Ivory Coast

Ivory Coast is a country located in West Africa with its south-facing the North Atlantic Ocean coast. It shares its borders with Ghana to the east, Liberia to the west, Guinea to the northwest, Mali to the north, and Burkina Faso to the northeast. Ivory Coast is a country on the south coast of West Africa directly on the Gulf of Guinea.

The land has a total area of 322,460 km² and a total coastline of 515 km. This area is approximately 80% of the area of California. The country has about 30 islands. Ivory Coast has a rich cultural tradition, artistic talents, and French-speaking prowess.

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Abidjan, on the Atlantic coast, is the main urban center of the country. While, Yamoussoukro is the administrative capital of the Ivory Coast. Since 1985 the country’s government has requested that it be known as Cote d’Ivoire, but it is still largely referred to by its English name, Ivory Coast.

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The holidays of the Ivory Coast are governed by the Ministry of Social Affairs and the President and the Labour Code. The president retains the right to add or remove any national holiday through national decree and publication. Holidays in the Ivory Coast that fall on a Sunday are recognised and celebrated on the following Monday.

Ivory Coast was a French colony until its independence in 1960, the Ivory Coast has wrestled with civil unrest and increasing poverty rates for years. In 2015, poverty in the country was as high as 46.3 percent. Like many African countries, in-country ethnic conflicts hurt the Ivory Coast’s development during its independence.

Since achieving Independence from France, Côte d’Ivoire’s primary economic objective has been growth. During the 1960s, growth was accomplished by expanding and diversifying agricultural production, improving infrastructure, and developing import substitution industries.

History of Ivory Coast

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1842 – France imposes protectorate over coastal zone and later colonizes Ivory Coast.

1944 – Felix Houphouet-Boigny, later to become Ivory Coast’s first president, founds a union of African farmers, which develops into the inter-territorial African Democratic Rally and its Ivorian section, the Ivory Coast Democratic Party.

1958 – Ivory Coast becomes a republic within the French Community.

1960 – France grants independence under President Felix Houphouet-Boigny. He holds power until he dies in 1993.

1999 – President Henri Konan Bedie, in power since 1993, is overthrown in a military coup.

2000 – Laurent Gbagbo becomes president after a controversial election.

2002-2007 – Civil war effectively splits country into Muslim rebel-held north and government-controlled Christian south after renegade soldiers try to oust Mr Gbagbo.

2007 – Gbagbo and rebel chief Guillaume Soro of the New Forces sign an agreement to end the crisis.

2010 – Long-delayed presidential elections. Election commission declares Alassane Ouattara the winner of the run-off. Mr Gbagbo refuses to quit. Post-election violence leaves 3,000 people dead and 500,000 displaced.

2016 March – Al-Qaeda jihadists attack the beach resort of Grand Bassam, near Abidjan, killing 18 people.

Politics

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Alassane Ouattara has been in power since his predecessor, Laurent Gbagbo, was forcibly removed from office after refusing to accept Mr Ouattara’s internationally recognised victory in the November 2010 presidential election.

In 2015, Mr Ouattara won a second five-year term with nearly 84% of the vote, in an election described as credible by US observers.

A US-educated economist from the Muslim north, Mr Ouattara served as President Felix Houphouet-Boigny’s last prime minister after a long career at the International Monetary Fund.

Economy

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The economy of Ivory Coast is stable and currently growing, in the aftermath of political instability in recent decades.The Ivory Coast experienced economic and political changes that forced the country to evaluate the vulnerabilities of the Ivorian economy and society.

The Ivory Coast is largely market-based and depends heavily on the agricultural sector. Almost 70% of the Ivorian people are engaged in some form of agricultural activity. GDP per capita grew 82% in the 1960s, reaching a peak growth of 360% in the 1970s.

Cote d’Ivoire is heavily dependent on agriculture and related activities, which engage roughly two-thirds of the population. Cote d’Ivoire is the world’s largest producer and exporter of cocoa beans and a significant producer and exporter of coffee and palm oil.

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Côte d’Ivoire’s economic freedom score is 59.7, making its economy the 101st freest in the 2020 Index. Real GDP growth was 7.4% in 2018 and 2019, and could remain above 7.0% during 2020-21, assuming good rainfall and favorable terms of trade. The service sector remains the main driver of the economy, contributing 3.4 percentage points to growth in 2018. Industry contributed 1.5 percentage points, according to the African Development Bank.

Ivory Coast scored 35 points out of 100 on the 2019 Corruption Perceptions Index reported by Transparency International. Corruption Index in Ivory Coast averaged 26.45 Points from 1998 until 2019, reaching an all time high of 36 Points in 2017 and a record low of 19 Points in 2005, according to Trading Economics.

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From 2011 until 2012, Ivory Coast adopted several solutions to reduce burdens when paying taxes. In particular, the country reduced the corporate income tax rate and eliminated the contribution for national reconstruction. However, in 2014 Ivory Coast increased the employers ‘contribution rate for social security related to retirement.

The West African nation have exported an estimated US$10.8 billion worth of goods around the globe in 2019. That dollar amount reflects an -8.9% decline since 2015 and an -8.5% dip from 2018 to 2019.

Today, Cote d’Ivoire has a strong and diverse infrastructure to include telecommunication services, over 8,000 miles of paved road, and more.

Agriculture

Between 60% and 70% of the Ivory Coast people are engaged in some form of agricultural activity. Most of the inhabitants live along the sandy coastal region. The country also as a sparsely populated forested interior.  Ivory Coast is the world’s largest exporter of cocoa beans, and its citizens enjoy a relatively high level of income compared to other countries in the region. One area that continues to be a challenge is livestock.

Culture

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The Ivory Coast is considered the cultural hub of West Africa.
In the Ivory Coast more than sixty indigenous ethnic groups are often cited, although this number may be reduced to seven clusters of ethnic groups, by classifying small units together on the basis of their cultural and historical characteristics, which differ somewhat from one to the next. Ivory Coast food legacies based on whatever they had available on land or by coast. The Ivoirian food is known for slow cooked stews which are fiery and saucy.

Climate

In Ivory Coast, the climate is tropical, with a dry season from December to February and a rainy season from April to October due to the African monsoon.Along the coast, the rains are significant also in March and November, and even in December on the westernmost part.

Tourism

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From the soaring grass-clad mountains of Mount Nimba in the north to the lagoons and roaring Atlantic waves of the south, the mist-topped rainforests where chimps live in the west to the sweeping plantations of cocoa and plantains in the east, the Ivory Coast represents one seriously huge slab of West Africa.

Ivory Coast’s undulating countryside rises to savannah in the north, mountains in the west and a long, languid coast along the Gulf of Guinea. The coastal plains are dotted with rivers and lagoons, which attract thousands of birds.

In 2017, the Ivory Coast launched a system to obtain an e-Visa for tourist or business purposes. The Ivory Coast e-Visa application process is 100% online. The printed e-Visa must be picked up at Port Bouet Airport in Abidjan this is the only port where you will be able to retrieve this document.