@chessmaster, I differ on the issue of youth unemployment in Libya and Egypt being the major drivers of the uprisings. During the period, Egypt had an unemployment rate of about 9.3% while Libya had an unemployment rate of 28%. In Kenya, where we have an unemployment rate of 40%, reducing our unemployment levels to match those of Egypt would be a major achievement. Let's agree that unemployment was not the issue.

On the issue of resources, the US is sitting on huge oil reserves (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oil_reserves_in_the_United_States). on that wikipedia article note this point ' The United States has the largest known deposits of oil shale in the world, according to the Bureau of Land Management and holds an estimated 2.175 trillion barrels (345.8 km3) of potentially recoverable oil." Essentially, it looks like the US wants to deplete everyone's oil before they start refining their own.

The inflation rate in Kenya has averaged around 12% for the last 6 years with a high of 31.5 Percent in May of 2008 and a record low of 3.2 Percent in October of 2010. During the period, unemployment has averaged at about 22 percent with a high of 40.0 Percent in December of 2011 and a record low of 12.7 Percent in December of 2006. I don't have the graphs for unemployment and inflation, but am sure they would be interesting to compare their correlation.


Lastly, I don't expect a worse economic period than what we underwent in 2008.We we experiencing high food and oil prices, a persistent drought, post election chaos and the shocks of global financial crisis. The fact that we pulled through even with against these odds is comforting. For the first time, our Tourism revenue plummeted at the worst rates in history, capital inflows declined due to the financial crisis and our agricultural exports were lackluster. So with Europe crisis or not, am remaining very positive if next year elections go smoothly.

@Chessmaster, we need the long posts to learn from one another.

First, you are definitely right about the oil resources. They will get depleted at some point. However, we are making progress in seeking for more sustainable and more ecofriendly sources of energy. Think of electric trains, electric cars, geothermal etc. So when we run out of oil, the necessity of new energy sources will drive humankind to new inventions.

About unemployment, we can't say that because only 43% of egyptians are employed, then 57% of them are unemployed. WHY?, Because we have retirees and people below the age of 15 years within that 47%. Instead, we regard unemployment interms of those who are willing and able to work, and are actively seeking for employment opportunities without success. see a table of Egypt unemployment rates on this link and this other link

compare the egypt figure with Kenyan figure from charts in this linkand this one too

In regards to inflation
,
I would say we need to check our optimal inflation. What happened is we had low interest rates, people borrowed to invest. We had unprecedented demand in the real estate and construction was taking place all over. This means extra people were getting jobs in the construction sector. Everyone had more money to spend, and we were demanding more imports. So I think our inflation was driven by demand and an increase in money supply. When the central bank responded, it raised the interest rates, and people were demotivated from borrowing. Certainly, our construction sector and real estate have slowed down due to the interest rates. It is logical therefore that some jobs have been lost and our inflation is cooling down. Will we be better off when inflation goes below 5%? I don't think so. We need a balance between unemployment and inflation.

Cheers.

A slowdown in Africa?? Wouldn't we have already began seeing it since the great recession began in 2008??