Mauritius

The Republic of Mauritius is an island nation off the east African coast with a land mass of 2,040km², a coastline of 330km, a population of 1.3 million and a GDP of US$15.5 which is expected to grow by 3.9% in 2025. It has previously been a colony of France and the UK, and to quote a resident, citizens “speak English, write in French and think in Creole”.
Its currency is the Mauritian Rupee.
Key sectors in Mauritius are sugar, textiles and clothing, tourism, which contributes 13.5% of GDP, and financial services.

The nation has developed from a low income, agricultural producer to a diversified, middle-income earner with emerging industrial, financial, business outsourcing and tourism sectors. It has positioned itself as a base for investment in Africa by scrapping exchange controls so that profits can be freely expatriated and has established double taxation treaties with most African countries. The services sector accounts for around 75% of GDP.

Its political system is dominated by three parties, namely the Militant Socialist Movement (MSM), the Labour Party, and the Mauritian Militant Movement (MMM). The 13th general election took place in November 2024. A coalition named Alliance du Changement, which was mainly comprised of the Labour Party and MMM, won 60 out of 62 seats in the National Assembly. Dr. Navin Ramgoolam was sworn in as Prime Minister as well as to the roles of Finance Minister, Minister of Defense, Home Affairs and External Communications, and Minister of Rodrigues and Outer Islands Development. In Mauritius, the President is the head of state, while the Prime Minister has full executive powers and heads the government.

Mauritius has the highest level of financial inclusion in Africa. Strategically located at the crossroads of Africa and Asia, the small island state is an important regional financial services hub and an international financial jurisdiction of growing importance, which provides a range of offshore, onshore and hybrid financial services, including cross-border business facilitation and investment, fund administration, corporate banking, global business services, private banking, and wealth management. Despite external shocks, the Mauritian banking industry’s solvency and liquidity buffers have remained well above minimum regulatory requirements. The financial services sector is the single largest contributor to GDP and the primary driver of the Mauritian economy. Financial and insurance activities contributed 14.1% to GDP in 2023, compared to 13.5% in 2022, according to Statistics Mauritius. In line with its objective of transforming Mauritius from an upper-middle income country to a high-income country, the government is aiming to increase the sector’s contribution to GDP to 15% by 2030
In the early 1990s, Mauritius positioned itself as an attractive domicile for offshore companies (global businesses) and as a low-tax jurisdiction for international businesses investing into Africa and Asia (particularly India and China). With offshore tax havens coming under growing scrutiny from international regulators, and multinationals under increasing pressure to declare profits and pay more tax in the countries where they carry out business, Mauritius opted to shed its tax haven image by strengthening its tax laws and ensuring regulatory compliance. In 2021, the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) removed Mauritius from its grey list of jurisdictions under increased monitoring, and the UK removed Mauritius from its list of high-risk third countries1, with the European Union (EU) following suit on 13 March 2022.

Mauritius is, however, facing greater regional competition from other international financial jurisdictions in Africa, notably Kenya and Rwanda, which are emerging fintech hubs. Globally, it is facing competition from India’s fintech hub, Gift City, and from established international finance centres such as Dubai, Singapore, the Netherlands, and Luxembourg.






Sources: Who Owns Whom sector reports, CIA Factbook, African Development Bank, World Bank, Trading Economics, African Statistical Yearbook and IMF. ?>