Angola’s Agency for Private Investment and Exports Promotion (AIPEX) yesterday held a Press Conference to mark its third year of existence.
In essence, AIPEX representatives were able to highlight the country’s strengths in attracting private investment – national and foreign – even through times of Covid-19 pandemic uncertainties and declining business confidence across the globe, as well as the important role the agency has been playing in leveraging a more robust and varied business panorama for the traditionally oil-dependent nation.
According to the President of the Board of Directors at AIPEX, António Henriques da Silva, the majority of the projects registered by AIPEX in the past 3 years are linked to the manufacturing industry. This makes the manufacturing industry account for US$1,78B, in an universe of 345 total projects worth more than US$3B.
Other sectors showing healthy private investment inflows were the tertiary (service) sector, with 69 projects worth US$313M, agriculture, with 16 projects raking in US$213M and commerce, with 78 projects worth US$149M. Provided these projects bear fruit, they should create some 25 thousand jobs down the entire value chain.
António Henriques da Silva explained that “Out of the 345 investment projects, 81 have already been implemented and are functioning, generating 7,279 direct jobs. Of the remaining projects, 254 are in the process of being implemented and 10 have in fact been canceled as per the investors decision”.
Also read: Angola AIPEX CEO stresses foreign investment
Regarding these already implemented projects, he said that they are estimated to be worth around US$1,02B.
The province of Luanda has been the preferred destination for investors with 3 out of 4 projects being in that area, followed by Bengo, Benguela and Malanje.
As for Angola’s ability to attract foreign direct investment, AIPEX detailed in its presentation that 40 countries have invested in a total of 168 projects (49% of all projects registered), with the United Arab Emirates and China as the largest investors in Angola since AIPEX’s creation. The UAE counts 19 investment projects, worth US$399.4M (with 4 having been fully realised, to the amount of US$153,37M); China registered 21 projects, valued at US$206M (4 projects already concluded, amounting to US$44,2M). 25 out of these 168 projects have already been executed, for a total of US$220,87M worth of FDI projects now concluded.
Economic impact
Since 2018 there has been a steady decline in imports, as stated by the agency, which can be explained by an increase in Angola’s national production and recent industrialisation drive, much aided by the country’s fiscal and structural reforms under President João Lourenço mandate. This has reduced the weight of imports to 22% by September 2020, down from 42% only 3 years prior.
For the AIPEX board members, the economic impacts of the projects implemented are directly related to Angola’s successful policies to encourage the private sector to be at the forefront of this national industry revival; the increase of Angola’s national production and the manufacturing industry displaying such healthy results after 3 solid years, seem to attest to that belief.
