Efectos adversos de los fármacos biológicos

After the discovery of crude oil in commercial quantities in Libya in 1959, and the start of export in 1961, the social and economic conditions in the country witnessed rapidly changed. More precisely, following the discovery of crude oil the Libyan economy dramatically shifted from a deficit economy to a surplus economy; this led to significant changes in the Libyan economic structure and the structure of both exports and imports. s John (2008, p. 76) pointed out “Libya moved from a stagnant to an exploding economy, from a capital-deficit state to a capital-surplus state, from an aid recipient to an aid extender”. In addition, Metz (1987, p. 30) also stated that:

The discovery and exploitation of petroleum turned the vast, sparsely populated, impoverished country into an independently wealthy nation with potential for extensive development and thus constituted a major turning point in Libyan history.

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In a similar vein, Mahmud and Russell (2003, p. 199) have described how Libyan’s economic situation changed following the discovery of crude oil in commercial quantities in 1959. They stated that, “since 1961, when Libyan crude oil was first exported in commercial quantities, annual crude oil revenue, gross domestic product (GDP), and per capital income have increased at an exceptional rate”.

By 1969, Libya’s crude oil production rose rapidly to more than 3 million barrels a day, making it one of the prevailing members of Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) at the time (World Bank, 2006). In 1962, Libya became a member of the OPEC. As a result of the oil boom, Libya's economy is no longer dependent on foreign aid or exports for a few simple agricultural goods. By 1965 Libya was the sixth- largest oil exporting country and its population was only 1.6 million (Hagger, 2009, p. 4).

The large petroleum revenues and a small population have given the Libyan state one of the highest GDPs in the African continent. Libya has been classified by the World Bank (WB) as an ‘Upper Middle Income Economy’, alongside only seven other frican countries. Nevertheless, few of these large petroleum resources and incomes flow down to the lower orders of society (World Factbook, 2012). It was reported in 2009 by the CIA that Libya’s economy ran ed 74th in the world in 2009, and its per capita income ranked 83rd.

According to the IMF report of 2013, over 90% of Libya revenue came from the hydrocarbon sector. Chami et al. (2012) point out that hydrocarbons have long dominated the Libyan economy, accounting for more than 70 % of GDP, more than 95 % of exports, and approximately 90 % of government revenue. Around 2.0% of the world’s crude oil was produced by Libya and it was ranked the fourth African country in terms of the capacity of crude oil produced, after Nigeria, Algeria, and Angola (Taib, 2011).

Before 2011, Libya produced around 1.65 million barrels per day (bbl/d) of mostly light, sweet crude oil, as was reported in 2012 by the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA). However, crude oil production had sharply fallen to 22,000 barrels per day in July 2011, due to the Libyan revaluation, which started in February

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2011 (Chami et al., 2012). It had significantly negative effects on GDP due to a dramatic decline in the exports.

ccording to the EI , Libya’s proven oil reserves are estimated at the beginning of 2012 to be 48.01 billion barrels, and Libya’s petroleum reserves are the biggest on the African continent and amongst the nine largest worldwide. Badcock (2005, p.35) has claimed that “Offshore and onshore, Libya has great untapped reserves, the true extent of which remains unknown, the country has 36bn barrels of proven oil reserves, the world’s eighth largest store.” Near to 80 % of Libya’s proven oil reserves are found in the eastern Sirte basin, which also accounts for most of the country’s oil production (EIA, 2012).

Besides this, the Libyan state is considered a main natural gas exporter and has a number of gas liquefaction factories. The Oil and Gas Journal has revealed that the natural gas reserves in Libya are proved at 52.8 trillion cubic feet at the beginning of 2012. However, the EI estimated Libya’s natural gas reserves at about 70 trillion cubic feet. In this regard, ongoing geological discoveries (onshore and offshore) in Libya have demonstrated that Libya has very significant reserves of natural gas.

In addition to crude oil and gas production, which represent the underpinning of Libya’s national economy, the country has also a large amount of other natural resources which include iron, petrochemicals, limestone, salt, gypsum, pharmaceuticals, and huge reserves of silica. These resources could help the country to attract both foreign and national investments in the non-oil industrial sector in the future. Although the Libyan state was involved in the past years in some heavy industries such as cement manufacturing, limestone factories, petrochemicals, and steel, nevertheless, the oil and gas sector in Libya will continue to be the lifeblood of the country’s economy for at least an additional two decades (Porter and Yergin, 2006).

Overall, Libya’s economy is heavily dependent upon revenues from the hydrocarbon sector, which in turn is affected by changes in the worldwide oil market. As noted by Blanchard and Zanotti (2011), the Libyan economy remains extremely dependent on oil revenue and therefore greatly vulnerable to international oil price fluctuations. In addition, Libya seems to be one of the less diversified oil-producing economies in the world (World Bank, 2006).

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