According to data from the North American authorities, last year Angola sold goods and services, the overwhelming majority of which were oil, to the United States of America (USA), worth 1.6 billion dollars, which, discounting the 653 million dollars of products imported from the USA, totals a favorable trade balance for Angola worth 945 million dollars, 57.8 percent more than the positive balance of 346 million dollars recorded in 2021.
In the regional context, Angola is the US's third largest trading partner in sub-Saharan Africa, "mainly due to its oil exports, while US sales include machinery, aircraft, poultry, and iron and steel products", reads a report by the State Department, equivalent to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in European governments, on the relationship between the largest economy in the world and the second largest oil producer in sub-Saharan Africa.
A good part of the trade between the two countries has been carried out under the African Growth and Opportunity Act, known by its English acronym AGOA (African Growth and Opportunity Act), which includes several African countries that benefit from preferential conditions in the bilateral relationship. with the USA.
US Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) in Angola was 255 million dollars last year, while Angolan investment in the US was just 92 million dollars, a drop of 3.2 percent compared to the amount invested in 2021.
In terms of concrete deals, there are two that stand out in the panorama of the bilateral relationship: the US investment in the Lobito Corridor and the award of the construction and management of the Soyo refinery, worth 3.5 billion dollars, attributed to Quanten LLC, a consortium of privately held North American companies, in 2021.
"The project will strengthen domestic refining capacity, increase access to affordable fuels, and create an estimated 7 thousand direct and indirect jobs in the country", reads the press release distributed by the US embassy in Luanda in 2021, in which it is stated that the Americans will "build, own and operate the refining project of 100 thousand barrels of oil per day".
This project, the note also pointed out, followed two other important investments, the granting of a telecommunications license to the company Africell, supported by the USA, and also a solar energy project by Sun Africa, which would be "the largest of sub-Saharan Africa".
The most recent US investment in Angola is almost one billion dollars for the multisectoral development of the Lobito logistics corridor to connect Angola, the Democratic Republic of Congo and Zambia.
From the perspective of the United States Government, the new railway line that will connect Zambia to the port of Lobito will be "the largest single investment by the US and the EU on the African continent in a generation", aiming to "unlock the enormous potential" that exists in the railway sector in sub-Saharan Africa.
Beyond the economy, the US looks at Angola as a country in which the low level of development does not match the economic opportunities, stressing that work in the country helps to "strengthen good governance, increase economic opportunities and improve availability of social services" to Angolans.
"The low level of development in Angola is in contradiction with its potential for economic prosperity, considering the country's level of natural resource wealth; much of this paradox is explained by the social disruption and physical destruction caused by 27 years of civil war", reads an analysis of the country carried out by the State Department, which also highlights that "the second largest oil producer in sub-Saharan Africa, with tremendous agricultural potential, can become a regional power in regional trade and investment".
