The Congo's economy is based primarily on its petroleum sector, which is by far the country's major revenue earner. The Congolese oil sector is dominated by the French oil company TotalFinaElf. In second position is the Italian oil firm Agip. Chevron Overseas Limited (in partnership with TotalFinaElf) is the primary American oil company active in petroleum exploration or production. Murphy Oil has signed a contract but has not begun exploration or production; that project should begin in 2008. Congo's oil production is expected to decline over the next 15 years with fields yielding less. However, based on an agreement with Angola signed in 2002 to jointly administer certain Congo-Cabinda border areas, Congo's production could rise if exploration is successful.

The country's abundant northern rain forests are the source of timber. Forestry, which led Congolese exports before the discovery of oil, now generates less than 7% of export earnings. Wood production came to a standstill during the war years but has recommenced, and new concessions were leased in 2001.

Earlier in the decade, Congo's major employer was the state bureaucracy, which had 80,000 employees on its payroll--enormous for a country of Congo's size. The World Bank and other international financial institutions pressured Congo to institute sweeping civil service reforms in order to reduce the size of the state bureaucracy and pare back a civil service payroll that amounted to more than 20% of GDP in 1993.