The Reign of his majesty King Abdullah

                               The second bin Al_Husseini : Amarch of welfare and progress

The Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan has witnessed a process of sustainable development in all economic as well as social fields during the reign of His Majesty King Abdullah The Second Bin Al-Hussein.  Jordan has stood on equal footing with those countries that implement distinguished development policies-according to many observers in our region and on other nations -which had a positive impact on raising the living standard of the Jordanian citizen. All these tangible achievements came true with the royal directives of His Hashemite Majesty and the intensive follow-up by the Government. The objective was to fulfil the ambitions of His Majesty for a serving at economic welfare for the sons of this great homeland.

In the field of national economy, figures indicate the volume of progress which was achieved during the reign of His Majesty. The rate of economic growth which stood at 3.4% in 1999 has risen to 8.4% in 2004 and 7.2% in 2005. The Gross Domestic Product Per Capita in current prices has risen from JD 1166 in 1999 to JD 1649.1 in 2005. This has contributed clearly to lowering the poverty rate from 21% in 1997 to 14.7% in 2005, thus showing an improvement in the living standard of the people during the afore-mentioned period.

As for the External Trade there was a considerable increase from JD 3934 million in 1999 to JD 10492 in 2005. One of the major developments the Jordanian economy witnessed was the emergence of exports as a major factor for economic growth as it has jumped from JD 1299 million in 1999 to JD 3050 million in 2005.

The Financial Services Sector has also expanded significantly during the said period. The number of banks was 24 and the number of insurance companies was 26 in 2005.  

An important qualitative improvement took place in the Communications Sector, leading to an increase in the subscribers of the telephone lines to 613089, the mobile phones to 3.137.704 and the internet to 188000 in 2005.

The Tourism Sector has been given special attention, therefore the number of hotels has increased from 422 in 1999 to 468 in 2005. Accordingly, the income from this sector has risen from JD 564 million in 1999 to JD 1165 million in 2005.

The Health Sector, too, has experienced a remarkable growth during the reign of His Majesty since 1999 till now. This was represented by the rise in the number of hospitals from 84 to 98 (42 of which are governmental and 56 are private). This increase was also accompanied by an increase in the number of beds from 8726 to 10141 and an increase in the number of doctors from 2988 to 4004 during the same period.

In the same domain, the numbers of health centres and clinics has grown steadily from 1221 to 1322 and the number of pharmacies has gone up from 1470 to 1615.

The improvement in the field of health and health care had a positive impact on lowering the Infant Mortality Rates from 29 to 22 per one thousand live birth Health awareness among people and among mothers in particular has contributed to increasing the rate of births under medical supervision to 99.5%.  This improvement also helped in raising the life expectancy at birth from 69 years for males and 71 years for females in 1999 to 70.6 years for males and 72.4 years for females in 2005.

The Hashemite leadership paid special attention also to education which resulted in a huge increase in the numbers of schools in Jordan from 4676 schools in 1999 to 5497 in 2005. This increase was associated with a tangible increase in the number of students from 1380722 in 1999 to 1547689 in 2005. The number of teachers has also increased from 63886 in 1999 to 83543 in 2005 leading to a decrease in the number of students per teacher from 22 in 1999 to around 18 in 2005.

The illiteracy rate has gone down in the Kingdom to 8.9 in 2005. In the field of Higher Education, the number of universities has reached 21 in 2005, and the number of graduates has jumped from 18287 in 1999 to 35799 in 2005.

The gender issue has been given a special care by the Hashemite leadership to bridge the gap between males and females in all spheres for elevating the status of women and to enhance their role in the modern Jordanian society. Education of females in Jordan witnessed big strides, thus lowering the illiteracy rates among them in the age group 15 years and more from 16.5% in 2000 to 13% in 2005. Therefore, women achieved significant gains by assuming high ranking positions in the diplomatic corps. The rate has increased from 2.4% in 2000 to 9.8% in 2005. Representation of women in the parliament has risen from 2.5% in 1997 to 7.5% in 2005.

Infrastructure had its share in this development according to the results of the surveys and censuses conducted by the Department of Statistics. The number of households who have access to the public water network was 846559 and the public sewage network was 508993 in 2006. The number of subscribers to the electricity network has also risen from 833600 in 1999 to 1129100 in 2005.

In this context, the length of the main, secondary and rural roads network has increased considerably, noting that the length of the main roads has increased from 2911 kilometres in 1999 to 3109 kilometres in 2005.