The African Statistical Yearbook (ASYB) 2017 is the nine edition jointly produced by the African Development Bank (AfDB), the African Union Commission (AUC), and the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (ECA). It is a result of the fruitful collaboration that exists among the three Pan-African organizations within the field of statistics. This synergistic collaboration has two principal benefits: (1) it minimizes the risk of inconsistent information being produced by the three organizations, and (2) it reduces the reporting burden on member states, who might otherwise be obliged to submit data separately to each institution.

The Yearbook series is a result of joint efforts by major African regional organizations to set up a joint data collection mechanism of socioeconomic data on African countries as well as the development of a common harmonized database. The Joint African Statistical Yearbook is meant to break with the practices of the past where each regional/subregional organization was publishing statistical data on African countries of the continent in an inefficient way, leading to duplication of efforts, inefficient use of scarce resources, increased burden on countries and sending different signals to users involved in tracking development efforts on the continent. It is expected that the joint collection and sharing of data between regional institutions will promote wider use of country data, reduce costs and significantly improve the quality of the data and lead to better monitoring of development initiatives on the continent.

The Statistics presented in the yearbook are, as possible in accordance with international recommendations and definitions. Where important deviations are known to exist, they are indicated in footnotes at the end of each country’s table. Owing to the rounding of figures, the totals shown in tables do not always correspond exactly to the sum of their component items.