segments of each
sector, with majority ownership of railway, electricity, aircraft, and
telecommunication firms. It nevertheless has been slowly relaxing its
control over these sectors since the early 1990s, most recently
selling 23% of France Telecom. The government also plans to sell its
stakes in Air France and in the insurance, banking, and defense
industries. Meanwhile, large tracts of fertile land, the application
of modern technology, and subsidies have combined to make France the
leading agricultural producer in Western Europe. A major exporter of
wheat and dairy products, France is virtually self-sufficient in
agriculture. The economy expanded by 2.3% last year, following a 1.3%
gain in 1996. Persistently high unemployment still poses a major
problem for the government, however, as does the need to control
government spending to keep the economy internationally competitive
and meet membership qualifications for the European Economic and
Monetary Union (EMU) which is slated to introduce a common European
currency in January 1999. Succeeding governments have shied away from
cutting exceptionally generous social welfare benefits or the enormous
state bureaucracy, preferring to pare defense spending and raise taxes
to keep the deficit down. The JOSPIN administration has pledged both
to lower unemployment and bring France into EMU, pinning its hopes for
new jobs on economic growth and on legislation to gradually reduce the
workweek from 39 to 35 hours by 2002.

GDP: purchasing power parity-$1.32 trillion (1997 est.)

GDP-real growth rate: 2.3% (1997 est.)

GDP-per capita: purchasing power parity-$22,700 (1997 est.)

GDP-composition by sector:
agriculture: 2.4%
industry: 26.5%
services: 71.1% (1994)

Inflation rate-consumer price index: 2% (1996)

Labor force:
total: 25.5 million
by occupation: services 69%, industry 26%, agriculture 5% (1995)

Unemployment rate: 12.4% (1997)

Budget:
revenues: $222 billion
expenditures: $265 billion, including capital expenditures of $NA
(1998 est.)

Industries: steel, machinery, chemicals, automobiles, metallurgy,
aircraft, electronics, mining, textiles, food processing, tourism

Industrial production growth rate: 4% (1997 est.)

Electricity-capacity: 102.94 million kW (1995)

Electricity-production: 467.541 billion kWh (1995)

Electricity-consumption per capita: 6,841 kWh (1995)

Agriculture-products: wheat, cereals, sugar beets, potatoes, wine
grapes; beef,