Indicators from the Central Bank of Tunisia and the National Institute of Statistics certainly paint a less critical picture than in 2023 or 2024.
Inflationary pressures have eased, tourism revenues are increasing, and foreign exchange reserves are benefiting from this boost.
However, this improved economic outlook is struggling to reach households. After several years of rising prices, purchasing power remains eroded, and the decline in inflation by no means signifies a return to previous prices.
Tourism is one of the few genuine lifelines. Visitors are returning, and so are foreign currency reserves. A welcome performance, but one that cruelly underscores the problem: fifteen years after the 2011 revolution, Tunisia is still struggling to rebuild a productive engine powerful enough to sustainably drive growth.
Private investment remains weak, and the deindustrialization that began in 2011 has never truly been reversed.
The labour market tells the same story. Unemployment remains particularly high among young graduates, while the interior regions remain trapped in underemployment and precariousness.
Fifteen years after the uprising, which erupted precisely against a backdrop of unemployment, territorial inequalities, and a lack of prospects, the promised rebalancing remains largely incomplete.
The Tunisian paradox thus becomes stark: macroeconomic indicators are beginning to improve, while a segment of society continues to suffocate.
Households are making difficult choices about their spending, access to housing remains challenging, and the labour market remains unable to absorb enough new workers.
Adding to this fragility is the financing impasse. President Kais Saied’s government is advocating for economic sovereignty and rejecting several conditions associated with negotiations with the International Monetary Fund (IMF).
Politically, this rhetoric allows Tunisia to dismiss the image of reforms dictated from the outside. Economically, however, it fails to address a much more practical question: how can the country sustainably finance its budgetary needs and investment? Tunisia may have averted the spectre of an absolute financial crisis, but it has
not resolved its fundamental problem.
Tourism, remittances from the diaspora, and a slowdown in inflation are providing some relief. They are no substitute for productive investment, jobs, or structural reforms.
Stabilisation exists in certain indicators. For a segment of the Tunisian population, however, it remains primarily a statistic they still haven’t seen reflected in their own wallets.
MK/AK/Sf/fss/as/APA