ABSTRACT
Minus a 2.6 percent annual population growth rate, Burkina actually recorded annual per capita growth of 1.6 percent, a remarkable performance not only for West Africa but by overall sub-Saharan African standards. Although these statistics hide a bumpy business cycle with dramatic year-to-year fluctuations, data from the early 1990s suggest a continuation and possible improvement of this performance. This chapter looks more closely at this apparent paradox of growth amid poverty. After placing Burkina's economy into historical and cultural perspective, it goes on with a descriptive profile of each sector and ends with a macroeconomic overview covering issues such as economic instability, monetary dependence, foreign aid, structural adjustment, and migration. Colonial economic policy had thus two contradictory effects on Upper Volta's economy. In 1960 agriculture accounted for about 62 percent of Burkina's GDP. In the 1990s, as in precolonial times, small units dominate Burkina's agriculture. Burkina's known mineral resources include gold, zinc, manganese, limestone, phosphate, and diamonds.
