Panama's dollar-based economy rests primarily on a well-developed services sector that accounts for more than three-quarters of GDP. Services include operating the Panama Canal, logistics, banking, the Colon Free Trade Zone, insurance, container ports, flagship registry, and tourism and Panama is a center for offshore banking. Panama's transportation and logistics services sectors, along with infrastructure development projects, have boosted economic growth; however, public debt surpassed $37 billion in 2016 because of excessive government spending and public works projects. The US-Panama Trade Promotion Agreement was approved by Congress and signed into law in October 2011, and entered into force in October 2012.
Future growth will be bolstered by the Panama Canal expansion project that began in 2007 and was completed in 2016 at a cost of $5.3 billion - about 10-15% of current GDP. The expansion project more than doubled the Canal's capacity, enabling it to accommodate high-capacity vessels such as tankers and neopanamax vessels that are too large to traverse the existing canal. The US and China are the top users of the Canal.
Strong economic performance has not translated into broadly shared prosperity, as Panama has the second worst income distribution in Latin America. About one-fourth of the population lives in poverty; however, from 2006 to 2012 poverty was reduced by 10 percentage points.
5.4% (2017 est.)
5% (2016 est.)
5.8% (2015 est.)
0.9% (2017 est.)
0.7% (2016 est.)
Fitch rating: BBB (2011)
Moody's rating: Baa1 (2019)
Standard & Poors rating: BBB (2020)
$133.587 billion (2019 est.)
$129.688 billion (2018 est.)
$125.07 billion (2017 est.)
note: data are in 2010 dollars
$66.801 billion (2019 est.)
$31,459 (2019 est.)
$31,049 (2018 est.)
$30,455 (2017 est.)
note: data are in 2010 dollars
30% of GDP (2019 est.)
29.3% of GDP (2018 est.)
31.4% of GDP (2017 est.)
agriculture: 2.4% (2017 est.)
industry: 15.7% (2017 est.)
services: 82% (2017 est.)
household consumption: 45.6% (2017 est.)
government consumption: 10.7% (2017 est.)
investment in fixed capital: 42.9% (2017 est.)
investment in inventories: 3% (2017 est.)
exports of goods and services: 41.9% (2017 est.)
imports of goods and services: -44.2% (2017 est.)
Overall score: 66.6 (2020)
Starting a Business score: 92 (2020)
Trading score: 85.5 (2020)
Enforcement score: 49 (2020)
sugar cane, bananas, rice, poultry, milk, plantains, pineapples, maize, beef, pork
construction, brewing, cement and other construction materials, sugar milling
6.3% (2017 est.)
1.633 million (2017 est.)
note: shortage of skilled labor, but an oversupply of unskilled labor
agriculture: 17%
industry: 18.6%
services: 64.4% (2009 est.)
6.14% (2018 est.)
6% (2017 est.)
22.1% (2016 est.)
49.2 (2018 est.)
56.1 (2003)
lowest 10%: 1.1%
highest 10%: 38.9% (2014 est.)
revenues: 12.43 billion (2017 est.)
expenditures: 13.44 billion (2017 est.)
20.1% (of GDP) (2017 est.)
-1.6% (of GDP) (2017 est.)
37.8% of GDP (2017 est.)
37.4% of GDP (2016 est.)
calendar year
-$3.036 billion (2017 est.)
-$3.16 billion (2016 est.)
$25.94 billion (2018 est.)
$24.7 billion (2017 est.)
note: includes the Colon Free Zone
Ecuador 20%, Guatemala 14%, China 8%, United States 6%, Netherlands 6% (2019)
refined petroleum, copper, bananas, ships, coal tar oil, packaged medicines (2019)
$28.978 billion (2018 est.)
$28.175 billion (2017 est.)
note: includes the Colon Free Zone
China 21%, United States 19%, Japan 16%, Colombia 6%, Ecuador 5% (2019)
ships, refined petroleum, crude petroleum, tanker ships, packaged medicines (2019)
$2.703 billion (31 December 2017 est.)
$3.878 billion (31 December 2016 est.)
$101.393 billion (2019 est.)
$94.898 billion (2018 est.)
balboas (PAB) per US dollar -
1 (2017 est.)
1 (2016 est.)
1 (2015 est.)
1 (2014 est.)
1 (2013 est.)
NOTE: The information regarding Panama on this page is re-published from the 2021 World Fact Book of the United States Central Intelligence Agency and other sources. No claims are made regarding the accuracy of Panama 2021 information contained here. All suggestions for corrections of any errors about Panama 2021 should be addressed to the CIA or the source cited on each page.
This page was last modified 16 Dec 23, Copyright © 2023 ITA all rights reserved.