According to the North American body equivalent to the National Statistics Institute, in the last five years the balance of trade has always been favorable to Angola, and this year it continues.
Oil decisively influences the evolution of the trade balance, which reached the most unbalanced value in 2022, when Angolan exports exceeded US imports by almost 950 million dollars.
"Angola is, in sub-Saharan Africa, the third largest export market for the USA", reads a White House analysis of relations between the two countries, which points out that "North American exports to Angola include machinery, aircraft, poultry and iron and steel products", while purchases by the United States of America (USA) from Angola are essentially made up of crude oil.
US investments in Angola fall into several sectors, from aviation to transport, but it is the Lobito Corridor project that will receive the majority of the investments planned for the coming years, and which will therefore be at the center of the agenda for the visit of the Outgoing President of the United States, Joe Biden, from December 2nd to 4th in Luanda.
The US sees the project, which connects the port of Lobito in Angola by rail to Zambia and the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRCongo), as essential to "connecting communities and creating new opportunities across Southern Africa", including "construction of modern infrastructures from the Atlantic Ocean to Zambia".
In addition to investments in these sectors, the USA plans to make one million dollars available for the Ministry of Transport to develop the public-private partnerships unit, which will be the preferred contracting model for investments in railway and port structures, and five million dollars for actions to promote female employment.
Other North American investments in Angola also include the energy sector, namely the construction of photovoltaic solar plants, one worth 907 million dollars, and a loan to the government of 1.6 billion dollars from the Export and Import Bank of the United States, also for the area of renewable energy.
For the US, Angola is a "strategic partner" and "a regional leader", and this is also revealed in the strengthening of the relationship between the two countries in recent years, with several agreements and memoranda, as well as visits by members of the government, who now culminate with that of Joe Biden, the first for a North American head of state in that country.
The US is also an important partner on a technical level, providing training to the Geological Institute of Angola in minerals critical to the energy transition, and also in the area of digitalization, in which the Americans are helping to sustain "telecommunications networks trustworthy companies, through trusted companies, which will benefit the people of Angola and improve digital connectivity to the global economy."
...........................2020...........2021........2022........2023........2024 (until September)
Exports................470.............444.9........651.4....... 598.8.........497.0
Imports..............471.7.........1,043.8........1,598.0.....1,160.9....1,307 .3
Balance...............-1.8............-598.9.........-946.6.......-562.0......-810.3
Source: United States Government
Values in millions of dollars
