Nigeria, Africa’s most populous country, accounts for just 0.65 percent of global economy says the World Bank in latest figures on the world’s economy just released. But the country’s economy remains Africa’s largest despite its small size in global play.
At $519 billion, the country’s economy, which has seen contractions in growth over the last two years, is still ahead of Egypt and South Africa, the two other economic powerhouses in Africa.
According to the World Bank figures Egypt leapfrogged South Africa to the second position with a share of 0.45 percent of world economy, while South Africa’s share is put at 0.42 percent. South Africa’s economy has been shaky for sometime, with the announcement last week that it has gone into a recession.
Globally, however, the economy of the United States is rated the largest in the world at a size of $18 trillion, representing almost a quarter share of the global economy (24.3%).
China follows, with $11 trillion, or 14.8% of the world’s economy. Japan is in third place with an economy of $4.4 trillion, which represents almost 6% of the world’s economy.
European countries take the next three places on the list: Germany in fourth position, with a $3.3 trillion economy; the United Kingdom in fifth with $2.9 trillion; and France in sixth with $2.4 trillion.
India is in seventh place with $2 trillion, and Italy in eighth with an economy of over $1.8 trillion. Ninth place goes to Brazil, with an almost $1.8 trillion economy. And in 10th is Canada, with an economy of over $1.5 trillion.
The economy of the United States is larger than the combined economies of numbers three to 10 on the list. The US may not dominate for much longer, however.
Although China trails the US by $7 trillion, it’s catching up. China’s economy grew by 6.7% in 2016, compared with America’s 1.6%, according to the IMF.
China has also overtaken India as the fastest-growing large economy. The IMF’s World Economic Outlook estimated China’s economy grew at 6.7% in 2016, compared with India’s 6.6%.
Brazil’s economy has contracted in the last year by 3.5%, the only one in the top 10 to do so.
The Asian bloc clearly has a larger share than anywhere else, representing just over a third (33.84%) of global GDP. That’s compared to North America, which represents just over a quarter, at 27.95%.
Europe comes third with just over one-fifth of global GDP (21.37%). Together, these three blocs generate more than four-fifths (83.16%) of the world’s total output.
A new study by PricewaterhouseCoopers says that China will be in first place by 2050, because emerging economies will continue to grow faster than advanced ones. India will rank second, the US will be third, and fourth place is expected to go to Indonesia.
The UK could be down to 10th place by 2050, while France could be out of the top 10 and Italy out of the top 20 as they are overtaken by faster-growing emerging economies such as Mexico, Turkey and Vietnam.
The report also says that the world economy could more than double in size by 2050, far outstripping population growth, due to technology-driven productivity.
