‘Pocket World’ offers a number of surprises

A book published by The Economist offers interesting statistics and should be perused regularly.

The Economist’s Pocket World in Figures is my annual festive gift to myself.

For a mere Dh65 outlay, this invaluable little volume will sit on my desk for the next 12 months, getting tattier and more dog-eared each day, and by the end of 2014 will be worn out through constant reference.

There is no other source of information quite like it. It’s difficult to imagine a website so comprehensive and accessible as the Pocket World (hereafter known as “the book”), or one that regularly throws up such quirky, fascinating factoids.

Do you know, for example, which country can boast the highest average level of annual GDP growth between 2001 and 2011? Higher than any of the Bric countries, or Qatar?

The answer, according to the book, is oil-rich Azerbaijan, with 14 per cent growth per year for that decade. I would never have known.

But then again, Azerbaijan came from a low point. The book also reveals that it was among the fastest contracting economies in the previous decade (1991-2001) with a 4.2 per cent shrinkage per year.

And how about this – which economy has the third-lowest growth rate in the same period? It was Italy, which at 0.2 per cent surpassed only Zimbabwe and Puerto Rico.

Mind you, most of the euro zone had a poor decade, averaging only 1.1 per cent. Even smug Switzerland, which regularly tops the global league tables of successful economies, managed only 1.8 per cent.

Part of the reason the book is so fascinating is because it takes a very eclectic view of economic statistics, regularly comparing likes with unlikes, apples with pears, on successive pages.

So, we learn that the population of the UAE exploded by 147.6 per cent between 2001-2010, second only behind Qatar for global population growth. Then, a couple of pages down, you read that in the five years from 2015-2020, Abu Dhabi, Sharjah and Dubai will be the fastest-growing cities in the Arabian Gulf (in that order). No mention of Doha at all.

Qatar is often assumed to be the richest country in the world per capita, but not according to the book. A clutch of European statelets such as Monaco, Liechtenstein and Luxembourg, as well as Norway, are ahead of it. The UAE comes in at 25th.

But tell me, how does Equatorial Guinea (ranked 43) have a higher per capita GDP than Saudi Arabia (at 58)? That is another beauty of the book: it does not explain, it solely informs.

Sometimes, this can be infuriating. For example, one of the oft-repeated “facts” about the UAE is that it has the highest consumption of energy in the world.

Well, not according to the book it doesn’t. The UAE comes in seventh on this table, way behind the world’s biggest energy guzzlers per head – Iceland and Trinidad and Tobago. Gulp.

Other times, you just think it has to be wrong, but take it with a pinch of salt. For example, the UAE comes out on top of 44 countries’ “global government competitiveness”, measuring public-sector economics and finance. Nice thought, but really?

And I think I have found at least one definite error in the latest edition. In the section “highest car ownership”, the UAE does not figure in the top 50 countries.

A trip down Dubai’s Sheikh Zayed Road would make you sceptical, but the table on the facing page, “cars sold”, has the UAE in at number 19 for new car registrations. Surely both cannot be right?

But then, who am I to doubt the book?