Increasing Agricultural Productivity:
Encouraging Foreign Direct Investments in the COMCEC Region
5
remained higher in the African Group with 42,1 percent and the lowest level was Arab Group in
with 25,5 percent in 20119.
Figure 1 shows that 53.7 percent of the total population in the COMCEC Member Countries are
living in rural areas, compared to 54.2 percent in the developing countries and 49.6 percent at
global level. In 2000, 42.3 percent of the total population living in the COMCEC Member
Countries worked in the agricultural sector.
Figure 1: Percentage of the Urban and Rural Population in the COMCEC, Developing Countries,
and the World (2012, percent)
Source: SESRIC, 2013
Figure 2 shows that size of the agricultural population in 2000 and 2010 in all regions shrank.
Compared to the developing countries and the world, the COMCEC Member Countries have
shown the largest decline in ten years time in terms of its share of agricultural population. The
total size of the agricultural population in the COMCEC Member Countries reduced to
36.2percent in 2010, a reduction of -14.4 percent.
9 COMCEC, 2013.
53,7 54,2 49,6
46,3 45,8 50,4
0
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30
40
50
60
70
80
90
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COMCEC Countries Developing Countries World
Urban
Rural