arable land: 9.1%
permanent crops: 40.6%
permanent pasture: 1%

Sao Tome and Principe’s youthful age structure – more than 60% of the population is under the age of 25 – and high fertility rate ensure future population growth. Although Sao Tome has a net negative international migration rate emigration is not a sufficient safety valve to reduce already high levels of unemployment and poverty. While literacy and primary school attendance have improved in recent years Sao Tome still struggles to improve its educational quality and to increase its secondary school completion rate. Despite some improvements in education and access to healthcare Sao Tome and Principe has much to do to decrease its high poverty rate create jobs and increase its economic growth.
The population of Sao Tome and Principe descends primarily from the islands’ colonial Portuguese settlers who first arrived in the late 15th century and the much larger number of African slaves brought in for sugar production and the slave trade. For about 100 years after the abolition of slavery in 1876 the population was further shaped by the widespread use of imported unskilled contract laborers from Portugal’s other African colonies who worked on coffee and cocoa plantations. In the first decades after abolition most workers were brought from Angola under a system similar to slavery. While Angolan laborers were technically free they were forced or coerced into long contracts that were automatically renewed and extended to their children. Other contract workers from Mozambique and famine-stricken Cape Verde first arrived in the early 20th century under short-term contracts and had the option of repatriation although some chose to remain in Sao Tome and Principe.
Today’s Sao Tomean population consists of mesticos (creole descendants of the European immigrants and African slaves that first inhabited the islands) forros (descendants of freed African slaves) angolares (descendants of runaway African slaves that formed a community in the south of Sao Tome Island and today are fishermen) servicais (contract laborers from Angola Mozambique and Cape Verde) tongas (locally born children of contract laborers) and lesser numbers of Europeans and Asians.

urban: 98.9% of population
rural: 93.6% of population
total: 97.1% of population
urban: 1.1% of population
rural: 6.4% of population
total: 2.9% of population (2015 est.)

urban: 40.8% of population
rural: 23.3% of population
total: 34.7% of population
urban: 59.2% of population
rural: 76.7% of population
total: 65.3% of population (2015 est.)

Force for Democratic Change Movement or MDFM [Fradique Bandeira Melo DE MENEZES]
Independent Democratic Action or ADI [Patrice TROVOADA]
Movement for the Liberation of Sao Tome and Principe-Social Democratic Party or MLSTP-PSD [Aurelio MARTINS]
Party for Democratic Convergence-Reflection Group or PCD-GR [Leonel Mario D'ALVA]
other small parties

This small poor island economy has become increasingly dependent on cocoa since independence in 1975. Cocoa production has substantially declined in recent years because of drought and mismanagement. Sao Tome and Principe has to import fuels most manufactured goods consumer goods and food making it vulnerable to fluctuations in global commodity prices. Maintaining control of inflation fiscal discipline and increasing flows of foreign direct investment into the nascent oil sector are major economic problems facing the country. The government also has attempted to reduce price controls and subsidies.
Over the years Sao Tome and Principe has had difficulty servicing its external debt and has relied heavily on concessional aid and debt rescheduling. It benefited from $200 million in debt relief in December 2000 under the Highly Indebted Poor Countries program which helped bring down the country's $300 million debt burden. In April 2011 the country completed a Threshold Country Program with The Millennium Challenge Corporation to help increase tax revenues reform customs and improve the business environment. In 2016 Sao Tome and Portugal signed a five-year cooperation agreement worth approximately $64 million some of which will be provided as loans.
Considerable potential exists for development of a tourist industry and the government has taken steps to expand facilities in recent years. Potential also exists for the development of petroleum resources in Sao Tome and Principe's territorial waters in the oil-rich Gulf of Guinea which are being jointly developed in a 60-40 split with Nigeria but any actual production is at least several years off. Volatile aid and investment inflows even with a growing tourism sector have kept growth moderate at around 4% annually which is insufficient to alleviate poverty. The IMF in late 2016 expressed concern about the country’s banking sector vulnerabilities.

$638 million (2016 est.)
$606 million (2015 est.)
$576 million (2014 est.)

4.1% (2016 est.)
4% (2015 est.)
4.1% (2014 est.)

$3,100 (2016 est.)
$3,000 (2015 est.)
$3,000 (2014 est.)

21.6% of GDP (2016 est.)
19.1% of GDP (2015 est.)
3.3% of GDP (2014 est.)

12.6% (2016 est.)
13.6% (2015 est.)

58.8% of GDP (2016 est.)
56.7% of GDP (2015 est.)

5.4% (2016 est.)
5.2% (2015 est.)

16% (31 December 2009)
28% (31 December 2008)

19.59% (31 December 2016 est.)
23.31% (31 December 2015 est.)

$65.47 million (31 December 2016 est.)
$63.82 million (31 December 2015 est.)

$116.3 million (31 December 2016 est.)
$126.7 million (31 December 2015 est.)

$72.19 million (31 December 2016 est.)
$72.71 million (31 December 2015 est.)

$-22 million (2016 est.)
$-68.6 million (2015 est.)

$13.6 million (2016 est.)
$11.3 million (2015 est.)

$119.1 million (2016 est.)
$118.9 million (2015 est.)

$61.5 million (31 December 2016 est.)
$72.86 million (31 December 2015 est.)

$308.5 million (31 December 2016 est.)
$249.4 million (31 December 2015 est.)

$430.3 million (31 December 2016 est.)
$409.5 million (31 December 2015 est.)

$2.2 million (31 December 2016 est.)
$2.5 million (31 December 2015 est.)

dobras (STD) per US dollar -
22,149 (2016 est.)
22,149 (2015 est.)
22,091 (2014 est.)
18,466 (2013 est.)
19,068 (2012 est.)