial Architecture
African Center for Economic Transformation
Accelerating the growth of the green economy should happen rapidly through policy actions. If the global green transition is left to market forces, it can have grave consequences for the world. Considering the varied levels of technological advancements among countries, some will be better placed to develop and push forward green technology, whereas others will simply be adopting these new technologies.
Egypts Green Transition: Nurturing a Sustainable Economy and Workforce
Middle East Council on Global Affairs
Libya’s political crisis took a new turn after its House of Representatives, based in the eastern city of Tobruk, approved a plan to appoint an interim government that would reunify the country’s two parallel executives as part of a roadmap to general elections. House members made this decision with backing from representatives of the rival Tripoli-based assembly, the High State Council, and from east-based military strongman Field Marshal Khalifa Haftar.
Forming a Unity Government May be Libyas Best Bet for Healing Rift
International Crisis Group
Algeria is back. After years of self-imposed withdrawal from international politics under the leadership of geriatric former president, Abdelaziz Bouteflika, Algeria now wants to reinvigorate its role as a regional power. But it is re-emerging amid heightened tensions with its rival Morocco and rapidly destabilising southern and eastern neighbours.
Power couple: How Europe and Algeria can move beyond energy cooperation
European Council on Foreign Relations
Historically, the women, peace, and security (WPS) agenda’s four pillars—prevention, protection, participation, and relief and recovery—have largely developed along separate trajectories. This has started to change with the UN Security Council’s recent progress in recognizing the link between women’s participation in peace and security and their protection, as well as the need to create “enabling environments” for women’s participation. Nonetheless, there is often a gap between international frameworks on participation and protection and the realities experienced by women, especially in conflict-affected contexts.
Full, Equal, Meaningful, and Safe: Creating Enabling Environments for Womens Participation in Libya
International Peace Institute
Renewed negotiations to reach a settlement on the disputed territory of Western Sahara could be within grasp after painstaking diplomatic spadework. But progress toward resolving the controversy over the area will prove hard to achieve without stronger U.S. backing. Widening differences between Morocco and the pro-independence Polisario Front, as well as mounting tensions between Morocco and the Front’s main sponsor, Algeria, have narrowed UN Envoy Staffan de Mistura’s room for manoeuvre.
Paving the Way to Talks on Western Sahara
International Crisis Group
Morocco made a surprising announcement last year, on July 5, 2022. The Maghreb-Europe Gas Pipeline, which had up until November 2021 transported billions of cubic meters (bcm) of natural gas every year from Algeria to Spain via Morocco, would be reversed. Instead, natural gas imported from North America via Spain would be sold to Morocco. For the first time since the inauguration of Mediterranean pipelines, natural gas would now flow south across the Mediterranean, from Europe to the Maghreb.
In Reverse: Natural Gas and Politics in the Maghreb and Europe
Foreign Policy Research Institute
The European Union faces intricate challenges in its policy towards Tunisia. Examining the country’s intertwined political and socio-economic crises, the analysis sheds light on President Kais Saied’s populist politics, which have hindered the political transition and undermined democratic structures. Amidst the pressing challenge of high inflation, escalating debt, sluggish growth and critical shortages in basic goods, the analysis delves into the IMF loan negotiations amidst European concerns regarding Tunisia’s economic collapse and increased migration flows across the Mediterranean.
EU-Tunisia Relations: Unpacking the Conundrum
Istituto Affari Internazionali
High levels of debt and changing bailout strategies are reshaping the geopolitical landscape of the Middle East and North Africa. Countries exporting hydrocarbons are gaining prominence over the highly indebted nations of Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon, and Tunisia. This is exacerbating the economic marginalization of low- and middle-income countries, forcing them to align geopolitically with ambitious, resource-rich funders, whose overlapping or colliding spheres of influence are fragmenting the region.
How Rising Debt Has Increased Egypts and Tunisias Geopolitical Peripheralization
Carnegie Middle East Center
Young Egyptians’ dissatisfaction with their employment prospects was a key driver of protests in 2011 and 2013. Since then, the country’s political authorities have worked hard to create job opportunities for young Egyptians by boosting growth in the construction sector (infrastructure and public works), among other things.
Power and potential: The economics of Egyptian construction and ICT
Clingendael Institute
Young Egyptians’ dissatisfaction with their employment prospects was a key driver of protests in 2011 and 2013. Since then, the country’s political authorities have worked hard to create job opportunities for young Egyptians by boosting growth in the construction sector (infrastructure and public works), among other things.
Power and potential: The economics of Egyptian construction and ICT
Clingendael Institute
In Tunisia, migration issues were historically limited to Tunisians residing abroad and, since the 1990s, has also referred more dramatically to the irregular emigration of Tunisians to Europe. National identity in Tunisia remains officially homogeneous and does not include contemporary cultures or migrations in its definition. Since independence, the national narrative has partly recognized cultural diversity, but only in relation to the past.
Reading of the Week: An Aborted Cosmopolitanism? Sub-Saharan Migration and the Entry into the Politics of Racism in Tunisia
Arab Reform Initiative
Although a considerable body of research has examined the relationship between information and communication technology and the food production process, less attention has been paid to whether internet utilization impacts food production in north African countries. This research sought to investigate the short and long-run relationship between internet utilization and food production in north Africa. Yearly data sets from 4 countries (Algeria, Tunisia, Egypt, and Morocco) were used, covering the period 1990-2021.
Internet and Food Production: Panel Data Evidence from North African Countries
Economic Research Forum
Beyond having an internationally recognised government, Libya is in dire need of a legitimate administration to take it a step away from political stagnation and division. A legal framework and a roadmap associated with a timetable for Libya’s elections in 2023 is therefore paramount, although caution is required – as to not be too hasty. Holding elections without an implementable constitutional basis and without unifying key state institutions like financial institutions (central bank), security institutions and the executive branch, will be counterproductive.
Resolving Libyas Legitimacy Crisis: 2023 Elections as a Pathway for Peace and Democratisation?
Istituto Affari Internazionali
Food security in Egypt is under threat due to many domestic and external challenges, such as climate change, water scarcity, global instability and disruption of supply chains, especially during the Russian Ukrainian crisis, and the economic deficit and need for reforms, particularly in the post-COVID era. This threat is expected to worsen in the near and distant future.
The Egyptian Holistic Approach to promote food security and tackle related challenges
Euromesco
In a recent football game between Tunisia and Senegal, Senegalese players celebrated their victory by proudly pointing at the colour of their skin. The gesture comes following weeks of a fierce racist campaign against sub-Saharan African migrants in the country, resulting in many fleeing the country. Ensuingly, a boycott campaign against Tunisian products in certain sub-Saharan countries has been launched. A leaked internal document by the World Bank announced it is pausing its partnership with Tunisia over the State’s racist rhetoric and the attacks victimizing sub-Saharan Africans.
The Disjunction of Black and White Africa: The Case of the Racist Campaign Against Sub-Saharan Africans in Tunisia
Brussels International Center
Since the election of al-Sisi in 2014, the main drivers of Egypt’s economy have been its construction and extractive sectors. Based on official data, these sectors have done a decent job in boosting the country’s GDP that has increased faster than that of many of Egypt’s neighbours.
The Egyptian political economy under al-Sisi
Clingendael
Anecdotal evidence suggests growing numbers of migrants intercepted at sea by the Tunisian coastguard return to Libya via smuggling. This article empirically document the experiences of “rescued” migrant mothers who consider and/or purposely re-engage in irregular, highrisk returns involving crossing the Tunisian border back into Libya.
A Mothers Choice: Undocumented motherhood, waiting and smuggling in the Tunisian Libyan borderlands
Danish Institute for International Studies
This study on the state of the energy sector in Tunisia (including renewable energy) is based on the key premise that energy is not a profit-making commodity, but a right. The study argues that access to energy and its production are political questions in essence, rather than purely technical ones.
Towards a just energy transition in Tunisia
The Transnational Institute
Blue Nile region has been characterized by conflicts for several years but the situation worsened in 2022. Since 19th October, 2022 approximately 191 people were killed including Women and children and injuring 220 others from Gomez, Hausa and Berta tribes living in the towns of Arousers Dam in Wad Almahi locality in Blue Nile region. Additionally, 95,000 Hausa members were displaced to other States in Sudan and others crossed the boarders to Ethiopia as refugees. Approximately 30 Sudanese Army Forces (SAF) soldiers were tried and convicted by the military judiciary parish (military court) and sentenced to 15 to 20 years imprisonment depending on the charges as provided for under the SAF law, 1986. 10 MI officer were resultantly transferred from Blue Nile to other Sudanese states.
Reading of the Week: Analysis of Conflicts in Blue Nile Region
Africa Centre For Justice and Peace Studies
Morocco has successfully begun to connect its once-neglected eastern region to domestic and global economic resources. But it is vital to ensure that the benefits these initiatives bring are fairly reinvested in local communities.
Defying Peripherality. How Morocco Has Sought to Integrate Its Eastern Borderlands
Carnegie Middle East Center
Since Tunisia’s President Kais Saied began consolidating his rule in July 2021, the country’s once-strong civil society has been plagued with divisions. The former strength was a product of the post-Arab Spring period, when Tunisia emerged as a paragon for democratic transition and NGOs proliferated, including labor unions, human rights groups, and school charities. These civil society groups drew Western support based on the hope that they would help propel the state’s transition away from authoritarian rule.
Civil Society in Tunisia: Resetting Expectations
The Washington Institute for Near East Policy
This paper proposes two new approaches for targeting the beneficiaries of social benefit programs in Tunisia, such as the cash transfer and healthcare programs. The first approach is a mixed means test, which extends the proxy means test model to explicitly combine both individual/household assessment and geographical targeting methods. The second approach is drawn from the identification step of the family of multidimensional poverty measures.
Social Safety Nets in Tunisia: Comparison of Different Targeting Methods
Economic Research Forum
Europe is witnessing an unprecedented energy crisis with gas prices up by eight times their ten-year average. As of August 2022, EU countries have spent 281 billion euros to curb the impact of the crisis on households and businesses. A significant portion of the crisis is due to Europe’s overreliance on Russian hydrocarbons, specifically following the Russian Gazprom’s indefinite suspension of its pipeline flow to Europe, a way to leverage European sanctions following the invasion of Ukraine.
Europes Energy Crisis and the Opportunity for an EU-Algeria Renewable Energy Cooperation
Brussels International Center