Kosovo was traditionally the Socialist Federal Republic of
Yugoslavia’s (SFRY) poorest province and besieged by months of
fighting and years of civil strife. Under SFRY’s constitution
of 1974, Kosovo was a largely autonomous province within the
Republic of Serbia. In 1989 and 1990 this status was removed
through a series of constitutional changes. While full and
reliable economic data for the province remains scarce, it is
believed that as a result of a deterioration in the political
situation coupled to international economic sanctions on the
Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (FRY), Kosovo’s GDP contracted
by 50 percent from 1990-1995, falling to less than $400 per
capita by 1995. Economic activity had been centered on industry,
predominantly electric power, mining and metallurgy,
construction materials and agroprocessing. Agriculture was also
important, responsible for about a third of GDP in 1995.
Kosovo’s pre-conflict
population is estimated at slightly above 2.2 million, of which
82 to 90 percent were ethnic Albanians. About 60 percent of the
pre-conflict employment was created by agricultural activities
(including forestry and agrobusiness). Unemployment was already
high, reportedly rising as high as 70 percent in 1995, due to
long-term impacts of regional crisis. This unemployment rate was
disproportionately high among ethnic Albanians.
Damage assessments of physical
infrastructure, social and economic consequences of the crisis
to determine Kosovo’s current situation were completed in 1999 (see War
Impact). A
Reconstruction and Recovery Program, prepared by the
European Commission and the World Bank, was made available prior
to the second donor conference, held on November, 17 1999.
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Facts
and Figures
Kosovo has an area of 10,887 square
kilometers (one third the size of Belgium). It is a
geographical basin, situated at an altitude of about 500
meters, surrounded by mountains, and divided by a central
north/south ridge into two subregions of roughly equal
size and population.
Detailed demographic data are not
available - but the total 1998 population is believed to
have been slightly above 2.2 million people, including 82
to 90 percent ethnic Albanians. A large diaspora, mainly
in Western Europe, plays an important role, particularly
through remittances and the financing of the parallel
structures developed throughout the 1990s. Minorities
include Serbs, Gorans or Bosniacs (Muslim Slavs), Roms,
and Turks. Demographic growth is estimated at about twenty
per thousand and average household size is believed to be
about 6 to 7 persons. Kosovo’s population is by far the
youngest in Europe, with about half the people below the
age of 20.
Kosovo is divided into 29
municipalities and about 1,500 villages. It is mainly
rural, with about two thirds of the population living in
villages, and only nine towns with over 20,000 inhabitants
(about 30 percent of the population).
Pre-war GDP is unknown, since official
estimates (at about US$400 per capita) did not account for
a large share of the economy: the informal sector
activities. Still, Kosovo was clearly by far the poorest
part of FRY.
European Commission / World Bank
Program for Reconstruction and Recovery in Kosovo
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