The primary sector contributes the largest part of gross value added in the world’s youngest country’s economy. Up to 95% of the population depends on farming, fishing and/or herding to meet their food and income needs. Farm crops from low-input, low-output subsistence operations include sorghum, maize, millet and rice production. However, only 4% of South Sudan is currently under cultivation. The secondary sector is very small in terms of value added despite the country’s significant oil reserves, with crude production exported (via Sudan) without being refined. The tertiary sector is hamstrung by low investor sentiment and limited economic diversity in the country, with government expenditure squandered on security spending. The retail sector is under significant pressure from very high levels of inflation while the telecommunications industry suffers from underinvestment.

The UN General Assembly resolution 65/151, which was passed on 20 December 2010,designated 2012 as the International Year of Sustainable Energy for All. This was inrecognition of the growing importance of energy for economic development and climatechange mitigation. It also attempted to correct what many people working on energy anddevelopment issues had for many years argued was a major error in not including actionon energy poverty in the Millennium Development Goals. The UN Secretary Generalestablished the Sustainable Energy for All Initiative in September 2011, in order to guideand support efforts to achieve universal access to modern energy services, rapidly doublethe rate of energy efficiency, and double the use of renewable energies in the globalenergy mix.

South Sudan is a landlocked country located in northeastern Africa. The trade and investment conditions in South Sudan are not favorable to U.S. firms and the country’s economic situation further deteriorated in 2014. The country is rich in natural resources, has fertile land and shares the different fish varieties of the River Nile. Nevertheless reduced oil production and the decline of international oil prices severely cut the ability to generate revenue, and the Government of the Republic of South Sudan (GoRSS) refused to curb spending. Increasingly the GoRSS turned to external and domestic borrowing to cover a growing financial shortfall and to cover monthly operating expenses. During the annual review of countries eligible to maintain their benefits under the African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA), it was determined the GoRSS failed to address human rights violations and other concerns related to eligibility and South Sudan was terminated as an AGOA beneficiary effective January 1, 2015.

The South Sudan Oil Almanac has been created to significantly increase the stock ofinformation available in local contexts among journalists, civil society actors, governmentofficials and others. The Almanac provides a living database of publicly availableinformation around the South Sudanese oil industry, from both domestic and internationalperspectives, and will form the basis for a locally based knowledge communityon these issues. The first edition of the Almanac has been prepared by OpenOil UG.

On July 9, 2012, South Sudan will celebrate its first anniversary as an independent and sovereign state. The January 2011 referendum effectively ended the prolonged, violent confrontation between the Republic of Sudan and the territories that would ultimately gain independence as South Sudan. This development marked an important stage in the implementation of the Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA). In addition to regulating relations between the two feuding parties from 2005 to 2011, the CPA also implemented the framework for the creation of two separate nations. Despite the success of the CPA in guiding South Sudan’s path to independence, the young nation must now address a myriad of challenges related to its domestic policies as well as continued hostilities with the Republic of Sudan.

This report presents the findings of full scale participatory rural appraisals (PRA) that were conducted in each of the bomas in the payams of Ifwoto and Lainya.  The purpose of those appraisals was to generate and collate basic socio-economic,environmental and organisational data that could be used in support of the South Sudan Pilot Community Forestry Project.

The results of South Sudan’s referendum were finalized in February 2011. Over 98 percent of thevotes favored secession from the all parts of Sudan. Going forward, South Sudan faces the major hurdleof overcoming policy and capacity challenges and determining the priorities of its overall developmentagenda. Since 2005 the government of South Sudan (GOSS) has generated over $6 billion in oil reserves,more than half during the 2008 oil spike, yet social and infrastructure spending has not been remotelyproportional to this accruing oil wealth. On the contrary, public spending and the actual provision ofservices supporting infrastructure and social needs have lagged what was accomplished in other parts ofSudan before the split.

One can learn a lot about the economy of South Sudan just by watching the roads.The first thing one notices on the streets of Juba, the capital, is the abundance ofwhite Toyota Land Cruisers. There are fewer than 100 kilometers of tarmac roadsin the entire 240,000-square-mile country; one cannot move around without afour-wheel-drive vehicle. A closer look at the Land Cruisers reveals that most havespecial license plates: UN for United Nations vehicles, and GOSS for those ownedby the government of South Sudan.

South Sudan - Open for Business: Peaceful and secure; A conducive investment climate; Rapidly improving infrastructure; A booming economy

Overview of investment opportunities: Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry; Resources; Infrastructure; Manufacturing and Services; Tourism

Things have not gone according to plan for the world’s newest country, South Sudan. Aftergaining independence from Sudan in 2011 amid great hope and international celebration,South Sudan has seen stagnating economic and political progress exacerbated by a new civilwar that erupted in late 2013. Since then, tens of thousands have been killed, more than 30percent of the population has been displaced, the economy has imploded, and the countryhas once again become the center of a major humanitarian crisis—as highlighted by thedeclaration in February 2017 of famine in several northern states.1 A regionally sponsoredpeace agreement signed in mid-2015 has effectively collapsed, and fighting seems likely tocontinue for the foreseeable future. There is no obvious way to escape the current cycle ofconflict, and regional and international mediators have no clear strategy for moving forward.

In the southern Greenbelt of South Sudan’s three Equatoria States, USAID’s Food Agribusiness, and Rural Markets (FARM) Project helps smallholder farmers grow staple crops to become self-sufficient, develops farmer cooperative organizations to aggregate and better market surplus production, promotes more agriculturally favorable policies, and builds local institutional capacity.

This master thesis investigates the impact of the oil-industry on the local communities in Block 5A,Sudan. During the war the people here experienced harassment, attacks and forced displacementbecause the central government and oil-companies wanted to access the black gold underneath. TheComprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) ended the over twenty year long civil war in Sudan. Hereit is stated that the local communities living in vicinity to oil-extraction areas shall benefit from theoil-industry. This research maps the impact of oil-industry today and whether the statements in theCPA regarding the oil-industry are being followed. It also maps knowledge and expectations of thelocal communities towards the oil-industry. The research is of qualitative character based oninterviews with 40 respondents in 5 villages proximate to oil-extraction areas. In addition it looks atthe greater aspect of the link between war and natural resources in post-CPA time in Sudan.

Following decades of conflict with Sudan, South Sudan declared independence in a referendum in 2011. At the end of 2013, civil war broke out in the country following a political struggle between the president and former vice-president.

The South Sudanese economy is heavily reliant on oil, which comprises the vast majority of GDP, exports, and government revenue. Foreign investment has been highly concentrated in the oil sector. However, the government has acknowledged the importance of private sector development and diversification for the future of the country, and has begun streamlining the regulatory environment and investment process to facilitate this growth.

Reports that construction of an alternative oil pipeline from South Sudan to PortLamu, Kenya, will begin in October 2013 are overly optimistic and on-schedulepipeline construction is unlikely. Despite delays and ongoing barriers to projectconstruction, Juba is highly likely to continue pursuing alternatives to the existingpipeline to Port Sudan, Sudan. Such alternatives, if constructed, would havesignificant economic and political impacts on South Sudan, Sudan, China, and Kenya,Ethiopia and other potential pipeline partners.

In January 2011, South Sudan held a referendum to decide between unity or independence fromthe central government of Sudan as called for by the Comprehensive Peace Agreement that endedthe country’s decades-long civil war in 2005. According to the South Sudan ReferendumCommission (SSRC), 98.8% of the votes cast were in favor of separation. In February 2011,Sudanese President Omar Hassan al-Bashir officially accepted the referendum result, as did theUnited Nations, the African Union, the European Union, the United States, and other countries.On July 9, 2011, South Sudan officially declared its independence.

Natural resource revenues have played a key role in the conflicts that have plagued resource-rich African countries over the past three decades. This is mainly due to lack of equitable and transparent use of the revenues from natural resources in almost all conflict ridden countries. Many oil producing countries in Africa have failed to bring about overall development in their societies. For example, on most measures of human welfare, particularly infant mortality and literacy rates, sub-Saharan Africa’s established oil producers have generally performed no better than non-resource endowed African countries, even after receiving large oil windfalls.1 When South Sudan gained independence in 2011 after fighting its northern neighbor Sudan for over a decade, its oil wealth held the prospects of a brighter future.

This report is part of the Oakland Institute’s (OI) seven-country case study project to document and examine land investment deals in Africa (Ethiopia, Mali, Mozambique, Sierra Leone, Sudan, Tanzania, and Zambia) in order to determine social, economic, and environmental implications of land acquisitions in the developing world.

This report is the product of research undertaken by OI between June and October 2011. The research team conducted thorough examination of the actual agreements and the extent and distribution of specific land deals.  Through field research, involving extensive documentation and interviews with local informants, multiple aspects of commercial land investments were examined including their social, political, economic, and legal impacts.  The team also met with government officials, civil society, investors, and the local communities that have been impacted by land investments.