sing the precarious financial
situation of several highly indebted provinces.

GDP: purchasing power parity - $367 billion (1999 est.)

GDP - real growth rate: -3% (1999 est.)

GDP - per capita: purchasing power parity - $10,000 (1999 est.)

GDP - composition by sector:
agriculture: 7%
industry: 29%
services: 64% (1999 est.)

Population below poverty line: 36% (1998 est.)

Household income or consumption by percentage share:
lowest 10%: NA%
highest 10%: NA%

Inflation rate (consumer prices): -2% (1999 est.)

Labor force: 15 million (1999)

Labor force - by occupation: agriculture NA%, industry NA%, services
NA%

Unemployment rate: 14% (December 1999)

Budget:
revenues: $44 billion
expenditures: $48 billion, including capital expenditures of $NA
billion (2000 est.)

Industries: food processing, motor vehicles, consumer durables,
textiles, chemicals and petrochemicals, printing, metallurgy, steel

Industrial production growth rate: -7% (1999 est.)

Electricity - production: 75.237 billion kWh (1998)

Electricity - production by source:
fossil fuel: 42.71%
hydro: 47.55%
nuclear: 9.47%
other: 0.27% (1998)

Electricity - consumption: 75.57 billion kWh (1998)

Electricity - exports: 250 million kWh (1998)

Electricity - imports: 5.85 billion kWh (1998)

Agriculture - products: sunflower seeds, lemons, soybeans, grapes,
corn, tobacco, peanuts, tea, wheat; livestock

Exports: $23 billion (f.o.b., 1999 est.)

Exports - commodities: edible oils, fuels and energy, cereals, feed,
motor vehicles

Exports - partners: Brazil 24%, EU 21%, US 11% (1999 est.)

Imports: $25 billion (c.i.f., 1999 est.)

Imports - commodities: machinery and equipment, motor vehicles,
chemicals, metal manufactures, plastics

Imports - partners: EU 28%, US 22%, Brazil 21% (1999 est.)

Debt - external: $149 billion (1999 est.)

Economic aid - recipient: $2.833 billion (1995)

Currency: 1 peso = 100 centavos

Exchange rates: peso is pegged to the US dollar at an exchange rate of
1 peso = $1

Fiscal year: calendar year

@Argentina:Communications

Telephones - main lines in use: 7.5 million (1997)

Telephones - mobile cellular: 1.8 million (1997)

Telephone system: 12,000 public telephones; extensive modern system
but many families do not have telephones; despite extensive use of
microwave radio relay, the telephone system frequently fails during
rainstorms, even in Buenos Aires
domestic: microwave radio relay