Contribution to Improving Food, Security and Import Substitution

Food Security in Angola

Angola has the natural resources to become one of the leading agricultural countries in Africa, as its diverse and fertile ecology is suited to a variety of crops and livestock. However, the country currently only cultivates approximately 10 percent of its 35 million hectares of arable land.

The Angolan government and international entities are also heavily focused on fisheries development to advance the country’s economic diversification, to generate employment opportunities, and to expand food production capacity both for national consumption and for export. 

Population projections from the Government of Angola (GoA) and the United Nations (UN) indicate that the 2017 Angolan population of more than 26 million will increase to more than 65 million by 2050, and to 137 million by 2100.  Local demand for food will increase in line with population growth, impacting both pricing and purchasing trends.  With Angola’s abundant natural resources, the arable land could be utilised to produce enough crops to address the needs of the increasing local population.  This in turn will decrease import dependency and expenditure, and will secure the basic need for food security.  Further exports of agricultural products will also generate foreign exchange and increase the sector’s contribution to the GDP.

Angola currently imports more than half of its food, with some estimates putting the figure as high as 90 percent.  An estimated 90 percent of farms in Angola are small to medium in size and are used mainly for communal, subsistence farming.  Fisheries represented less than 1 percent of Angola’s GDP in 2014 with production of approximately 310,000 tons, according to African Development Bank (AfDB).  This increased to 529,310 in 2018.

ACP, through its Funds, invested in two companies that materially contributed to improving food security and import substitution in Angola. Fazenda Girassol which produces and distributes fresh vegetables and other agricultural products and African Selection Trust (AST), which is an integrated fishing operation harvesting pelagic fish and processing it through its freezing, canning and fishmeal factories.