On the sidelines of the G20 Summit of Finance Ministers and Central Bank Governors, in the Brazilian city of São Paulo, asked about the defense that the President of Brazil, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, makes of the adoption of other currencies as a reference for transactions international teams, Vera Daves stated that Angola "sympathizes with the idea".
"We must explore these avenues to diversify. In the same way that the economy is diversified, the currency portfolio must also be diversified to have resilience. When there is an interest rate shock, when there is an exchange rate shock in a currency, in the relationship with one currency, we have the other to provide a counterweight", explained the minister in an exclusive interview with Lusa.
Regarding the scarcity of currency in the Angolan domestic market, the Minister of Finance considered that the structural solution to the problem is the growth and diversification of sources of income.
"Angola basically exports oil and the currency it receives from oil, it uses either to pay external debt, as I mentioned, or to pay some expenses that it also has in external currencies – contracts, service provision, goods, whatever – in dollars" , she highlighted.
"For this to be less suffocating, because naturally we will have to continue making investments in infrastructure and we will continue to have this set of expenses, we have to find other export goods and services that give us access to dollars, in addition to oil. And today I discussed this topic with the Minister of Finance [of Brazil], Fernando Haddad. We spoke quickly and asked for his help", she added.
Vera Daves revealed that Angola brought interest in attracting businesspeople from the agricultural and livestock sector to the G20 finance ministers' debates because the African country has productive land and water, in addition to having neighbors such as the Democratic Republic of Congo which, according to her, has "a lot of appetite to buy food products".
"Agribusiness is something we want to pay attention to, in which we have put a lot of energy (...) Angola produces locally, but for internal consumption, and would like to attract businesspeople and farmers with the knowledge and capacity to take the country to the next level that is to export", she said.
"We would like the Brazilian authorities to study the possibility of financing private investors interested in producing in Angola for export to other markets in the region", she added.
Diversifying the economy, Vera Daves insisted, would help Angola to have currency from sources other than just oil.
"If [oil] production falls, if the price of oil falls, we have a counterweight in other sources. The minister [Fernando Haddad] said he took good note and, moreover, when President Lula da Silva visited Angola (...) this was one of the topics that was raised", she concluded.
Brazil, which assumed the presidency of the G20 on December 1, 2023, hosted a summit on February 28 and 29, which brought together those responsible for the Finance portfolios of the 20 largest economies in the world, including the European Union. and the African Union.
The meeting, which was also attended by the governors of the Central Banks (without the presence of Mário Centeno) took place in a volatile global context, marked by new geopolitical tensions and in the midst of a debate on the pace of monetary easing, following the post-pandemic inflationary surge.
The priorities of the Brazilian presidency for its mandate at the head of the G20 are the fight against hunger, poverty and inequality, sustainable development and the reform of global governance.
Brazil invited Portugal, Angola, Egypt, United Arab Emirates, Spain, Nigeria, Norway and Singapore to be G20 observers in 2024.
