SONANGOL UNIVERSO
Universo www.universo-magazine.com
JUNE 2013
Opening the door to the future KWANZA SUL: Treasure chest province
LOGISTICS:
Faster freight flows
JAPAN:
Driving progress forward
ISSUE 38 – JUNE 2013
INSIDE:
oil and gas news
Zhangyang
Universo is the international magazine of Sonangol Board Members Francisco de Lemos José Maria (President), Mateus de Brito, Anabela Fonseca, Sebastião Gaspar Martins, Fernando Roberto, Baptista Sumbe, Raquel Vunge Sonangol Department for Communication & Image Director João Rosa Santos Corporate Communications Assistants Nadiejda Santos, Lúcio Santos, Sarissari Diniz, José Mota, Beatriz Silva, Paula Almeida, Sandra Teixeira, Marta Sousa, Hélder Sirgado, Kimesso Kissoka Publisher: Sheila O’Callaghan Editor: John Kolodziejski Managing Editor: Mauro Perillo Art Director: Tony Hill Sub Editor: Ron Gribble Proofreading: Gail Nelson-Bonebrake
Logistics come of age
Production Manager: Matthew Alexander Production Assistant: Sebnem Brown Project Consultant: Nathalie MacCarthy Group President: John Charles Gasser Universo is produced by Impact Media Custom Publishing. The views expressed in the publication are not necessarily those of Sonangol or the publishers. Reproduction in whole or in part without prior permission is prohibited. This magazine is distributed to a closed circulation. To receive a free copy: circulation@universo-magazine.com Circulation: 17,000
Davenport House 16 Pepper Street London E14 9RP United Kingdom Tel + 44 20 7510 9595 Fax +44 20 7510 9596 sonangol@impact-media.com www.universo-magazine.com www.sonangol.co.ao hld.gci@sonangol.co.ao
M
assive investment, exciting growth projects with foreign partners and impressive advances in Angola’s industrial and agricultural industries are worth nothing unless the producers, manufacturers and farmers can get their goods from point A to point B. This is particularly true when it comes to moving imports and exports to and from the docks. The keys to success are joined-up thinking and an infrastructure which links the factories, farms and fisheries to the markets, shops and seaports. Angola’s economic regeneration is reaching just such a stage in the area of logistics. More efficient ports and railways, better connected by improved road networks, are facilitating the flow of goods and services from industrial hubs and agribusinesses to towns and villages throughout the country. In this edition we examine how logistics systems developing in Luanda are stimulating the greater interchange of economic activity throughout Angola’s potentially rich land. The physical logistics network is now in place and the time has come for it to fulfil its full potential. As a shining example, Universo throws the spotlight on Kwanza Sul province, where some of the positive changes mentioned above are rapidly coming to fruition.
Cover: Eric Lafforgue
John Kolodziejski Editor
2 SONANGOL UNIVERSO
ANGOLA NEWS BRIEFING
Millenium goals hit target; oil reserves head upwards; new finance
minister named; coastal conservation plan; Soyo subsea systems plant; who’s WHO
6
ANGOLA-JAPAN: SIGNS OF THE RISING SUN
How Japan contributes to Angola’s industrialisation and technology
14 KWANZA SUL: TREASURE CHEST PROVINCE
6 Brazuk
4
SeanPavonePhoto
Contents
Kwanza Sul’s economy is driven by the offshore oil industry, but this
rich land is also set to be a huge contributor to Angola’s food supply
24
CHANGING FACE OF MONEY
Angola introduces new coins and notes to improve its currency security
26
The capital’s architecture is an eclectic mix of styles; we look at the
14 Brazuk
LUANDA: BLENDING THE OLD AND THE NEW
reasons why
34
Creating sophisticated logistics systems is the next step once basic
SUPPLY CHAIN REACTION: FEEDING ANGOLA
transport infrastructure is in place. We look at how this impacts
26
freight flows, especially food
40
SONANGOL NEWS BRIEFING
Sonangol No 2 in Africa; Pazflor prize; boost for Lobinave shipyard;
Kizomba Satellites phase 2; new find in Block 15/06; Brazilian bid; pump prices held; Schlesser Sonangol triumph; Angola’s lead role in African refining
Angola’s burgeoning demand for umbilicals has led to expansion of
Skodonnell
44 ANGOFLEX: REEL TIME GROWTH
40
its Lobito spool base
46 FAST LANE TO SUCCESS
Sonangol subsidiary Cardlane celebrates 20 years of placing Angolan students in further education. We see how this is done
46 JUNE 2013 3
Angola news briefing
■ Angola reached its 2015 Millennium development goals well ahead of schedule in 2012. The country dramatically cut malnutrition cases by half between 1990 and last year. The welcome news was given by Mamadou Diallo of the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO). He said the Angolan government had been working hard, and as a result the country had made social, economic and environmental progress. “FAO is proud to accompany Angola in this battle and is convinced that this country will reach in a sustainable way all the Millennium development goals,” Diallo added.
Coastal conservation plan Pal Teravagimov
Oil reserves head upwards
Nolte Lourens
Millennium goals reached
■ Angola’s proven and probable oil
reserves stand at 12.67 billion barrels, according to Oil Minister José Maria Botelho de Vasconcelos. The Minister revealed the figure while speaking at the Seventh German-African Energy Forum held in Hamburg in April. He said this included the new exploration frontier of the pre-salt region where discoveries had been made in blocks 21 and 23. Botelho de Vasconcelos said that when Angola gained independence in November 1975, the country produced around 175,000 barrels per day (bpd) compared to over 1.7 million today. The Minister said production was expected to reach 2 million bpd in 2014. The priority for 2013-17 was to keep a balance between reserves and production through tendering blocks, applying new oil exploration and production technologies, and completing development projects such as the Kizomba Satellites in Block 15.
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■ The Angolan government has lent its support to a $10 million project to further protect the 1.5 million hectare Iona National Park, a conservation area shared with neighbouring Namibia. In a new agreement, the Ministry of Environment will work with the Global Environment Facility, the European Union and the United Nations Development Programme to monitor the size and dynamics of plants and animals and ward off the threats they face. Poaching is one problem for wildlife. Iona’s unique ecosystems include springbok, ostriches, oryx, zebras and some unique plants, including the Welwitchia mirabilis Angola’s national symbol. The project also aims to support the 15,000 people who live in the park, most of them pastoral nomads known as the Muhimba.
Angola news briefing
Soyo subsea systems plant
New finance minister named ■ President José Eduardo dos Santos appointed Armando Manuel as Minister of Finance in May. A presidential advisor, Manuel was formerly head of Angola’s $5 billion sovereign wealth fund. He replaces Carlos Alberto Lopes. Photoatelier
■ GE-GLS Oil & Gás Angola is investing $175 million over the next two years in an undersea systems factory at Song-Etona in Soyo, Zaire province. The plant will be built at the Kwanda logistics base and will manufacture components such as wellheads, valves, flow meters and instruments for the oil and gas industry in the region. The enterprise will create 400 jobs during the construction phase and 180 when operations start up. Edgar Lopes, project manager for GE-GLS, said that construction would begin once licences were granted. Completion is scheduled for 2015.
Who’s WHO ■ Angola was appointed vice-president at the 66th World Health Assembly of the
World Health Organisation (WHO) in Geneva in May. Angola represents Africa at the WHO. The event was run under the slogan ‘Ensuring health in the context of implementation of global development goals’. The Angolan delegation was led by Health Minister José Van-Dúnem, who told the assembly that the health situation in Africa had significantly improved over the last decade. He pointed to a fall in infant mortality from 159 per 1,000 live births in the year 2000 to 109 in 2010. The minister stressed that the African region had made an effort and recorded improvements to maternal health, although still far from reaching the Millennium development goals.
FIGURED OUT
Angola in numbers
$350 million
investments in restructuring the port of Luanda
2,500 tonnes
lift power of Africa’s largest crane located in Angola
$9 billion
global investment in Angola’s Pazflor deep-sea project
4,500 containers on largest vessels now docking in Luanda
$850 million
investment in revamping Angola’s textile industry
JUNE 2013 5
ANGOLA-JAPAN:
SIGNS OF THE
RISING SUN
SeanPavonePhoto
Japan’s economic relations with Angola and Africa in general have historically been rather underplayed compared to those of other major business partners. Universo sheds some light on major Japanese projects about to make an impact on the Angolan economy
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INTERNATIONAL
JUNE 2013 7
INTERNATIONAL
T
he most obvious evidence of Japan’s economic presence in Angola is on the streets. Japanese-made vehicles are so numerous and so common a sight that the connection to the Far Eastern economy is often overlooked. Luanda’s iconic blue-and-white Toyota HiAce minibuses are at the heart of most traffic jams in the car-besieged capital. Elsewhere, elegant top-of-themarket Toyota, Mitsubishi and Nissan 4x4s add to the throng along with other Japanese brands. Japanese car production and exports are among the highest in the world. Many of Luanda’s ubiquitous minibuses, the mainstay of urban transportation, even find their way into the country via secondhand markets. Africa is the second-fastest-growing market for Japanese cars, and as Angola is the continent’s highest growing major economy, it is not surprising that it is buying more and more Japanese vehicles with their reputation for reliability and endurance. Consumer electronics are also another
unsung Japanese success story in Angola with makers such as Sony, Panasonic, Toshiba, JVC and Sharp supplying many of Angola’s flat-screen TVs, computers and personal stereo systems.
Industrial projects One of Japan’s major strengths around the world is in developing sophisticated, large-scale industrial projects. This too has largely gone unnoticed in Angola, but that is about to change. Japan’s Marubeni Corporation is currently completing the first of three Angolan textile plants as part of an $850 million rebuilding and total re-equipment contract. Marubeni and the Japan Bank for International Cooperation (JBIC) are providing the finance. The impact of the project will be felt not only at plant sites, where as many as 5,000 jobs will be created, but also in rural areas where a cotton-farming revival is slowly under way. Malange and Kwanza Sul are Angola’s traditional cottongrowing areas, and the needs of the refurbished factories and the rising global
demand for raw cotton could create up to 120,000 farm jobs. Angola’s textile industry has a long history and was once of great importance. It developed on a large scale in the 1930s, based on ample local production of cotton, which reached 37,000 tonnes in 1974, and exports peaked at just over 35,000 tonnes in 1970. The first of three state-of-the-art textile plants, Luanda’s Textang, is scheduled to restart cotton manufacturing by September 2013 with workforce training beginning in June. The Luanda plant will initially produce cotton fabric for uniforms and shirts. Marubeni has already installed spinning, weaving, knitting, and dyeing
Japanese car production 2012 Manufacturer Units Toyota 3,492,913 Nissan 1,148,265
Mark Clydesdale BZO
Relative sizes of Angola and Japan
Mitsubishi 515,168 Mitsubishi Fuso
87,086
Mazda 845,550 Isuzu 241,247 Honda 1,029,313 Hino 152,839 Suzuki 1,061,863 Daihatsu 774,406 Subaru 570,173 UD Trucks
21,855
Others 2,115 Total 9,942,793 Source: Japanese Automobile Manufacturers Association (JAMA)
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INTERNATIONAL
Sugar and biofuel Marubeni is also developing a $650 million sugar and biofuel project in Angola’s southern Cunene province, having been awarded the contract in February 2012. It will produce 400,000 tonnes a year of sugar and 40 million litres a year of ethanol, used as fuel in most Brazilian-made cars and as an additive to petrol in other countries. Work is yet to begin as Marubeni is still choosing a site for the plant. Once it is completed, Angola will be able to meet most of the domestic demand for sugar in the country, which currently depends on imports.
Japanese car exports 2012
Total (Units)
% Chg.
Asia
539,836 -7.4
Middle East
536,927
+24.0
Europe
821,492
-13.6
1,813,660
+5.7
North America (USA)
(1,638,002) +6.8
Central America
151,435
-11.9
South America
190,137
-2.7
Africa
172,500 +12.6
Oceania
429,598 +3.9
Others Total
4,986 -11.7 4,660,571 +0.8
Source: Japanese Automobile Manufacturers Association (JAMA)
Nataliya Hora
machines as well as providing the rest of the factory’s infrastructure and other utilities such as its own power source, a 12MW generator. The other plants Marubeni is revamping are Africa Textil at Benguela and Satec at Dondo. Benguela, employing up to 900 workers, will start operations in 2014 and produce towels, sheets and blankets. The final resurrected cotton mill at Dondo is to manufacture T-shirts and denim jeans. The Angolan government is keen to diversify its economy away from the oil and gas industries and create new jobs, develop the regions and reduce imports. The Japanese project satisfies all these conditions and also holds out the promise of eventually exporting cotton goods to neighbouring markets and beyond. Cotton is currently commanding high international prices thanks to strong demand from India and China. A wellwatered Angola allows irrigated cotton plantations to produce as many as three crops a year.
Gas and fertilisers A Japanese consortium consisting of Sumitomo, Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, Toyo Engineering and Sojitz has been pursuing a $1 billion Angolan fertiliser plant contract since 2009. The consortium signed an early work agreement covering engineering work, basic design, preparation of documents and contracts and site surveys in 2011. The proposed plant will take four years to
JUNE 2013 9
INTERNATIONAL
Mine clearance co-operation in Bengo Komatsu Ltd.
Japanese exports to Angola 2012 Non-electric machinery
46%
Transportation equipment
35%
Manufactured goods
8%
Electrical equipment
5%
Chemical products
1%
Raw materials
1%
Others 4% Brazuk
Angolan exports to Japan Komatsu Ltd.
Fuel 99.8%
Japan’s Marubeni at work at Textang build and is adjacent to Angola’s liquefied natural gas (LNG) plant site at Soyo in northern Zaire province. Planned daily production capacity is 2,000 tonnes of ammonia and 1,750 tonnes of urea. Urea is a base chemical for fertilisers. The plant is part of the Angolan government’s March 2009 plan to create 3,000 jobs at Soyo while stimulating farm output at the same time. Japan is also understood to be very interested in importing LNG from Soyo to meet its energy needs, especially since part of its nuclear generating capacity has been offline since a tsunami in 2011. Japan was active in supporting the rebuilding of Angola’s port infrastructure at Namibe in 2011. Here Japan’s TOA Corporation has spent $25 million on a 240-metres-long refurbished quay, a
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A common sight in Angola's countryside: a Japanese pickup container terminal and other facilities. The work was financed by Japanese bank JBIC, which offered to support a $20 million second stage of improvements at the port in May 2013. Namibe will be the export outlet for iron ore production from Angola’s interior in the near future and is already an important fishing port.
Sojitz success Sojitz, an international trading corporation based in Tokyo, has had a key role in providing plant and infrastructure for a $600 million contract to build Angola’s largest cement works at Sumbe, Kwanza Sul. The Fábrica de Cimento do Kwanza Sul 250km south of Luanda will officially open later this year and will produce 1.4 million tonnes a year and provide 25 per cent of
Angola’s need for an estimated five million tonnes of cement a year. Sojitz has a long-established relationship with Angola and has provided loans totalling approximately $1 billion during the period of 1991-2003. It has also proposed other projects in Angola such as an industrial park and steel businesses and to make the best use of its natural gas. In addition, the corporation has completed topside modules for BP Angola’s $14 billion PSVM floating production, storage and offloading (FPSO) system. The presence of Japanese majors in Angola goes beyond the projects mentioned above. The conglomerates are also establishing positions for themselves in anticipation of orders connected to Angola’s Sonaref refinery at Lobito, which is expected to be worth $8 billion.
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S.R.Lee Photo Traveller
INTERNATIONAL
INTERNATIONAL
Help and advice Japan has been a significant aid donor to Angola, providing $440 million and has given training to over 1,500 Angolans. Cooperation began in 1998 in the form of emergency relief via Unicef and the UN and later came in the form of economic aid in developing infrastructure and the rebuilding of the Port of Namibe. Japan has also helped rebuild and modernise the Viana School of Building along with primary schools elsewhere. It has also contributed to health and safety training in Angola and has refurbished the Josina Machel Hospital and supported staff training. Other Japanese contributions have been in the reintegration into civil society of former soldiers and refugees, as well as mine education and clearance, notably in Bengo province, where it is benefiting 240,000 people directly. Komatsu and Sumitomo have donated
demining equipment, including an armoured mine-clearing vehicle using Hitachi technology. The Japan Mine Action Service, an NGO run by former Japanese soldiers in partnership with Angola's Instituto Nacional de Desminagem, operates this vehicle. Japan is also co-operating directly with Angola’s agricultural sector. The provinces of Huambo and Bié hosted the first field trials using Japanese ricegrowing techniques in early 2013, thanks to an agreement with Japan’s International Cooperation Agency (JICA). The agency sponsored training of Angolan agronomists in Japan in 2012 and they are now applying new techniques at home. JICA specialist Katsuyuki Ohara said the first planting experiments had been successful. Each hectare was planted with 15 kilos of rice with the expectation of a harvest of 4.5 tons. The growing cycle lasts 150 days.
Afonso Pedro Canga, the Minister for Agriculture and Rural Development, said Angola’s availability of water for irrigation meant that farmers could grow rice all year round. Until now rice yields in Angola have been low because farmers have grown it in dry-field conditions. “The trials we are undertaking are giving very exciting results, and everything points to our ending rice imports in a few years,” enthused Minister Canga. “We’re introducing techniques that raise output, and our farmers can produce rice without depending on rain.”
Japan-Africa co-operation Japan provides a unique contribution to Africa in the form of the Tokyo International Conference on African Development (TICAD). Since 1993 Japan has organised the TICAD forum on a fiveyearly basis. TICAD is a forum Japan offers to
Japan-Angola trade
Japan exports to Angola US$ million
Angola exports to Japan US$ million
2003 52.6
83.7
2004 303.6
8.7
2005 118.1
18.2
2006 186.9
696.9
2007 208.1
190.4
2008 317.5
25.6
2009 178.4
24.1
2010 131.1
89.4
2011 142.3
26.9
2012 257.9
383.5
Source: Embassy of Japan, Luanda
mashe
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Boykov
INTERNATIONAL
Cultural icons Japan is famous for its martial arts, also practised in Angola, and donated $100,000 to Angola’s Judo Federation for equipment in 2009. It has also funded judo and karate demonstrations in Angola. Another icon associated with Japan is the robot, and in 2012 Japan sponsored a demonstration of robots in Angola.
Looking ahead Angola has shown an interest in using the Nippo-Brazilian digital TV standard (ISDB-T). Japan’s Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communication and Angola’s
Ministry of Telecommunications signed a memorandum of understanding on the subject in February 2011, and digital TV tests in Luanda started in May 2011. Alternative systems for Angola to choose from are ATSC, used mainly in the United States, and DVB-T, employed in Europe, Australia and New Zealand. Japan is synonymous with high technology, and if Angola adopts its digital TV standard, this will open up the Angolan and possibly neighbouring markets to buying Japanese telecommunications and broadcasting systems. Botswana has already adopted the ISDB-T system. Japan’s large projects in Angola have tended to take a long time to come to maturity given their characteristic complex nature and scale. As these plans are realised, creating jobs and new products for consumers, then Japan's profile and prestige in Angola will rise accordingly. p
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the international community to discuss the development of Africa. Its aim is to develop multilateral relations and promote trade, private companies and co-operation while not exclusively benefiting Japan. The fifth TICAD took place in Yokohama June 1-3.
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KWANZA SUL: TREASURE CHEST PROVINCE
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JUNE 2013 15
Courtesy of Gauff Engineering. Photographer: Andreas Linke
Fertile Kwanza Sul is well placed to serve the burgeoning food needs of Luanda and western Angola. It also has a shoreline close to Angola’s pre-salt discoveries and thus provides an ideal base for the oil industry. Universo explores the natural riches of a region brimming with potential
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Binga Falls on the Sumbe-Gabela highway
T
he vistas broaden as the excellent coastal road south of Luanda approaches the neighbouring province of Kwanza Sul. The gently rolling light-green hills of the savannah terrain give the traveller an uplifting sense of space and well-being. Kwanza Sul is where the foothills leading to Angola’s well-watered central highland plateau come closest to the South Atlantic, evidenced by the fiercely huge Binga waterfalls – some 50km from the coast on the Sumbe-Gabela highway – where tonnes of water tumble down each second. Kwanza Sul’s geography and climate made it a centre of high-quality Arabica coffee production in colonial times, precious enough for the Portuguese to build a railway from Porto Amboim up the steep escarpment to tap this rich beverage. While coffee production is in the process of a slow revival and large-scale arable agribusiness is quickly developing,
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the oil industry is now setting the pace of the province’s economy. Kwanza Sul is industrialising thanks to the demands for offshore production structures, and Porto Amboim is at the heart of this movement. This role is likely to increase in importance because of its location in relation to the fast-expanding oil discoveries in the Kwanza Basin.
Industrial hub: Paenal Porto Amboim Estaleiros Navais (Paenal) is a shipyard manufacturing equipment and modules for oil platforms, especially floating production, storage and offloading (FPSO) vessels. Established in 2008, Paenal is a joint venture between Sonangol, Dutch company SBM Offshore and South Korea’s Daewoo Shipbuilding & Marine Engineering. Paenal has absorbed investments of $300 million and employs 1,300 people. Thanks to Angola’s stringent requirements for local content and staffing, around 85 per cent of the
workforce is Angolan. This policy has had profound effects on the local economy and the career prospects of the population of Kwanza Sul, creating jobs and skilled workers for the oil industry. Paenal complements similar yards in Lobito and Soyo which also manufacture topside modules, suction anchor piles, buoys and subsea systems. The yard has a 490-metre-long deepwater quay protected by a breakwater and is currently assembling the largest crane in Africa. The 4,500-tonne crane will be capable of lifting up to 2,500 tonnes and will be used to place locally-made and assembled modules directly on to FPSOs. Paenal is currently concentrating efforts on serving Total’s CLOV (Cravo, Lírio, Orquídea and Violeta oil fields) and Eni’s N’Goma projects. The CLOV FPSO will moor at Porto Amboim in late 2013 for fitting out, the first such quayside operation in Angola. Paenal also has two wellhead platforms on its order books from Chevron’s Cabinda Gulf Oil Company.
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Africa's largest crane takes shape
PROVINCE
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Paenal employee – Daniel Maurício Raúl
Daniel Maurício Raúl is a great example of how Angola’s policy of creating jobs for the local population works in practice. Raúl, a 28-year-old from Porto Amboim, was one of the first local recruits to start work at Paenal in 2007. He began as a scaffolder, moved on to become a machine operator and is now a first-class safety officer, one of his duties being to carefully guide visitors around the Paenal complex. Paenal provided the job opportunities and the ladder of success for Raúl; it has also laid the foundations for the modernisation and industrialisation of Kwanza Sul’s economy.
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PROVINCE
Heerema Marine Contractors Paenal shares its complex with Sonangol’s TOPA fuel depot built to serve central and southern Angola, and another offshore equipment and service company, Heerema Marine Contractors. Heerema also has a very proactive attitude to training and local employment. It currently employs nearly 89.7 per cent local personnel. Heerema’s country manager Patrícia Lopes sees Porto Amboim as a new industrial hub and points out that recent pre-salt discoveries are just 96km away, and Luanda, only three hours by road. Other advantages for companies setting up shop in Porto Amboim include a reduction in imports and fewer delays caused by customs procedures. According to Lopes, Porto Amboim has contributed to the knowledge base of Angola’s oil and gas industry as well as to the country’s longterm development.
Educational opportunities Just north of Sumbe, provincial capital of Kwanza Sul, is the home to Angola’s prestigious National Petroleum Institute (INP), the country’s main educational facility for the industry. The verdant residential campus has everything needed for future generations of oil industry professionals to learn their trade.
The leafy campus with state-of-the-art practical facilities has trained more than 9,000 students since its creation in 1984. INP’s 50 instructors train around 10 per cent of the qualified oil sector workforce in Angola. Courses include geology, drilling and production, refining, gas processing, oil and gas instrumentation and mechanics. Students can enter the institute as young as 15 years of age once they complete basic secondary schooling and can opt for a wide range of technical or vocational training such as electronics, instrumentation and computer science. Apart from Sonangol, eager employers of INP students are Esso, Total and BP among others. Looking ahead, the institute is reinforcing its teaching staff to meet new developments related to pre-salt oil deposits and Angola’s growing liquefied natural gas (LNG) capacity.
Marine training Not far from INP a new oil-industryrelated residential training centre is taking shape. The official opening of the Angolan Maritime Training Centre (AMTC) is scheduled by the end of 2013. AMTC will eventually supply skilled crews for oil and LNG tankers. The school, with capacity for 192 students a year, is owned by Sonangol EP and operated Heerema training
The National Petroleum Institute’s new state-of-the-art library in partnership with the City of Glasgow College in the UK. It will provide training for maritime ratings and the first year of academic training for deep-sea deck and engineer officer cadets. In the future it will provide the entire academic cycle of training for deep-sea and restricted certification qualifications.
Fruitful farming Kwanza Sul’s tradition in coffee farming is showing some modest signs of growth, but this is far overshadowed by the large mechanised agribusinesses that are taking shape, especially those with irrigated areas. The administration of provincial governor Eusébio de Brito Teixeira is providing institutional support for one such project at Kirimbo near Gabela. The vast 180,000-hectare Zambia agribusiness project, which has technical assistance from Brazil’s University of Santa Cruz do Sul, includes homes, schools, irrigation channels and tourist facilities. China’s Convec is providing finance
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Lighting the way
Students on INP campus
to build a power dam to supply electricity to the 22 industrial concerns planned and for the population at the project. One of the proposed factories will produce fruit concentrates and provide 50 jobs. Another will produce biofertilizers and biological pesticides. Elsewhere in Kwanza Sul, other giant agribusiness concerns are thriving. An advanced example is Angolan-Portuguese company Nuviagro at Quibala. Nuviagro hopes to create 400 jobs and produce 72,000 tonnes of fruit and vegetables a year to supply the needs of Luanda and also associate company Refriango, the largest fruit-juice producer in Angola. This $5 million project has cleared and levelled a large area for irrigation and built a reservoir and infrastructure for the local population, including water supply, a school and a clinic. Crops planned are papaya, melons, mangoes and grapes as well as lettuce, cabbage, broccoli, onions, garlic, carrots, potatoes and tomatoes. The first crops
are being harvested this year. Nuviagro currently uses diesel generators to supply energy for its irrigation and cold storage needs, but will be connected to much cheaper power from the national grid in coming years. Gangula, a $39 million farming project on the outskirts of Sumbe, is an ambitious cotton plantation project supported by Spanish and South Korean experts in seeds and irrigation. The farm currently cultivates corn, beans and cotton, but engineers at the project say cotton output could produce three crops a year with high yields once the irrigation system is operative. The system is presently awaiting a power connection, which may take another two years to reach the site. Kwanza Sul’s arable farming also includes other crops such as rice, wheat and soya. Ranching is mainly undertaken at Sumbe, Conda, Quibala, Amboim, Cela and Cassongue, where there are lush pastures and a favourable climate. Apart from 127,000 head of cattle, goats, pigs and poultry are also reared and eggs produced.
The oil industry is now setting the pace of the province’s economy JUNE 2013 19
PROVINCE
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Corn crop at Gangula cotton project
Kwanza Sul is on the cusp of a period of accelerating development as its workforce’s skills grow 20 SONANGOL UNIVERSO
Waku Kungo Waku Kungo is home to Aldeia Nova, a huge farming project employing 600 workers, which combines large agribusiness with family farms, some owned by former soldiers. The project has a speciality in dairy farming, producing 35,000 litres of milk a day which is used for cheese, yoghurt and butter. Aldeia Nova also currently produces 125,000 eggs a day and plans to raise this amount to 200,000. It will harvest 7,000 tonnes of corn and soya this year and become self-sufficient in chicken feed. The surrounding area has a number of large, efficiently-run, mechanised private farms. Sediac is an association of farmers consisting of 40 farms operated by 250 workers. Sediac produces around 15,000 tonnes of cereals a year and has storage
silos and a flour mill. The association also produces beans and soya.
Cementing the future The province is to open the $600 million FĂĄbrica de Cimento do Kwanza Sul cement works later this year. The Samsungfinanced project at Cuacra, just north of Sumbe, will produce 1.4 million tonnes a year of cement and employ 2,000 people. The site has sufficient limestone and other minerals to supply the plant for 100 years. It will provide a key ingredient to construction and infrastructure development in Kwanza Sul and neighbouring provinces such as Huambo, which plans a 30,000-tonne capacity cement warehouse. Another construction material plant near Sumbe is the $20 million Super Gesso
Courtesy of Gauff Engineering. Photographer: Andreas Linke
PROVINCE
Bridging the gaps in Kwanza Sul's infrastructure
Emily Anderson
Sumbe street scene
at Alto Chingo. Operating since 2009, this factory has an output of 13,000 tonnes of gypsum per year, which is mostly used for plaster but also as an input for cement and as a farm fertilizer.
Tourist potential Kwanza Sul-born writer Luís Reis paints an idyllic picture of his Cela childhood home and the province’s marvellous landscapes, the Binga Waterfalls and the dense forests of Gabela, and his enthusiasm is contagious. Indeed, Kwanza Sul does have varied landscapes that please the visitor’s eye and the additional attractions of glorious beaches (Kicombo, Chicucula, Carimba and Porto Amboim as well as riparian and highland forest areas. The province’s easy accessibility from the population centres of Luanda
and Huambo also enhances its potential for tourism. Ecotourism is one possible variant. There are delightful, spectacularly large groups of hippopotamus to be seen in the River Keve near Ebo, south west of Quibala, and rare birds such as the Gabela Bush-shrike lure ornithologists to the Kumbira Forest Reserve near Conda. Kwanza Sul’s other tourist attractions include rock tombs, spa waters, cave art, stalactites and stalagmites. The province is on the cusp of a period of accelerating, sustained economic development as its workforce becomes increasingly sophisticated and skilled. This applies not only to the oil industry but also to the high-tech plantations now literally bearing fruit. Kwanza Sul is the province that has, or soon will have, it all. p
Happy landings Kwanza Sul has 178km of unspoilt coast with rich fisheries that include prized oyster beds at the mouth of the River Keve. Small fishing boats operate as far as 6km offshore, where catches have been rising sharply. The province landed 13,968 tonnes of fish in 2012, compared to 8,036 tonnes the previous year.
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PROVINCE
Mark Clydesdale BZO
Kwanza Sul
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Hippos in the Keve near Ebo
Lourenço Amorim
Kwanza Sul has varied landscapes that please the visitor’s eye and the additional attractions of glorious beaches, riparian and highland forest areas
Lourenรงo Amorim
Lourenรงo Amorim
Peter Moeller
Peter Moeller
Lourenรงo Amorim
PROVINCE
A characteristically colourful cemetery
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FINANCE
Angola is replacing kwanza notes and coins introduced 14 years ago with new versions aimed at reinforcing security and making more change available
CHANGING FACE OF
MONEY A
ngola began introducing a set of attractive new banknotes on March 22. The central bank, Banco Nacional de Angola (BNA), said that the changeover was merely a replacement operation for the previous set of notes introduced in 1999 and that they should be accepted in all commercial and financial transactions. New notes for 50, 100, 200 and 500 kwanzas were the first to circulate and were followed by higher denominations of 1,000, 2,000 and 5,000 kwanzas on May 31. The bank previously brought new coins into circulation on February 18. Their introduction is expected to facilitate the supply of change and thus help reduce inflationary pressures. The coins include one for 50 cents as well as one, five and ten kwanzas. BNA said the new family of notes had different security
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characteristics such as water marks, a high-relief texture, a metal strip and improved paper quality, raising the kwanza to match high international standards. The new notes were made in Russia. According to BNA, the new notes would guarantee greater confidence and security in the Angolan currency. The old notes were subject to a greater risk of forgery. The new banknotes pay homage to the first two presidents of independent Angola, and their backgrounds are illustrated with images of the country’s rich culture and natural resources such as waterfalls and dams. A BNA advertising campaign takes up this theme, hailing the new notes and coins as “strong like our nature”. BNA also said that the new notes were an asset symbolic of national sovereignty and urged all users to help keep them in good condition. p
The new notes would guarantee greater confidence and security in the Angolan currency
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CULTURE
Luanda was one of the first cities to embrace modernist architecture featuring glass and steel high-rise buildings, yet it has also managed to treasure its colonial heritage. Universo examines the harmonic styles of the city’s buildings By Lula Ahrens
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LUANDA: BLENDING THE OLD AND THE NEW
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Museum of Science and Technology
“Luanda is the mouth that swallows everything.” – António Ole, Angolan artist
L
uanda is not an easy treat like Prague, Cape Town or Paris. One has to take a closer look to see why some experts see this hilly capital with its peninsula and magnificent bay as nothing short of a magical, organic piece of art. The city is like a great personality; you either love or loathe it, but it always intrigues. This is largely thanks to its stark contrasts between colonial, modernist and futurist building styles, its intense 24hour buzz and its stunning, continuously transforming skyline. “Luanda’s contemporary structures and the pace at which they are being built are often compared to those of Dubai,” said German architectural photographer
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Hans Engels. “Indeed, I have never seen a city transform itself as quickly as Luanda. The difference to Dubai is that beautiful, intriguing Luanda will always remain a city with a past. Angolans treasure and maintain their historic buildings. The capital is definitely changing for the better.” The world’s third most populous Portuguese-speaking city, after São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro, is undergoing a transformation so rapid that it is hard to keep track of its phases. The recent, large-scale renovation of Luanda Bay has perhaps had the greatest impact. With its well-kept lawns, palm trees and flower beds, walkways, playgrounds, and sports and performance areas, this is now the main public space in town.
This is especially the case at weekends, when hundreds of families and youngsters flock there to have fun, enjoy the sunset and get a breath of fresh air. Angolan architect Maria João Teles Grilo advocates a symbiosis between Luanda’s different styles and eras. “Cities are the physical embodiment of the stories and history of society. Technically speaking, one cannot catalogue buildings as ‘old’ and ‘new,’” she told Universo. “The point is to create dialogues between what has been built in the city throughout time. One has to try and do this in harmony, in the same way that grandparents, parents and children relate to each other and form the ‘human tissue’. We should weave those same joys, traumas, heartbreaks and smiles that support our lives into the physical fabric that surrounds us.” The harmonic process of incorporating and blending the modern into existing historical buildings is in evidence at the
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restaurant
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The new fortress
southern end of Luanda Bay, where the hill fortress of São Miguel overlooks its calm waters and the business district beyond, as well as the Atlantic Ocean on the other side of the protective Ilha peninsula. Built in 1576, the fortress served as the colony's administrative centre, as a major outlet for slave transports to Brazil, and finally, up until 1975, as the headquarters of the commander-in-chief of the Portuguese Armed Forces in Angola. Over the last three years the fort has undergone a thorough renovation which includes the addition of new public areas and a modern restaurant with panoramic views. The fort now houses the Museum of the Armed Forces, re-opened to the public in April. Immediately below São Miguel, the shell of Luanda’s old soap factory is being restored, expanded and turned into Angola’s first Museum of Science and Technology. A magnificent white building with a huge internal space, it is destined,
along with the fort, to become a magnet for visitors, providing an end-of-the-bay attraction for walkers along the seafront. From the fort it is a 15-minute walk to the city’s peninsula, or Ilha. This tongue of land, now dotted with state-of-the-art luxury clubs, boasts a breathtaking view of the city’s skyline. And that is exactly the spot where the impressive pace of Luanda’s building craze is best observed and appreciated, both during the day and at night.
World City Luanda’s urban development is largely based on the master plan, which aims to turn the capital into a modern city capable of joining the ranks of the world’s major metropolitan areas while preserving its historical buildings. The government body in charge is the Luanda Institute of Planning and Urban Management. The institute is largely responsible for the modernisation of the bayside avenue
“Angolans treasure and maintain their historic buildings. The capital is definitely changing for the better” – Hans Engels, photographer JUNE 2013 29
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Hill fortress of São Miguel
and the rebuilding of the Ilha’s roadways and promenade, as well as other urban improvement projects. Despite the master plan, an often heard criticism of Luanda’s development is that it is chaotic. Photographer Engels has his own thoughts on this: “In Germany after the war, people also just built according to their pressing needs. It was an unplanned, organic growth of structures, but the end results were very positive. Brazil’s capital Brasília, on the other hand, was built according to a plan, in a very clean and well-organised manner. But Brasília is not a lively and attractive city.”
Harmony and style Modernising a city and trying to create a marriage between different architectural eras is not an easy task; many of the world’s cities have demonstrated that it can easily go wrong. The daring beauty of most of Luanda’s contemporary high-rise buildings, however, is striking, and so is the way they fit into and add to their historical surroundings. Problems aside, it is hard to deny that modern-day Luanda is packed with style. The emblematic contrast between Luanda’s old and new is the picture postcard rose-coloured domed Angolan National Bank (BNA). The whole of the bayside bank’s background is now a screen of tall buildings, mostly added in the last decade. Angolan modernism was divided into two movements. The first emphasised Portuguese nationalist, colonialist style – for example, covered outdoor galleries and porches. Examples are the BNA by Vasco Regaleira and Mutu Ya Kevela high school by José da Costa e Silva. Rational functionalism influenced the more international and revolutionary movement. This style can be recognised by its garden terraces, open façades and longitudinal windows, among other features.
Modernism 1950–1975 The 20th century brought Luanda arguably its most defining architectural style, modernism. This era began in 1950 with
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Schoolchildren in the shadow of Queen Ginga's statue outside the fortress
CULTURE
Palácio Dona Ana Joaquina Palácio Dona Ana Joaquina, a typical example of a 17th-century Luanda mansion with the grandeur of a palace, is known as one of the most valuable architectural treasures in Angola and, like the Palácio de Ferro (on page 32), has a fascinating history. The palace used to belong to the merchant and shipowner Dona Ana Joaquina dos Santos Silva (1788-1859), the greatgranddaughter of an emancipated black slave. A member of the Luandan aristocracy, she was dubbed the ‘Rich Lady of Luanda’. At the beginning of the 20th century, the palace was turned into a college and business school until it was abandoned. When Angola gained independence, displaced rural families occupied the palace until it was demolished in 2000. But that was not the end of it. The demolition caused such an outcry that it was replaced by a replica of the old building the same year, at a cost of $8 million. President José Eduardo dos Santos inaugurated the replica in 2003. The new structure – larger than the old one, and with an extra floor – now houses Luanda’s law courts.
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the building of Luanda’s market of Kinaxixi – the most prominent example of this style which, sadly, has been demolished – and ended in 1975. Its key concept was a break with the past and opposition to the Portuguese authoritarian principles guiding urban planning and design then. Architect Teles Grilo investigates the development of megacities in developing countries. Her favourite modernist buildings in Luanda are the Ministry of Public Works and the collective-housing building across the road from the psychiatric hospital by Vieira da Costa, and the Angola National Radio building by Simões de Carvalho. Both architects are Angolan. Explaining what makes Luanda’s modernism so unique, she said: “Although built during the colonial era, from a historical perspective Angola’s modernist architecture is profoundly anti-regime [to the former Portuguese government]. Modernism was not influenced by
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Palácio de Ferro Portugal, where hardly any modern architecture could then be found, but by Brazil and France. “In global terms, modernism was a social movement. It was a philosophical, political affirmation of social equality, democracy and dignified living space for the people. Before the world adopted modernism as its poster child, we were already practicing it here in Angola.” According to Teles Grilo, what is designed and built in the world today still contains elements of modernism: “It’s the great movement of the 20th century. Contemporary architecture has not yet formulated its own paradigms. What we basically added to the modernist movement was a technological advance.”
AFP/Getty Images
Historical background
Palácio de Ferro Iron Palace) is a surprising historical gem in the middle of Luanda’s rapidly modernising city centre. It is generally believed to be designed and built by – or by someone associated with – Gustave Eiffel, who designed the Eiffel Tower in Paris and the internal structure of the Statue of Liberty in New York. As no official building records of Palácio de Ferro exist, the structure’s history is shrouded in mystery. It is believed to have been prefabricated in the 1890s in France and meant to be transported to Madagascar by ship. Instead, the building ended up on Angola’s ‘skeleton coast’ after the vessel carrying it got caught up in the notorious Benguela currents. Portuguese colonial rulers are said to have claimed the ship along with all its contents, including the palace. During Portuguese colonial rule, the building was used as an art centre. Following Angola’s independence in 1974, it was neglected and then heavily damaged during the civil war. After 11 years of peace, the Iron Palace is now undergoing renovation with the help of Brazilian construction companies. Many of the reclaimed iron balustrades and floor tiles were individually renovated in Rio de Janeiro. The Angolan Ministry of Culture has not yet decided whether the Iron Palace will become a diamond museum or a restaurant.
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In the period 1940–50, construction in Luanda was carried out according to the traditionalist, monumental and nationalist style of the colonial metropolis. Examples are the Liceu Salvador Correia de Sá and Colégio de São José de Cluny, which Soares da Costa restored in 1997. The 1960s were a major turning point in Luanda’s architectural history. Oil discoveries, rising fuel prices, international pressure on Portugal as a colonising power and the intensification of Angola’s war of independence (1961-1974) led Portugal to increase investment in its overseas colonies. The Office of Colonial Urbanisation – later renamed Office of Overseas Urbanisation – was set up in Lisbon to draw up new guidelines for urban planning and public works, and it sent a huge workforce to Angola to carry out its plans. A new urban planning strategy and modern, vanguard buildings reflected the quest for an image of modernised colonialism. That was how Portugal attempted to show the world that it was committed to improving the living conditions of people in Angola.
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As a result, economic growth and development reached record heights. The capital grew into a wealthy, cosmopolitan city of 475,328 people in 1970, and Luanda was referred to as the ‘Paris of Africa’ in the that decade. There was, however, another side to the story. The war of independence also saw a massive exodus of Portuguese from Angola, especially Luanda, leaving public and private buildings abandoned. Angolans fleeing the countryside occupied Luanda’s vacant buildings with the government’s approval in a random, spontaneous fashion. Some anti-regime architects in Angola introduced social elements into their urban planning and contradicted the racial divide favoured by the colonial state. After Angolan independence, Luanda’s existing musseques (shanty towns) grew out of proportion, while urban development ground to a halt as a result of the civil war (1975-2002), to be reborn like never before after the war came to an end.
Celebrating modernism In 2010, the Goethe Institute Angola and the Sindika Dokolo Foundation invited widely travelled photographer Hans Engels to exhibit his work on German Bauhaus architecture, which is similar to Luanda’s modernist architecture, at the Luanda Triennial. He also exhibited his photographs of modernist buildings in Luanda in collaboration with the Goethe Institute Angola and at the Lusíada University in Lisbon. “Nowhere in the world have I seen such a huge collection of modernist buildings as in Luanda,” he said. “In the future, I would love to exhibit a series of photographs on Luanda’s impressive contemporary architecture as well. I’m absolutely certain that the world would be interested in seeing the impressive, glamorous transformation of this southern African capital.” p
Hill fortress of São Miguel JUNE 2013 33
INDUSTRY
SUPPLY CHAIN
REACTION: FEEDING ANGOLA
Huge progress made in rebuilding Angola’s infrastructure has created efficient logistics systems to handle the country’s exports and imports. Universo looks at this promising development
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JUNE 2013 35 EvrenKalinbacak
INDUSTRY
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ngola needs not only essential food and goods for internal consumption, but also a constant supply of building materials for the country’s massive and dynamic reconstruction process. For the best part of 40 years, the nation has largely depended on imports and overwhelmingly on a single port, Luanda, to handle this traffic. Even now, Angola’s largest city accounts for around 80 per cent of the country’s imports. Luanda’s port until recently was Angola’s largest bottleneck in the movement of goods – mainly food, construction materials, machinery and equipment – to points across its huge territory, but that is rapidly becoming a thing of the past. The capital’s port has now broken the logjam of long delays in mooring and
zhangyang
Isaac Mateus
Containers load at Luanda docks destined for Viana
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unloading and regularly breaks records in moving goods. Improvements in port management, speedier customs clearance and publicprivate partnerships in freight handling have meant waiting times for ships to dock have shrunk from 91 days in 2009 to fewer than two days now. Daily container movements have rocketed from 150,000 in 2007 to a projected 600,000 in 2013. The country is now reaching a tipping point whereby massive investment in port restructuring, roads and railways has created the conditions for the development of integrated freight services.
How has this come about? According to Francisco Venâncio, chief executive at the Port of Luanda, the changes result from organisational, infrastructural and managerial improvements aimed at accelerating cargo clearance from the port. As part of a $350 million investment programme, the port has extensively renewed quays, resurfaced areas, and added new terminals and navigation-safety systems. Recent new facilities include a 40,000-tonne-capacity bulk grain silo and a 4,000-tonne cold storage depot. A key change at Luanda has been the adoption of 24-hour working.
Two of the port’s terminal operators, Sociedade Gestora de Terminais (Sogester) and Multiterminais, armed with 20year concessions, have invested in and decongested the port by creating new spaces to store containers. These ‘second line’ terminals or dry ports help clear the immediate quayside area and make room for new container-handling operations. Sogester’s dry port at Panguila north of Luanda has space for 24,000 containers, while Multiterminais through its sister company Multiparques runs a 26,685-unit dry port at Viana. In March 2013, the regional train company Caminho de Ferro de Luanda (CFL) began running a regular dedicated container train to Viana as part of a 500-container-amonth contract with Multiterminais. This development is the first step for container trains to use the full length of the CFL line – allowing them to unload as far as Dondo (a major route centre for central Angola) and Malange at the eastern extremity of the CFL line 450km away. Roads adjacent to the port of Luanda suffer from notorious congestion and the rail link will ease pressure on them. However, a major northern-coast road improvement and drainage project is about to be completed that will largely
INDUSTRY
remedy this situation, benefiting dock traffic to Angola’s highway network and to Panguila’s dry port. Customs clearance at Luanda has improved dramatically. The port now offers importers a one-stop shop that permits the release of containers in around three hours, compared to two days and visits to several different office locations previously. Clients may take their cargo free of charge up to five days after unloading, but after that a fee is payable. After ten days without collection, the container is removed to a secondary terminal, and it may be auctioned off if it is left more than 60 days. Sogester, founded in 2007 to unload, store and deliver containers from Terminals
3 and 5, has invested $140 million in improving freight flows, and the results have been felt very quickly. The company initially moved about 150,000 containers a year. This doubled to 300,000 in 2011 and 450,000 in 2012, and is expected to grow by 25 per cent in 2013 to between 500,000 and 600,000 containers a year.
Larger ships Another milestone in driving down logistics costs in Angola was reached in November 2012 when the biggest container vessel ever to berth at Luanda docked. The ship was owned by Maersk Line, the largest dedicated container-handling company in Angola. The giant was a new
Customs clearance at Luanda has improved dramatically. The port now offers importers a one-stop shop
WAFMAX vessel named Maersk Cape Coast. These ships are specially designed to operate in West African ports with shallower docksides. The 249-metre-long vessel is capable of carrying 4,500 containers and means that freight unit costs will fall and may eventually benefit consumers. Luanda’s new WAFMAX service connects with Asian ports on a weekly basis, offering a more competitive service and enabling better control over stocks and faster availability of cargo. Maersk, a partner of Sogester in terminal operations, accounts for a quarter of all container movements at Luanda and 40 per cent of refrigerated containers. Cláudio Rosa, Maersk’s director-
Luanda port container movements 2007 150,000 2011 300,000 2012 450,000 2013 500,000-600,000* Source: Sogester
(* projection)
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INDUSTRY
Maersk
Maersk
The largest container ship to dock in Luanda unloads general in Angola, said Angola’s imports grew 18 percentage points in volume in 2012 compared to 2011 and that he expected a 10 per cent rise in 2013. According to Rosa, foodstuffs are the leading containerised import with flour, drinks and fresh food the most important products. After that come construction materials led by cement. Portugal is Angola’s main supplier of foodstuffs while China is the source of the large amounts of plastic goods Angola imports. Rosa said Angola’s main exports in containers grew 55 per cent in 2012 and were mainly timber, scrap metal and ornamental stones destined for markets such as China, Portugal and India. He sees reconstruction and insufficient domestic food production as driving Angola’s imports, and this has led to the number of containers used increasing by between 8 and 12 per cent per year.
Angolan produce now on Luanda's supermarket shelves
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Away from the port of Luanda, a glittering yardstick of the success of Angola’s logistics can be found in the Nosso Super supermarket network managed by Nova Rede de Supermercados de Angola (NRSA) a part of Brazil’s Grupo Odebrecht. Nosso Super is the only supermarket chain present in all 18 of Angola’s provinces and is supplied by a central depot in
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Supermarket network
Luanda. The fact that a nationwide network of 29 supermarkets exists at all is testimony to Angola’s improving port and road transport systems, as around 60 per cent of the food, including fresh produce, and other products on its shelves, are imported through the Port of Luanda. NRSA originally planned two distribution centres to supply the chain, one in Luanda and another in Lobito, but found that the one in Luanda was sufficient for now. Lobito may come on-stream in 2015 as the shop network grows. Thanks to improved local telecommunications, the Nosso Super fleet of 60 heavyweight trucks are monitored by satellite to guarantee security, optimum driving techniques and fuel economy. The fleet ensures the stores get deliveries twice a week and is able to supply fresh fruit and vegetables as well as frozen food. Greater efficiencies in logistics around Luanda mean that a major Nosso Super supermarket at Rocha is now receiving six deliveries a week. Delivery times and fuel consumption, as well as maintenance and breakdown costs, have dropped across Angola as roads have improved, and fragile goods such as glassware and eggs can now arrive unbroken. Nosso Super welcomes locallyproduced supplies by buying from local farmers. These small-scale suppliers
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Angola is meeting the challenges of its logistics but more improvements are needed can take their fresh goods to a local supermarket where Nosso Super can verify the quality and wash and pack them. Large Angolan farming concerns also supply Nosso Super, as do fisheries, so there can be cuts in freight costs, as goods such as potatoes can be transported from Huambo in central Angola to Luanda, or fish from Benguela and crabs from Namibe, giving a return cargo. Nosso Super is also championing the promotion of Angolan factory-produced goods in its stores as these companies develop. It now supplies Angolan bottled water, beer, soft drinks, cleaning products, clothing, cooked meats and dairy products. All of the above show clearly that
the challenges of Angola’s logistics are being met, but more improvements are needed to bring down the high costs of transporting goods and cut consumer prices.
Easing congestion Angola’s recent moves to boost domestic production of major imports, notably cement and foodstuffs, will inevitably take pressure off its ports and move centres of supply away from congested Luanda. While there has been heavy investment in new cement plants, Angola – with its massive reconstruction projects, especially in dam-building and housing – is not expected to be reach self-sufficiency until 2017-18 in this basic product.
Similarly, domestic farm output, although expanding markedly, is unlikely to satisfy demand in the short term. The port of Luanda is coping with the pressures currently placed on it, but it has its spatial limitations, at the heart of a congested metropolis. Over the next five years work is expected to begin on a new, spacious greenfield port at Barra do Dande, north of the city. Here, large chunks of Luanda’s existing port traffic will find a new way into and out of Angola. However, Angola in the medium term is expected to realise its promise and reestablish its historical position as a net exporter of foodstuffs. When that happens, the required logistical system will be ready and waiting to meet that demand. p
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Sonangol news briefing
Sonangol No 2 in Africa Brazuk
■ The March edition of Parisian magazine Jeune Afrique classified Sonangol as the second-largest company in Africa for a second consecutive year. Sonangol’s high ranking was based on a study of 500 African and African-based companies. The leading position in the league table of important companies was Algeria’s Sonatrach, which is also an oil and gas company. Sonangol and Sonatrach presented very solid structures, enabling them also to rank among the 500 largest companies in the world. The two African heavyweights would be even higher up the world rankings if they were traded on stock markets, Jeune Afrique noted.
Pump prices held
Kizomba Satellites phase 2
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■ Sonangol has confirmed that it does not foresee any change in its fuel prices. “At no time, and as a consequence of the adjustments made in the structure of profit margins and charges, is it expected, at present or in the near future, that there will be any change in fuel prices,” said a Sonangol press statement. Angola’s pump price for a litre of petrol is currently fixed at 60 kwanzas ($0.60) and diesel at 40 kwanzas ($0.40). Brazuk
■ Sonangol and Esso Exploration Angola have awarded an engineering supply, construction and installation contract to a consortium consisting of Saipem SA, Petromar (Angola) and Saipem (Portugal) Maritime Trade. The contract is for the second phase of the Kizomba oil well satellites project in Angola’s offshore Block 15, situated 145km from Soyo. Work includes engineering, procurement, fabrication and installation of pipelines with a total length of nearly 60km. Offshore work will take place between 2014 and 2015. Manufacturing activities will be undertaken in Angola at Soyo and Ambriz docks.
Sonangol news briefing
Angola’s lead role in African refining
AM70
New find in Block 15/06
■ Sonangol EP and ENI Angola have made another oil discovery in deep-sea Block 15/06. The well, Vandumbu-1ST, struck oil at a sea depth of 976 metres and a total depth of 3,480 metres. A study based on data from wells Vandumbu-1 and Vandumbu-1ST said that the site has the potential to produce 5,000 barrels a day. ENI was awarded the operation of Block 15/06 in 2006 with Sonangol EP as concession holder. ENI has a 60% stake in the block and is partnered with Sonangol P&P (15%), Total (15%), Falcon Oil Holding Angola SA (5%) and Statoil Angola Block 15/06 (5%).
Mark Schwettmann
■ Sonangol’s Brazil subsidiary Sonangol Guanambi qualified to take part in the country’s 11th auction of oil exploration blocks, according to Brazil’s national oil agency ANP. The auction for 289 blocks was held on May 15 in Rio de Janeiro. The blocks are in 11 sedimentary basins in an area covering 155,800 sq km. Offshore blocks predominate and total 166, of which 94 are in deep water and 72 in shallow water. The other 123 are on land.
of the African Refiners Association (ARA) at an event in Cape Town in March. The ARA 2013 conference theme was ‘Investing in Infastructure’ and was presided over by Sonangol EP administrator Anabela Fonseca. The need to invest efficiently and with security in products that may support economic growth in Africa was one of the main reasons for the choice of the conference subject. Administrator Fonseca reiterated Sonangol’s continued support for ARA and appealed to other members to do the same, not only in relation to the association but also for its new Nigerian president, Anthony Ogbuigwe, and to ensure the continued success of ARA. The Sonangol delegation to ARA 2013 also included Sonaref president, João Ramos and executive commission representative Augusto Bravo, the director for new business at Sonaci, João Silva, as well as specialists at the Luanda refinery and Sonangol EP. Communication & Image Dept.
Brazilian bid
■ Angola marked the end of its second presidency mandate
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Sonangol news briefing
Total
Pazflor prize
■ The $9 billion Pazflor deep-
Total
Gaspar Martins, between Yves-Louis Darrivarrére (left) and Steve Balind, accepts the award on behalf of Sonangol and Total
sea development offshore Angola, using the world’s largest FPSO, received a Distinguished Achievement Award at this year’s Offshore Technology Conference in Houston. “It is well-deserved recognition for the teams that took part in the project in meeting the stringent safety, environmental, scheduling, budget and quality specifications,” said YvesLouis Darricarrère, upstream president at Total. “They are all to be sincerely congratulated.” The prestigious award is presented annually to the company that has advanced deepwater oil expertise and technology as part of a major project. Pazflor is based in Block 17, Total’s main asset in Angola which it operates with a 40% interest. Sonangol P&P has a 20% stake in the block and Sonangol EP is the concession holder. A major part of developing Pazflor was undertaken in Angola.
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Boost for Lobinave shipyard
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■ Sonangol is to relaunch and capitalise its Lobinave industrial unit at Lobito. The marine company is capable of building mediumsized ships and refurbishing vessels, said Kiala Gabriel, Secretary of State for Industry. He said there had been insufficient investment in technical and technological development in the sector. Sonangol will take over the management of Lobinave from a South Korean company and make investment on behalf of the state. “We are confident that the situation will improve because the company is of great importance to the market owing to its specialisation and location,” said Gabriel. Lobinave (formerly Estalnave) employs 350 workers. It is located in Lobito Bay between the port, the Secil cement factory and the new minerals terminal. The company may also work in support of the new Lobito refinery, which will be located nearby.
Sonangol news briefing
Schlesser Sonangol triumph
■ Jean-Louis Schlesser claimed outright victory for Team Schlesser Sonangol in the four-
day 2013 Sealine Cross-Country Rally in southern Qatar in late April. The rally was over a distance of 1,500km in totally desert terrain. The win puts Schlesser in top position in the FIA World Cup for Cross-Country Rallies. The former Formula 1 driver said he was very happy with the result of the “nice but difficult race” which had put the team in a good position. Schlesser ended the race with a lead of 31 minutes, 18 seconds. His overall time was 16 hours, 11 minutes, 33 seconds.
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Mark Hall
Sonangol partners
ANGOFLEX: REEL TIME GROWTH Angoflex has doubled production capacity at its Lobito spool base, with dramatically positive effects on its local workforce
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Sonangol partners a year but with the modernisation we can double that,” Nunes explained. “Our focus now is to continue improving our internal processes and to develop our team to make us even more competitive.” The growth of Angoflex operations has also had beneficial effects on local employment. Fábrica de Umbilicais da Angoflex, the base’s full name, increased its workforce by 55 in 2012 to 235. This is a far cry from the 30 on the payroll back in 2003 when the factory opened. Today, 92 per cent of Angoflex’s Lobito base personnel are Angolan, which reinforces the process of developing local content. Back in 2003, just half of the employees were Angolans. According to Nunes, Angoflex is currently focusing its attention on meeting the demand from Angola’s oilfields although in the past it has exported to other African countries. “It’s worth pointing out that the Lobito factory is the only umbilicals producer in the whole of Africa,” he said. Since 2004, the Lobito facility has supplied steel tube umbilicals to projects including Dalia, Greater Plutónio, Block 31, Tômbua-Lândana, Lobito Tomboco, Gimboa, Mondo, Batuque, Kissanje East, AB 15, Kizomba and Girri. Angoflex is currently working on providing 75km of umbilicals for Total’s multifield CLOV development in Block 17 where there will be 34 wells. These are located about 150km off the Angolan coast in water depths of 1,400 metres. Looking ahead, Nunes said that, depending on demand, there is space at Lobito for the installation of at least one more carousel. p
What is an umbilical? The name umbilical suggests the connection between a child and its mother. In the oil and gas industry it describes a long cable connecting an oil platform to the wellhead on the sea floor. Umbilicals are composed of bundles of tubes, electric cables and optical fibres which remotely control and operate subsea equipment, often at great depths. Angoflex umbilicals for Angolan and West African deep waters have a steel casing to withstand the low temperatures and pressures, whereas umbilicals used elsewhere, such as in the shallower North Sea, use engineering plastics. Angoflex’s Helix machine merges the component tubes and so packs the cables into the umbilical cable sleeve. Ingvar Tjostheim
U
mbilicals manufacturer Angoflex, a partnership between Sonangol and France’s Technip, has completed a $40 million investment in expanding its operations at Lobito in Benguela province. The project comprises an upgraded Helix umbilical production machine and two additional carousels, the huge spools that hold the rolled-up cables. The equipment was installed in the third quarter of 2012 and started operations at the end of the year. Angoflex’s new investment also includes a kilometre-long loading bay where umbilicals are unreeled from the carousels and wound onto huge reels on board ships. The vessels then deliver the umbilicals to the oil and gas production areas off Angola’s coast. Carlos Nunes, plant manager at the Angoflex fabrication yard, said the investment was made to meet growing demand from deepwater oil and gas projects that require longer umbilicals without any joints. Over two-thirds of Angola’s oil is now being pumped from below seawater depths of 500 metres. Angoflex parent company Technip has already proved that it is capable of providing umbilicals for use at great depths. It supplied Shell’s Perdido development in the Gulf of Mexico at a water depth of nearly 3,000 metres. “The types of carousels installed at Lobito are the most modern in the world and the project is helping Angoflex to increase its production capacity. Just to give you an idea, the factory used to have the capacity to produce 100km of umbilicals
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Sonangol education
FAST LANE TO
SUCCESS
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Skodonnell
Sonangol education
London-based Cardlane Ltd has been channelling Angolan students towards university courses abroad, mainly in the UK, since 1993. In Cardlane’s 20th anniversary year, Universo looks at how this Sonangol affiliate performs this role
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new job, the break-up of a relationship and moving house are three of the most stressful situations we face in life, we are told by psychologists. So the combination of moving thousands of miles away from home, taking on a new study course and working in a foreign language is clearly a tough assignment for anyone, especially the young. Cardlane’s role over the past two decades has been to help young Angolans meet this challenge and to realise their academic potential. “We don’t sell anything”, says Verônica Martire, Cardlane’s Brazilianborn office manager. “We’re a not-for-profit organisation. We’re the agency for supporting students, the educational branch of Sonangol. We look after students.” Cardlane is a Sonangol subsidiary dedicated to placing Angolan students in educational institutions and currently oversees the academic careers of about 100 students a year. It also ensures that they have all the necessary help and support to complete their courses. The United Kingdom is the students’ main destination, but other countries are also options. The company is currently allocating courses for 218 students in Sonangol’s latest intake of candidates. Of these,
Cardlane will manage 153 in the UK, but will for the first time have the added responsibility for placing a 65-strong group on courses in Norway. The flow of students through Cardlane’s hands is not constant. The company routinely manages dozens of students each year but Sonangol recruitment drives – usually every five or six years – may more than double that number as present numbers demonstrate. Competition is stiff for Sonangol’s overseas scholarships. In the 2012-13 intake some 5,000 candidates competed for a total of 400 placements abroad whereas in 2005 a massive 7,000 young Angolans took the tough entrance examinations. Between these big recruitment guides Cardlane handles smaller numbers each year. Sonangol’s expansion and thirst for new professionals indicate that the demands on Cardlane’s services will inevitably grow. It is not alone in its task; sister organisations play a similar role in Portugal, the United States and Brazil.
Routes to rewards The first step in pursuing a course in the UK is to learn the English language. Some students go directly into residential language schools as they may be as young as 16. Cardlane tries to place students on
Resefe dos Santos, postgraduate at University of Essex (MSc finance and investment)
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Mauro Ceita - medicine student, Pavol Jozef Safarik University, Slovakia
language courses near their likely university choice where there are specialties such as Petroleum Engineering, Geology and Business Studies. The agency also keeps a close eye on university rankings to make sure the students get places on the most respected courses in their field. However, student acceptance depends on the results of their exams and the level of English attained, with the most sought after universities naturally requiring better results. Cardlane prefers to place students at colleges away from London because the higher everyday costs of living and accommodation in the capital would erode the students’ monthly allowance. There are also fewer social distractions away from the metropolis. Office manager Martire says Cardlane has developed tight relationships with some universities such as Aberdeen, Heriot-Watt and Robert Gordon in Scotland, as well as Leeds, Manchester, Salford, Essex, Newcastle and Ruskin. These universities often prepare special introductory programmes for the benefit of Angolan students. In the past, an important part of
All images by Cardlane
Sonangol education
Cardlane’s work was to look after as many as 300 Angolan Ministry of Petroleum (MINPET) scholarship students in the UK, the US and other European countries. It was a partnership between Sonangol/ Cardlane and the oil ministry. MINPET, however, has since developed its own support services for its students.
Happy anniversary Cardlane completed 20 years of activities in February 2013, but there were people dedicated to placing young Angolans on courses and giving support and advice for a few years previous to its establishment. Among them was JosĂŠ Carlos Paiva, the first director of Cardlane, who pioneered and supported the company all the time he was in Sonangol. The work of establishing Cardlane started in Sonangol Ltd when he was a director. Maria Ermelinda Kazmi oversaw the foundation of Cardlane. She was its first manager and the person who structured the company in its early days. Cardlane was founded out of the need to look after students sent overseas by Sonangol more efficiently as numbers started to grow. Medical doctor Maria Guilhermina
Dinamene Bernardo, Ondina Martins, Juber Lulendo graduates at University of Essex (they did courses related to finance, accounts, business)
Carvalho was another important pioneer of the present Cardlane set-up. Dr Carvalho was already resident in London in 1991 and was tasked with finding appropriate medical treatment for Angolans in the UK. When Sonangol needed help in finding courses for its students, they turned to her for help. She was instrumental in placing the first batch of around 30 Sonangolsponsored students to the universities of
Manchester and nearby Salford. The first students were mostly destined for management and engineering courses, but later the range widened to include more science, geology and other specialties related to the oil and gas industry. The number of colleges receiving Angolan students also increased to cover the whole of the UK from the north of Scotland to the south coast of England.
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Sonangol education
Cardlane staff Kwanza Norte-born Teresa Neves has been Cardlane’s director since 2011, having been with Sonangol for 14 years. A former scholarship student herself, she has a masters in HR management.
Brazil’s Verônica Martire joined Cardlane in 2005, first as an administrative assistant and now as office manager. With more than 20 years’ experience in education and administration, Martire, a history post-graduate, is currently pursuing an MBA. Dircilene Faria (Marcia), born in Benguela, has worked for the last seven years in the administration department. She has lived in the UK for more than two decades. She has a BA (Hons) in international business with Spanish and previously worked for HSBC. Administrative assistant Conceição João hails from Malange. A business studies with HR management graduate, she arrived in the UK in 1995 and joined the Cardlane team in 2010.
Cardlane’s in-house accountant, Indian-born Kiran Rajgor, joined the company in 2009. He has 17-years’ experience in his field and was previously finance manager at a pharmacy company.
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Dr Carvalho spent 11 years in this job and oversaw the foundation of Cardlane Ltd as a company dedicated to this task. “At first one was like Mother Courage,” she told Universo. (Indeed, her students called her that). “I had to deal with lots of young people far from home with many problems to sort out, such as the language and accommodation, and deciding on which families to place them with. It was a very gratifying experience and very positive for me.” Today, some of the students the company assisted in the early 1990s have achieved important positions: José de Lima Massano, the current governor of Angola’s national bank (BNA), and Sandra Júlio, Sonangol Ltd’s president and chief executive, were among the first to pass through the system that evolved into Cardlane. Other former Cardlane students include Baltazar Miguel, former director of the Luanda Refinery, now director of ISPTEC, Sonangol´s university; Manuela Coelho, human resources director of the Ministry of Oil (she has 70,000 oil workers under her responsibility); Pedro Fonseca, former Vice-Minister of Planning, and Leila Lopes, former Miss Universe.
and Oxford University’s prestigious pharmacology department. “My experience with Cardlane was excellent even though they weren’t very used to dealing with doctorate students. They were always very understanding,” he told Universo. Cruz already has a master’s degree in Medical Biochemistry from Lisbon University.
Future outlook Cardlane is currently in the process of moving to new offices at Indescon Court on Canary Wharf in East London from its existing office at Grosvenor Gardens in the West End. It is gearing up for the expected large growth in Sonangol recruitment over the next five years. In addition to relocating to new offices Cardlane is building its own website which will help reinforce its institutional image and credibility with local authorities. It will also provide information and news for students as well as publicise their successes. The future looks bright for both Cardlane’s and Sonangol’s ambitious expansion plans.p
Academic high-flyers Some other former Cardlane students have made extraordinary progress in academia abroad. Marcílio Santos is studying (2011-14) for a PhD in quantum physics and is president of the Sonangol Students Association. Santos aims to use quantum physics to design new types of precision sensors for geophysics, oil and gas non-intrusive explorations and pipeline inspections. He received his M.Eng in mechanical control at Aberdeen University (2006-11) Another PhD student, this time in neuroscience, is Armando Cruz, now studying in Portugal under the joint auspices of the Faculty of Medicine at Lisbon University
Mother Courage: Maria Guilhermina Carvalho with Evaristo Pascoal engineering graduate at University of Southampton and Heraclito Silva, IT post graduate at University of Southampton
Sonangol education
How Cardlane works Cardlane’s Brazilian-born office manager Verônica Martire explains how students are processed. “Sonangol sends us the name, copies of documents and an indication of what subjects the new student is going to take as an undergraduate; courses such as business, economics and chemical engineering. We then contact an English school and start the booking process going. “We have been working with around 30 English schools all over the country for several years. We choose the school for teaching quality but also for being closer to a centre where the student could proceed to a good university in his or her field of study. For example, if he or she is coming for electronics engineering, it is likely we would send them to Newcastle or Southampton where the universities excel in electronics. “The school processes the booking, sends us a certificate for the visa application, and then we forward all these details to Angola. The student will apply for the visa and once it is granted, he or she can come and start their studies. “After acquiring a good knowledge of English, they proceed to a Foundation course. They can either go to a college or university because some universities Adilson dos Santos, graduate at East China University of Science and Technology, Shanghai (oil and gas transportation storage)
are offering Foundation programmes nowadays. Depending on the age of the student and academic background, we prefer them to take their Foundation year in a smaller college where teaching will be done in a closer environment. “During Foundation they apply for universities via UCAS [the central clearing house for student applications]. At the end of the course, their results, together with their English language skills, as well as the grades they achieved in Angola, will determine whether they are accepted at whichever university they have applied to. The better the results, the more prestigious university they can go to. “We advise them all the way through as we keep up to date with the national ranking, the courses they intend to do, and the immigration and visa changes. But it is down to the hard work of the student to get to the university they prefer. There is no agreement between Sonangol and Cardlane with any university. “Exceptional students are often offered a masters or PhD programme during their time at the university, and then it is down to Sonangol EP to decide if they can pursue the post-graduate course or not.” Angolan student course completion rates are very high, Martire told Universo. “You can’t fail more than once. Very few drop out for illness or personal problems. If they fail to pass tests, then they will have problems with their visas.”
Marcilio dos Santos , PhD student at University of Aberdeen, quantum physics
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