The Least Developed Countries represent the poorest and weakest
segment of the international community. They comprise more than
880 million people (about 12 per cent of world population), but
account for less than 2 percent of world GDP and about 1 percent
of global trade in goods. Their low level of socio-economic
development is characterized by weak human and institutional
capacities, low and unequally distributed income and scarcity of
domestic financial resources. They often suffer from governance
crisis, political instability and, in some cases, internal and
external conflicts. Their largely agrarian economies are
affected by a vicious cycle of low productivity and low
investment. They rely on the export of few primary commodities
as major source of export and fiscal earnings, which makes them
highly vulnerable to external terms-of-trade shocks. Only a
handful has been able to diversify into the manufacturing
sector, though with a limited range of products in labour-
intensive industries, i.e. textiles an