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Algeria
Trading Partners
As trade patterns changed, in 1989 the United States joined France
and Italy to become one of Algeria's three major markets, as well
as its suppliers (see
table 5, Appendix). The appreciable growth in United States
exports (US$948 million in 1990) resulted from a high level of
Commodity Credit Corporation guarantees for United States agricultural
sales and a considerable increase in sales of industrial equipment,
aircraft, and spare parts. Other items that have dominated the
United States share of the Algerian import market included pharmaceuticals,
mining machinery, electric-power generating equipment, computers,
plasticsprocessing equipment, medical supplies, and telecommunications
gear. Algeria's economic austerity since the latter 1980s, however,
limited the demand for imported finished products.
The resumption of contracts between Sonatrach and United States
gas importers in 1989 was the main cause of increased United States
imports from Algeria (US$2.6 billion in 1990). Anadarko Petroleum
Corporation in October 1989 signed an oil exploration/production
contract for US$100 million over ten years. Occidental Petroleum
Corporation in June 1991 signed a similar contract for US$32 million.
Pfizer in October 1990 signed a contract establishing a joint
venture with the Algerian state National Enterprise for Production
of Pharmaceuticals (Entreprise Nationale de Production de Produits
Pharmaceutiques), for construction of a US$27 million pharmaceutical
plant near Reghaïa, east of Algiers. Air Products Company joined
forces with Aire Liquide (France) in signing a contract with Sonatrach
in July 1990 for construction of a US$90 million plant at Arzew
to produce helium and nitrogen gases.
Despite its close relationship with France, as a socialist country
committed to safeguarding its economic and political independence,
Algeria has developed and maintained special links to developing
countries and Eastern Europe. However, in the early 1990s it continued
to rely heavily on Western industrialized countries for the bulk
of its foreign trade. The European Community alone, for example,
accounted in 1990 for 35 percent of exports and 40 percent of
imports. By contrast, Algeria's partners in the Union of the Arab
Maghreb--Morocco, Tunisia, Libya, and Mauritania--accounted for
less than 2 percent of its trade. After diplomatic relations between
Algeria and Morocco resumed in 1988, the five countries formed
the union to promote "economic integration and cooperation" in
February 1989. Algeria, Tunisia, and Libya have agreed since to
construct a gas pipeline between Algeria and Libya across Tunisia.
Data as of December 1993
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