The African Statistical Yearbook aims to break with past practices, whereby each regional/subregional organization published their own statistical data on African countries. It is expected that the joint collection and sharing of data between regional institutions will promote a wider use of country data, reduce costs and significantly improve the quality of the data, leading to better monitoring of development initiatives on the continent. The data in this issue of the Yearbook are arranged generally for the years 2002 to 2010 or for the last eight years