5. Foreign direct investment (FDI)

For a long time, FDI was the business of companies from developed countries to other developed countries, but it changed its face in the 1990s, plummeting between 2001 and 2003, then picking up again since 2004. In order to assess this growing phenomenon, it is important to distinguish between FDI stocks (i.e., cumulative investment figures over the years) and flows, which relate only to current years. Recent downward and then upward movements are certainly important, but their impact differs according to the pre-existing stock of FDI in a given country.

The main trends in FDI are described in the "Find out more" section [... ].