One of the few freer economy in the EU, Cyprus first rose to the list of advance economies by the International Monetary Fund in 2001. World Bank classifies the country in the high-income bracket and the country has been in the list of developed countries ever since. Things staggered in 2009 with recession and 2013 with banking crisis but the country has always been able to bounce back with reformative measures and early preventive measures. The economic freedom index of the country has always been high and their preventive measures have gotten better with each crisis.
The effect of the pandemic is the same as that of the economic crisis of 2013. The country is set to have inflation in public debt and the unemployment rate is set to increase as the economy comes to a halt due to lockdown measures. The largest contributor to GDP, the service sector of the country contributes about 82% and has suffered negative growth with the decline of public and private consumption.
In a paper sponsored by the Cyprus Computer Society, the ICT market reached a value of 659.39 million euros in 2018 with an average yearly growth of 3%. Telecommunication is the largest contributor to this number. The stats say that the overall value is about 200 million euros with a growth rate of 6.5% after the exclusion of telecommunication services.
Telecommunication in the country has a strength that attracts foreign investment with its reputation for being an international services hub in this department. Many steps have been taken to ensure the positive growth of this sub-sector. In 2019, the country was halfway through achieving its goal of upgrading cellular networks and increasing the use of fibre connections.
The condition of the ICT sector in Cyprus is quite advanced as its ranks 24th on the European Commission’s DESI index and its score is well above the average recorded in the EU region. This is also evident in the fact that almost 100% of the population in the country is covered by mobile networks while broadband has reached about 90% of the households, says the Cyprus Profile.
The major contributors to the evolving telecom industry and hence the overall ICT sector are the skilled manpower, solid infrastructure and enthusiastic initiative in research. Additionally, Cyprus has strong policies to bounce back from the aftereffects of economical downgrade caused by the pandemic and 2021 looks promising.