Ioan M. Lewis

3 weeks ago | britannica.com | Jörg H.A. Janzen |Ioan M. Lewis

Somalia - Economy, Livestock, Agriculture: About three-fifths of Somalia’s economy is based on agriculture; however, the main economic activity is not crop farming but livestock raising. Between 1969 and the early 1980s, Mohamed Siad Barre’s military government imposed a system of “Scientific Socialism,” which was characterized by the nationalization of banks, insurance firms, oil companies, and large industrial firms; the establishment of state-owned enterprises, farms, and trading companies; and the organizing of state-controlled cooperatives. In the end, this experiment weakened the Somalian economy considerably, and, since the collapse of the military regime, the economy has suffered even more as a result of civil war. In