Two-thirds of Angola’s population are invloved in agriculture

The Angolan agricultural sector has remained small-scale, held back by a lack of investment and infrastructure problems. But that is changing, now that the government has identified agriculture as a keystone of the new Angola, and export products like the country’s famous coffee is helping rebuild rural livelihoods. Could one of Africa’s poorest countries be poised to become an agricultural powerhouse?

Many of the problems that have plagued other African producers are non-issues in Angola. A population density of just over 33 persons per square mile is a major advantage over more crowded Kenya (153 persons/mile) or Uganda (308 persons/mile), and lessens the pressure on Angola’s farmland. Only eight to 14 percent of the country’s 142 million acres of arable land are under cultivation, but its fertile soil and diverse landscapes – grasslands, highlands, forests, and plains – offer the potential to grow a broad range of crops.

Agriculture makes up eight percent of Angola’s GDP, but fully two-thirds of the population depend on the sector for their livelihoods. Improving agricultural productivity and profitability is therefore key to raising living standards by creating direct and indirect employment across Angola. To boost rural livelihoods, the government is taking steps to relaunch the agricultural sector by implementing financial incentives for small producers. Already, innovative microcredit schemes launched by the state-owned BPC bank are helping cattle cooperatives in Cunene province and cassava growers in Luanda Norte, and BPC is rallying Angolan financial insitutions to expand microcredit to more areas.

The government’s support for agricultural development extends to larger efforts as well. In June, Agriculture and Rural Development Minister Afonso Pedro Canga announced the 2009-2013 Agriculture Development Programme, which will direct $400 million to projects in the agricultural sector. A further $270 million will be distributed in 2008 to help farming families buy agricultural implements. The 740,000-acre Capanda Agro-Industrial Center will include 62,000 acres of irrigated land, with the government leveraging its own $370 million investment to attract $700 million in private capital.

Angola was once the fourth largest producer of coffee in the world, and recent government and NGO initiatives aim to perk up exports. The Common Fund for Commodities has partnered with the Angolan government, the International Coffee Organization, and scientific publisher CAB International to help establish microcredit and distribute farmland to small producers. Under a three-year pilot project, abandoned coffee plantations are being subdivided into smaller plots, so that farm families can gain titles to land and build businesses from the ground up.

Minister Canga views increased coffee cultivation as a way of restoring a historical strength of Angolan agriculture. “Coffee production once played an important role in our economy, and thanks to coffee a great part of Angola was built", he says. Delivering on a government donation of five vehicles to help coffee growers in the northern towns to get their crops to market, and Minister Canga said that the obstacles faced by Angolan coffee cultivators – such as a dearth of markets, and greater profits from other crops – are now “part of the past.”