Debt - external: $175.6 million (1998 est.)
Economic aid - recipient: Netherlands provided $37 million for project and program assistance, European Development Fund $4 million, Belgium $2 million (1998)
Currency: 1 Surinamese guilder, gulden, or florin (Sf.) = 100 cents
Exchange rates: Surinamese guilders, gulden, or florins (Sf.) per US$1 - 995 (December 1999), 710 (May 1999), 850 (January 1999); central bank midpoint rate: 639.50 (1st Qtr 1999), 401.00 (1998), 401.00 (1997), 401.26 (1996), 442.23 (1995); parallel rate: 1,325 (December 1999), 2000 (May 1999), 800 (December 1998), 412 (December 1995) note: beginning in July 1994, the central bank midpoint exchange rate was unified and became market determined; during 1998, the exchange rate splintered into four distinct rates; in January 1999 the government floated the guilder, but subsequently fixed it when the black-market rate plunged
Fiscal year: calendar year
@Suriname:Communications
Telephones - main lines in use: 56,844 (1996)
Telephones - mobile cellular: 3,671 (1995)
Telephone system: international facilities good domestic: microwave radio relay network international: satellite earth stations - 2 Intelsat (Atlantic Ocean)
Radio broadcast stations: AM 4, FM 13, shortwave 1 (1998)