A high level delegation from Angola, headed by Joaoqui Duarte da Costa David, Minister of Industry, and Manwel Pedro Pacavira, Ambassador, visited Malta on 28-29 May, in a bid to foster commercial relations between the two countries.
Tonio Borg, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs, who recently undertook similar initiatives with Jordan, Lebanon and Syria, described the visit as successful. Minister da Costa David explained that Malta’s membership in the European Union and the euro currency are the two main reasons why Angola is considering increasing business with Malta.
The foreign ministry organised a workshop, ‘Doing Business with Angola’, for Maltese entrepreneurs at Malta Enterprise on one of the two days with the main speaker being Dealdino de Oliveira Balombo, member of the management committee of the Angolan National Investment Agency (ANIP), and Alfonso Norman, director of the legal department of the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development. After the seminar, one-to-one meetings were organised for all Maltese participants. The Angolan delegation also paid a visit to the Ministry of Finance, the Economy and Investment where the Angolan Minister had a meeting with his counterpart, Tonio Fenech.
Angola, Africa’s fastest expanding economy, overtook Nigeria in April, 2008 as the leading oil producer in Africa. Commercial interest has traditionally been focused in the hydrocarbons sector. But not only is the oil sector doing well. The non-oil sector last year was able to almost follow the growth in the oil sector, increasing by a rate of 13.8 per cent.
Investments in the country over the last four years now total over US$4 billion, according to Angola’s National Private Investment Agency (ANIP).
Within the last 18 months, excellent opportunities for overseas companies have been emerging in a number of other sectors including education and training, agriculture and construction, electricity and water, tourism and hotels, infrastructure development and management and processing industries.