The_Open_Door_deel1

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modest (averaging less than 5 per cent of the total). The
military assistance was largely made up of grants consisting of
technical and financial assistance in the mapping of Liberia.
Credit sales of military equipment accounted for the major part
of the loans granted under the military assistance programme
(87). Total U.S. assistance in the years 1962- through 1977
amounted to $ 308.8 million. This is equivalent to nearly 84$
per cent of the direct revenues originating from the Open Door
Policy in the 1963 - 1977 period (see Table 37). In the 1946 -
19 77 period direct payments by the companies operating in
Liberia under the Open Door Policy had in all amounted to
$ 475-6 million, whereas U.S. assistance to the Liberian
Government in this period totalled $ 395-6 million or 83 per
cent.
Complete and reliable statistics on public foreign assistance
to Liberia in the 1964 - 1977 period are not available. The
main cause for this is the lack of continuity in reporting
periods, combined with the inconsistency of available data.
However, the data from Annex 25 justify the conclusion that the
total flow of foreign funds to Liberia exceeded the total direct
income from the concession sector (including Maritime Revenues)
in the 1963 - 1977 period.
CONCLUSIONS
Three important conclusions may be drawn from the foregoing.
First, the total flow of foreign funds to Liberia exceeded the
total direct income from the concession sector (including
Maritime Revenues) - which already formed nearly one third of
Total Domestic Revenues (see Table 37)- Ths Liberian Government
has thus shown its extreme dependency on foreign funds to
maintain its present level of expenditures, i.e. to continue
the services (limited and of poor quality as they may be)
actually provided to the country's population and to finance
the improvement of the productive capacity of the economy. To
give concrete form to this conclusion it may be stated that
without foreign funds the economy will collapse and tens of
thousands of civil servants and other workers will become
unemployed. This will become a reality without the willingness
of foreign investors to (continue to) invest in the exploitation
of Liberia's natural resources or without the continued flow of
foreign capital (from public, multilateral and private sources).
It goes without saying that the foreign investors' attitude is
to a large extent determined by the willingness of the
Government of Liberia to provide attractive incentives to foreigi
investments.
Secondly, the Liberian Government has shown itself to be unable
to introduce and implement a clear fiscal policy or even
development policy, apart from its general adherence to the
principles of the (much referred to) Open Door Policy. The
Government's fiscal practices in the 1926 - 1978 period do not
justify the qualification of "policy". Everything seems to have