Economy

Imports
$22.1 billion (2022). Refined Petroleum ($5.19B), Refined Copper ($1.17B), Vaccines, blood, antisera, toxins and cultures ($432M), Packaged Medicaments ($368M), and Cars ($318M), importing mostly from China ($6.54B), India ($4.05B), United Arab Emirates ($2.48B), Democratic Republic of the Congo ($1.17B), and Saudi Arabia ($548M).

Financial inclusion factors (over 15 years of  age)
• 21% have an account with a financial institution
• 13.3% have a credit card
• 38.5% have a mobile money account
• 12% make online purchases

Ease of doing business
Ease of conducting business is medium (rated 54.5 out of 100). Ranked 22nd out of 48 Sub-Saharan Africa countries. Ranked 141st out of 190 countries worldwide (2022, World Bank).

Exports
$10 billion (2022).  Gold ($3.34B), Raw Copper ($1.31B), Refined Copper ($384M), Copper Ore ($288M), and Coconuts, Brazil Nuts, and Cashews ($286M), exporting mostly to India ($2.73B), United Arab Emirates ($1.07B), South Africa ($939M), Kenya ($482M), and Rwanda ($474M).

Economic freedom
‘Mostly not free’ (rated 59.1 out of 100). Ranked 6th out of 47 Sub-Saharan Africa countries. Ranked 86th out of 186 countries worldwide (2023, Heritage Foundation and Wall Street Journal).

Global Innovation Index
Ranked 13th out of 28 Sub-Saharan Africa, and 113th out of 132 worldwide.

The Global Innovation Index captures the innovation
ecosystem performance of 132 economies and tracks the most recent global innovation trends.

Media

Media language Swahili, English

Information channels
Under John Magufuli the government cracked down on its critics, including the press. Samia Suluhu Hassan, who became president after Magufuli’s death in 2021, has begun to reverse these trends. The government has lifted bans and suspensions of several major newspapers. Freedom House says while there has been an increase in qualified criticism of the government, “self-censorship and pro-government bias remain prevalent”. The mainland and Zanzibar have separate media policies. Islanders can pick up broadcasts from the mainland and read the mainland press. Television is eroding radio’s traditional dominance, and Tanzania has made the switch to digital TV. Media ownership is highly concentrated. IPP Media and the state-run Tanzanian Broadcasting Corporation are major players. There were 23.1 million internet users by December 2021, comprising 37% of the population (Worldinternetstats.com). Facebook is the most popular social platform. Rules introduced in 2018 require bloggers and the owners of discussion platforms and streaming services to pay registration fees.

Television

Tanzania Broadcasting Corporation (TBC) – state-run 
Independent Television (ITV) – private, reportedly the most influential in the country
Azam TV – private, station operates three channels featuring news, entertainment, documentaries
Clouds TV – private media group, TV and radio

Radio

Tanzania Broadcasting Corporation (TBC) – state-run
Radio Free Africa – private
Radio One – private
Capital Radio – private
East Africa Radio – private

The press

Daily News – government owned, Tanzania’s oldest newspaper 
Habari Leo – in Swahili, from publisher of Daily News
The Guardian – private, Tanzania’s leading daily, owned by IPP Medai group
Financial Times – business news, also owned by IPP Media 
The Citizen – private
Nipashe – private, in Swahili

Internet Data

Internet users
31.9% penetration, 21.82 million.

Share of web traffic by device
76.57% mobile phones, 22.64% computers (laptops and desktops), 0.78% tablet devices.

Median speed of mobile Internet connection
22.61  Mbps

Median speed of fixed Internet connection
17.99 Mbps

Mobile connection as a percentage of total population: 99%

Percentage of mobile connections that are broadband (3G-5G): 81.1%

Most popular web search engines
Google (97.3%), Bing (2.19%), Yahoo (0.22%), DuckduckGo (0.17%), Yandex Ru (0.03%).

Most used social media
Facebook (45.91%), Twitter (18.71%), Pinterest (14.38%), Instagram (10.6%), YouTube (9.38%), Linkedin (0.52%), Tumblr (0.04%).

Social statistics

Life expectancy
66 yrs (2021)

Corruption perceptions Index
Tanzania scored 38 out of 100, ranked 94 out 180 countries worldwide.

Current health expenditure
3.75% of GDP

Ethnicity
More than 120 ethnic groups are represented in Tanzania. Each of these groups differs, to varying degrees, from other groups in culture, social organization, and language. Only the smallest groups are homogeneous, however. Most groups are characterized by some internal variation in language and culture. The largest ethnic group, the Sukuma, represents nearly 13% of the total population; the remaining large groups represent under 5% each. Ethnicity continues to reflect geographic area. Less than 1% of Tanzania’s population is made up of non-Africans, including Europeans, Asians, and Arabs.

Religion
Religion adoption varied across residential areas in Tanzania as of 2021. In urban regions, over 40 percent of respondents declared being Muslims, while this share stood at nearly 25 percent in rural areas. In urban and rural regions, around 15 percent and 14 percent of the surveyed population, respectively, identified as Christians only. Among Christian religions, Roman Catholic was the most followed – by 27 percent of respondents in rural areas and 20.8 percent in urban areas.

World Happiness Index
Tanzania ranked 139 out of 180 countries, with a score of 3.702.

CO2 emissions
0.2 metric tons per capita