Panama is one of the world's 15 fast growing countries for the period of last six years, according to data available at the official website of the World Bank for the period 2007-2012.
The country grows at an annual rate of 9.2 %.The group is leaded is Qatar (rate of 18,4%). It also includes China and some south Asian countries, several Arab nations, African and European, but no other American.
Macao follows Qatar ( 11.5 % ) , then Turkmenistan (11.3% ) , Liberia (10.8% ) , Myanmar (10.8% ) , East Timor ( 10.7 % ) , China ( 10.1 % ) , Afghanistan (10.0% ) and Bhutan (9.8% ).
Panama takes 12th position in this ranking with an average rate of 9.2%. Other Latin American countries that have had a strong performance in recent years include Peru, Argentina and Uruguay, but their average growth in this period was affected by the 2009 data, after the outbreak of the financial crisis and followed global economic downturn. Peru, Argentina and Uruguay had 6.9 %, 6.6 % and 6.0 % growth, respectively.
Regarding major emerging economies, it is worth mentioning that China is number 7 and that India, despite recording an average growth of 7% between 2007 and 2012 , doesn’t sustain enough growth to join the group.
How Panama managed to attain growth above 9% between 2007 and 2012? There are a number of factors, which accumulated provide the following result:
- Significant investments in large infrastructure projects.
- The economic reforms of the late nineties provided delayed result.
- Using a favorable geographical position in the times of booming trade and tourism and massive consumption.
