An economy essentially based on the mining sector
Representing over 10% of GDP, the agricultural sector is important for Suriname: the main crops are rice (half of the total cultivated land), fruit (led by bananas) and vegetables. Shrimp and fish exports and the timber industry - made possible by the abundance of tropical forest resources - are also growing sectors.
Suriname's main dependence,however, is on the mining industry , particularly bauxite processing (transformed into aluminium), but also gold and oil extraction: these activities account for 30% of government revenue and around 85% of exports, to Switzerland (38%), Hong Kong (21.9%), Belgium (10.1%) and the USA (7.2%). And this is precisely one of the Achilles' heels of the country's economy: such dependence on the mining industry makes it extremely vulnerable to the fact that these resources are non-renewable, on the one hand, and to the volatility of raw material prices, on the other, as we have seen in recent years.
Two other factors also need to be taken into account: in 2017, the American company Alcoa announced, after a century of operation, the definitive withdrawal of the Suralco refineries and bauxite mines, leaving the Surinamese government free to take over the reins, but financially unable to keep them running. One solution would be to take over the Afobaka hydroelectric dam, which would enable Suriname to stop paying astronomical electricity bills to Suralco. The other problematic element is linked to the gold industry, which is plagued by fraud and undeclared work, and would benefit from greater transparency, notably through the negotiation of agreements between the government and multinationals. Inland communities are generally excluded from these agreements, and some voices are beginning to be raised to assert the collective rights of these communities to the soil and subsoil.
At the same time, Suriname has excellent potential in terms of tourism (tropical forests, abundant wildlife, colonial architecture in Paramaribo). Although ecotourism is gradually developing and constitutes an important economic niche, it is far from being exploited to the full, due to the inaccessibility of the forest interior. In recent years, however, the number of hotels has increased, making the tourism offer increasingly attractive.
Last but not least, Suriname is starting to develop its oil industry: like its neighbor Guyana, and despite the global trend towards decarbonization, huge reserves have been discovered in the subsoils off the coasts of both countries, which could hold tens of billions of dollars. In Suriname, the state-owned company Staatsolie is already present in a few small onshore oil fields, but it was TotalEnergies that announced in September 2023 that it was investing nearly 9 billion to exploit subsea reserves estimated at 700 million barrels.
An ethnicized political spectrum
Even before independence (November 25, 1975), most political parties - in addition to being led by rather authoritarian leaders - were already ethnically based, which doesn't really help to create a national consensus. Since the 1955 elections, no single party has had a majority in the National Assembly, so coalitions are always needed to form a government. Thus, in May 2010, it was the Megacombinatie alliance, made up of former dictator Desi Bouterse's NDP (National Democratic Party), former president Jules Wijdenbosch's KTPI (Kerukanan Tulodo Pranatan Ingit, Party for National Unity and Solidarity) and a small Hindustani party, that won the May 25, 2010 legislative elections.
Weakened by this crushing defeat, one of the opposition wings, the NPS (Nationale Partij Suriname), which is supposed to represent the interests of the Creole community (just under a third of the population), is in sharp decline. The other opposition party, the VHP (Vooruitstrevende Hervormings Partij), which defends the interests of the Hindustani population (28% of the population), seems more dynamic, but continues to be seen as an economically dominant group with little openness to other communities.
Building on its influence, Desi Bouterse's NDP once again won the parliamentary elections of May 25, 2015, taking an absolute majority of seats (27 out of 51). Although it no longer needs to form alliances to govern, it must nevertheless deal with other parties to be re-elected to the presidency of the Republic, and it succeeds in doing so, on July 14, 2015. It should be added here that Surinamese politics is characterized by clientelism: a patron-client relationship between politician and voter in which the former provides the latter with socio-economic assistance (jobs, subsidies, etc.) in exchange for a vote.
In the 2020 legislative elections, the VHP won twenty of the fifty-one seats in Parliament, becoming Suriname's main political party. On the following July 13, the opposition refused to take part in the election, putting forward no candidate in the wake of the scandals surrounding the incumbent president. Santokhi was therefore the only candidate in the presidential election, elected by acclamation.
Regional position and socio-economic issues
Suriname has long remained isolated on the regional political scene because of its history (as the only Dutch-speaking country on the continent), its involvement with Cuba, Nicaragua, the Salvadoran guerrilla movement and the Maurice Bishop regime in Grenada in the early 1980s, but also because of its inward-looking attitude during the black-brown insurrection of 1986. To break this isolation, after becoming a member of the WTO, the country joined various regional organizations such as the Caribbean Common Market (CARICOM) and the Amazon Cooperation Treaty Organization (OTCA). Because of its large Muslim community, Suriname has also joined the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC).
Despite these efforts and commitment to cooperate with its neighbors, Suriname has internal grey areas that it will need to clarify in order to move forward: human trafficking, for one. The sexual exploitation of women and children at work is a major issue, as is the regularization of some of its undocumented workers from Brazil, Guyana and Haiti. Also, it is a question of finding a balance between the interests of the ethnic groups and those of the nation as a whole. Ethnic competition in the political sphere is an imposing obstacle to effective governance. In addition, unequal access to education, especially in the poorest areas, as well as access to health and housing, remain social factors that deserve considerable improvement.
