May 10 (Reuters) - Chad announced on Monday that Idriss Deby has won a fourth term as president of the land-locked country of Chad as his main rivals boycotted the race.
Here are some facts about Chad:
* ECONOMY:
-- Chad is among the poorest countries in the world, with around 55 percent of the population living below the poverty line and about 36 percent living in extreme poverty.
-- Chad is among the most corrupt of countries figuring 171 out of 178 in the 2010 Transparency International listings.
* LATEST DEALS:
-- Chad said last month it had signed a ${esc.dollar}1 billion accord with China CAMC Engineering Co for the construction of an international airport about 40 km (25 miles) from the Central African country's capital. This deal, expected to be completed by 2015, would help Chad to become an African hub for flights to the Middle East and Asia.
-- That deal was the second infrastructure project as the government signed a ${esc.dollar}7.5 billion agreement with China's Civil Engineering Construction Corporation to build 1,344 km of railway in March.
* SOME NUMBERS:
GDP, current prices (2010): ${esc.dollar}7.9 billion.
GDP per capita: ${esc.dollar}610
GDP growth-1.6 percent
Life Expectancy 49
Poverty Ratio 43.4 percent
* TRADE:
Exports -- U.S. ${esc.dollar}2.71 billion (2009): Including oil, cotton, livestock, gum arabic.
Imports -- U.S. ${esc.dollar}2.54 billion (2009): Including petroleum products, machinery and transportation equipment, foodstuffs, industrial goods, textiles.
* OIL:
-- Chad, one of the world's poorest countries, became an oil producer in 2003 with the completion of a ${esc.dollar}3.7 billion pipeline linking its oilfields to terminals on the Atlantic coast.
-- Today it produces around 115,000 barrels of oil a day.
* COUNTRY DETAILS:
POPULATION: 11.2 million
ETHNIC GROUPS: Northern Chadians are mainly of Berber and Tuareg origins; the Sara, Massa, Mundani and Hakka are predominant in the south. RELIGION: Muslims (mainly in the north) number about 50 percent, Catholics 23 percent, traditional African religions 27 percent.
LANGUAGE: The country's official languages are French and Arabic. More than 100 local languages are also spoken.
* RECENT HISTORY:
-- Independence in 1960 was followed by a series of coups and uprisings followed in the 1970s, and in 1982 Hissene Habre took power. -- Lieutenant General Idriss Deby came to power also in a coup in 1990, and won subsequent presidential elections in 1996, 2001 and most recently in 2006 when he gathered 65 percent of the vote.
-- Deby has spent much of the last five years since his last win in 2006 tackling a rebellion in the east. In 2008 he faced a rebel barrage of the capital that killed hundreds. But he has since made peace with Sudan, ending what analysts said was a proxy war fought by each country's rebels.
Sources: Reuters/State Dept/World Bank/UN/HDI/Transparency International
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