there is
no third-power representation of Albanian interests in the US or of US
interests in Albania

Flag: red with a black two-headed eagle in the center below a red
five-pointed star outlined in yellow

- Economy
Overview: As the poorest country in Europe, Albania's development
lags behind even the least favored areas of the Yugoslav economy.
The Stalinist-type economy operates on the principles of central
planning and state ownership of the means of production. In recent years
Albania has implemented limited economic reforms to stimulate its lagging
economy, although they do not go nearly so far as current reforms
in the USSR and Eastern Europe. Attempts at self-reliance and a
policy of not borrowing from international
lenders--sometimes overlooked in recent years--have greatly hindered the
development of a broad economic infrastructure. Albania, however,
possesses considerable mineral resources and is largely self-sufficient
in food. Numerical estimates of Albanian economic activity are
subject to an especially wide margin of error because the government
is isolated and closemouthed.

GNP: $3.8 billion, per capita $1,200; real growth rate NA% (1989 est.)

Inflation rate (consumer prices): NA%

Unemployment rate: NA%

Budget: revenues $2.3 billion; expenditures $2.3 billion,
including capital expenditures of NA (1989)

Exports: $378 million (f.o.b., 1987 est.); commodities--asphalt,
bitumen, petroleum products, metals and metallic ores, electricity, oil,
vegetables, fruits, tobacco; partners--Italy, Yugoslavia, FRG,
Greece, Czechoslovakia, Poland, Romania, Bulgaria, Hungary

Imports: $255 million (f.o.b., 1987 est.); commodities--machinery,
machine tools, iron and steel products, textiles, chemicals, pharmaceuticals;
partners--Italy, Yugoslavia, FRG, Czechoslovakia, Romania,
Poland, Hungary, Bulgaria, GDR

External debt: $NA

Industrial production: growth rate NA

Electricity: 1,630,000 kW capacity; 4,725 million kWh produced,
1,440 kWh per capita (1989)

Industries: food processing, textiles and clothing, lumber,
oil, cement, chemicals, basic metals, hydropower

Agriculture: arable land per capita among lowest in Europe; one-half of
work force engaged in farming; produces wide range of temperate-zone crops
and livestock; claims self-sufficiency in grain output

Aid: none

Currency: lek (plural--leke); 1 lek (L) = 100 qintars

Exchange rates: leke (L) per US$1--8.00 (noncommercial fixed rate