Country Profiles FMCG
Industries
With more than 1,000 insight-rich pages covering 81
countries and territories, Country Profiles offer
current and comprehensive business information, from
local laws and taxes to political and market
conditions Make them part of your smart trade
discovery process.
Country profile:
Lithuania
languages Lithuanian, Russian President: Dalia Grybauskaite
Republic of Lithuania
religion: Christianity
Agro-Industry Development
Agriculture
in Lithuania formed the basis of the Lithuania's
economy in 1940. More than half of the labor
force of Lithuania was engaged in agricultural
work. Fifty years later, agriculture of
Lithuania still continued to play a crucial role
in the economy of the country. The agricultural
sector in Lithuania provided a large number of
jobs and about fifty percent of the country's
national product. By the end of the communist
rule, the agricultural production costs in
Lithuania were almost 3 times more than that of
the western countries.
Lithuanian agriculture includes family farms and
farms owned by corporate houses. Approximately
3.37 million hectares of land in Lithuania are
used for agricultural production. Agricultural
exports included fish, milk, butter, cheese etc.
Almost 80% of the total agricultural products
are exported to Russia. EU is the major supplier
of agricultural products. Agricultural imports
include food and fruits. The most important
crops produced in Lithuania are potatoes, sugar
beets and wheat.
Lithuania is the largest and most southerly of the three Baltic republics.
Not much more than a decade after it regained its independence during the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1990, Lithuania was welcomed as a Nato member in late March 2004.
The move came just weeks before a second historic shift for the country in establishing its place in the Western family of nations as it joined the EU in May 2004. These developments would have been extremely hard to imagine in not-so-distant Soviet times.
Russia, anxious about the implications of the eastward advance of the EU and Nato to include the three Baltic republics, has a particular eye on Lithuania which has an important border with the Russian exclave of Kaliningrad.
Vilnius, the capital, weathered a series of foreign occupations
The history of Lithuania has close ties with that of Poland, its neighbour to the southwest. By the end of the 18th century most of the country came under the Russian empire. German occupation in the first world war was followed by two decades of independence, although Vilnius was occupied by Poland for most of that time.
Following a pact between Stalin and Hitler, Soviet troops arrived in 1940. They were pushed out by the Nazis the following year but returned in 1944.
For the next half century of Soviet rule, Lithuanians relied on Catholic tradition
and memories of independence to preserve their national identity, a skill
mastered through centuries of foreign domination. Pagan traditions with roots stretching back centuries have been kept alive too.
Lithuania has embraced market reform since independence. In the run up to and period following EU entry the republic saw very strong economic growth.
It applied to join the eurozone from January 2007 but was rejected because the inflation rate was too high.
The global financial crisis of 2008 brought a sudden end to Lithuania's boom, with annual growth rates of above 8% giving way to forecasts of a 10% contraction of the economy in 2009.
Dalia Grybauskaite was voted in as Lithuania's first woman president with an emphatic election victory in May 2009.
Ms Grybauskaite cites Margaret Thatcher as an inspiration
She won 69% of the vote, against 11% for her closest rival, Algirdas Butkevicius of the opposition Social Democratic Party.
Previously the European Union budget commissioner, she stood as an independent, but with backing from the four-party centre-right coalition of Prime Minister Andrius Kubilius.
A former finance minister, Ms Grybauskaite's reputation for plain speaking helped win over an electorate nervous about the severe economic downturn that hit Lithuania in 2008.
She is sometimes dubbed "Iron Lady", the nickname of former British PM Margaret Thatcher, a steely reforming conservative she describes as one of her political models.
Ms Grybauskaite has said that her decision to stand came after anger at the economic slump boiled over in a riot in front of the parliament building in Vilnius in January 2009.
She declared herself broadly in support of the governing centre-right's response to the crisis, but criticised some of its tax increases and called on some ministers to "correct mistakes of the past or go".
Born in 1956 in Vilnius - then still part of the Soviet Union - Ms Grybauskaite studied in the Russian city of Leningrad - today's St Petersburg.
A senior civil servant since Lithuania's independence in 1990, she served as finance minister from 2001 to 2004, when the country nominated her the European Commission after joining the EU that year.
Prime minister: Andrius Kubilius
Mr Kubilius heads a centre-right coalition
Andrius Kubilius is leader of the conservative Homeland Union-Lithuanian Christian Democrats group, and served once as prime minister in 1999-2000.
He led this conservative alliance into the October 2008 elections, and beat the governing Social Democrats into second place.
His coalition government with three smaller centre-right parties won parliamentary approval in December. Together they hold 80 seats in Lithuania's 141-member parliament.
Mr Kubilius has said his priority is to tackle Lithuania's economic downturn.
A physicist by training, he entered parliament in 1992 after involvement in the pro-independence Sajudis movement. He joined the Homeland Union the following year.
Lithuania's private TVs have eroded the public broadcaster's audiences. The radio market is similarly competitive, with dozens of stations competing for listeners and advertisers.
Public Lithuanian National Radio and Television (LRT) operates national networks.
The media are free and operate independently of the state. There are no government-owned newspapers.
Nonetheless, the national broadcaster has sometimes encountered attempts by politicians to influence its editorial policy.
By March 2008 there were 2.1 million internet users in Lithuania (Internetworldstats).
Country profile:
Lithuania
©
2008, www.tajagroproducts.com All rights reserved.