Howdoes Cabinda contribute to its own growth,

and the growth of the rest of the country?

In addition to oil, Cabinda has other min-erals, such as gold, phosphate and diamonds,that are still to be exploited. We have a lot ofwood and marine resources.

The resources that Cabinda generates arewithheld at the source to be used in recon-struction and public investment progams. Be-fore we had an annual budget of $72 million,and today we have a budget of $250 million.

High-profile public infrastructure projectsare being carried out at the airport, the port,in water, energy, education and health etc.We've even had the privilege of having thePresident of the Republic inaugurate some ofthese projects.

We're still investing a lot in housing pro-jects. We’ve just finished a neighborhood of100 houses that will be used by public work-ers, and we're now building another neigh-borhood of 250 houses, half of which are al-ready finished.

With all this we should see great progressin Cabinda, thanks to the support and or-

ganization of the central government. Ob-viously Cabinda plays an important role inthe development of other provinces. Thebounty that Cabinda has generated has beenimportant to the overall development of thecountry.

Cabinda's onshore oil reserves are nowmore ac-

cessible than they’ve been in the past. Given that,

would you say Cabinda can be Angola’s greatest

oil producer?

Yes. As you know, at this moment al-most 4% of the oil that the U.S. importsfrom the rest of the world comes fromCabinda. Until now exploration in theprovince was conducted offshore, but nowonshore exploration has revealed there'sgreat potential there.

Well-known companies have alreadycome to Cabinda and that will certainlyhave an impact on people's lives becauseit will create more employment. That'swhy we're going to create the housing con-ditions for locals and expatriots that cometo work in that activity.

What are you doing to spur agricultural produc-

tion?

In addition to working with the state,we're also cooperating with some non-gov-ernmental organizations, among them anAmerican one, in the organization of the agri-cultural sector. An interesting fact is that An-gola already has surpluses of some agricul-tural products.

Recently we've started using greenhousetechnology that will let us continue to producefood even during the rainy season, and now alarge part of the fruits and vegetables consumedin Cabinda are produced locally.

What are you doing to improve thewelfare of the

people in the region and help attract investment?

Cabinda has a functioning health care systemthat ensures people's safety. Right now we'reextending the health system to areas whereit has been weakest. We have a good healthsystem, and Cabinda stands out regarding thelow level of infant mortality – it's the lowestin the country.

We have a specific program against malar-

ia that goes beyond fight-ing local outbreaks to fu-migating households andstreets, which helps pro-tect people from the ill-ness.

I should add that theprovince has good quality schools, with no stu-dents outside the system, which means that wehave schools in every town.

What competitive advantages does the region

have?

The province is a 35 minute flight from Lu-anda, and is less than 400 kilometers from Lu-anda, Brazzavile and Gabon. One sign that in-vestments here are safe is the presence alreadyof many international oil companies.

We're going to build a deepwater port, aproject that has been ready to go for sometime, we were just waiting for the green lightto start it. Another project that will tie Cabin-da more closely to the rest of the country isfor a bridge on which construction will startat the end of this year.

Angola's province of Cabinda hasbegun a new era of political sta-bility and economic developmentfollowing the coming of peaceand the end of the local separatist

movement. Cabinda has long been one of An-gola's richest provinces, and for decades wasby far its biggest export earner, thanks to itsoil wealth.

Now Cabindans are living through a pe-riod of great advances in the province'seducation and health systems and are ben-efiting from the strong economic growththat has resulted from the end of thearmed conflict.

Peace returned to the province when theCabinda Forum for Dialogue, represent-ing the separatists, and the governmentsigned a pact on Aug. 1, 2006. That ac-cord has already improved the lives ofCabindans by permitting them to returnto their homes and farms and start theprocess of rebuilding the province.

“The government and the Cabinda Forumfor Dialogue signed the accords with the in-tention of ending the hostilities from whichthe province had been suffering,” said JoseAnibal Lopes Rocha, the governor of theprovince. “That event is what opened thedoor to the development that Cabinda is ex-periencing today.”

Under the terms of the pact, the gov-ernment and the guerrillas have ended hos-tilities, the guerrillas are being integratedinto the Angolan Armed Forces, and posi-tions in the national government have beenreserved for Cabindans.

As part of the effort to reintegrate mem-bers of the now defunct separatist move-ment, the former combatants and their fam-ilies will now be able to get themselves in-scribed on the national identification list, andreceive identification cards, free of charge.

The province's people are committed toforming an integral part of Angola's fu-ture. Voters turned out in large numbersto participate in the Sept. 5, 2008 elec-tion, which was judged by European Unionobservers to be “peaceful and orderly,” aswell as transparent, though organization-

al problems caused a few polling stationsto stay open for a second day to permit allvoters to cast their ballots.

The big winner in the elections was the gov-erning party, the MPLA, which won about 80%of the vote at the national level, with thebiggest opposition party, UNITA, gaining10%. In Cabinda, the result was a bit differ-ent, as the MPLA won 63% and Unita wassupported by 31%.

The big turnout shows that Cabinda is nowmore united than ever with the rest of An-gola. Of course that doesn't stop Cabindansfrom cheering on locals in nationwide com-petitions, and celebrating when they win.

Just this past November the province's rep-resentative came out on top in the Variante2008 popular music festival. Solange Nery, a20-year-old student, edged out the next clos-est competitor by one point, and was award-ed a diploma and a check for $10,000 by An-gola's Minister of Culture, Rosa Cruz e Silva.

Now that Cabinda and its residents enjoypolitical stability in the region, they can turn

their sights to improving their lives and theeconomy. Cabinda is already benefiting fromincreased government spending and greatereconomic expansion.

As part of the 2006 agreement, Cabindakeeps a percentage of the revenue from thesale of oil, and the regional government isdevoting that extra cash towards improvingthe lives of Cabindans through increasedspending on health, education and infra-structure.

“We all know that the Angolan people ingeneral, after the long period of war, findthemselves in terrible situations, in need ofurgent help, and for this reason the Forumand the government together are working tochange this situation,” said Bento Bembe,leader of the Cabinda Forum for Dialogue.

Another part of the spending has gone toincreasing the number of police in the province,which has led directly to lower crime rates.Cabinda has gone from having one police sta-tion to nine, plus another seven police postsspread throughout the area.

A project that will be funded with oil mon-ey is a 20-kilometer, $2.55 billion bridge androadway that will link the exclave of Cabin-da to the rest of Angola, crossing over theCongo river and parts of the Democratic Re-public of Congo upon completion in 2012.

With the improvement of the situation inCabinda, refugees are returning to their homes,and are now in need of employment, as arethe guerrillas that aren't being integrated in-to the armed forces. The regional governmentis helping in this area by funding efforts todiversify the economy, encouraging moreagricultural activity, building an industrialpark and promoting an increase in fishing andother productive activities.

“Our greatest wish is to see Cabinda as agreat destination for investment,” said Bem-be, who is also a minister without portfolioin the national government. “Peace is the es-sential factor to attract foreign investmentsthat help reduce unemployment. We're work-ing together with the government and theseconcerns are our priority.”

SPECIAL ADVERTISING SUPPLEMENT TO THE NEW YORK TIMES

INSIDER VIEW

THIS ADVERTISING SUPPLEMENT IS PRODUCED BY SUMMIT COMMUNICATIONS AND DID NOT INVOLVE THE REPORTING OR EDITORIAL STAFF OF THE NEW YORK TIMES

Location: A province of Angola,separated from the restof the country by theDemocratic Republic ofCongo and the Republicof Congo

Capital:Cabinda City

Population:Approximately 300,000

Agriculture products:Cassava, bananas, coffee

Industries:Oil extraction, oil refinery,construction materials,food produce, tobacco,timber and furniture

Area:3,020 square miles, orapproximately the samesize as Gambia

Petroleum production: 700,000 barrels per day

Ethnic groups:Cacongo, Ngoyo,Loango, Bakongo andKikongo

Bordering countries andoceans: Republic of Congo,Democratic Republic ofCongo, South AtlanticOcean

Municipalities:Belize, Buco Zau,Cabinda and Cacongo

Climate: Ecuatorial; tropical rainforest

Natural resources:Petroleum, diamonds,gold, magnesium,phosphates, uranium,gas, tropical wood,cocoa, palm oil, fish

Government type: ConstitutionalDemocracy

Currency: Angolan Kwanza

An online version is available at

www.summitreports.com

OUR TEAMProject management:

Alexis Fernández BarnesCristina SalgadoSergio Ramos

For further informationcontact:

Summit Communications 1040 First Avenue,

Suite 395, New York, NY 10022-2902

Tel: 1 (212) 286-0034, Fax: 1 (212) 286-8376,

E-mail:info@summitreports.com

Moving forward with the times

Interview with Jose Anibal Lopes Rocha, Governor of Cabinda

“We are extending the health system”

Some of the world’s largest oilfields lie off her shores, and for a very long time, Cabinda was synonymous with oil.

Now moving beyond this, the province is looking to use some of its other considerable advantages

CabindaInvesting in socialdevelopmentModern public works andtop-notch schools moveCabinda forward Page 04

West Africa’sgreen provinceNatural wonders abound,from wild vegetation to exoticanimal life Page 07

SUCCESSFUL EXAMPLEOF DIVERSIFICATION Page 03

Cabinda is heating up as West Africa’s premier destination for foreign investment.

Five years of development are also paying off as the Angolan province’s solid social

agenda is drawing new residents from all over the country. Now a new peace treaty

has put an end to political unrest, and a new statute has given local government a

green light to really think big. Angola’s green province is a region worth watching

Friday, February 20, 2009Jose AnibalLopesRocha,Governor of Cabinda

Theprovincialcapital,CabindaCity, is theepicenter oftheprovince’scommercialandindustrialactivity, andhome tomost of its280,000population

CABINDA nytsab pp1-4.qxd 06.02.2009 13:38 Página 1

SPECIAL ADVERTISING SUPPLEMENT TO THE NEW YORK TIMES Friday, February 20, 2009

Cabinda

2

Angola's and Cabinda's economies arebooming, thanks to increased revenue

from oil and the increased emphasis ingovernment spending on infrastructure de-velopment. The prosperity generated byall this activity is spreading to other partsof the economy, as more people find jobsand start to save money.

Angola's banks are getting more andmore involved in financing the country'sexpansion, according to a study pub-lished recently by consulting group KP-MG Angola. In 2007, Angolan bankschannelled 75% of deposits back intothe economy in the form of credits, an85% increase from the previous year,when just 43% of deposits were turnedinto credit.

According to the KPMG report, Ango-la's banking sector is experiencing a pe-riod of “exceptional growth, profitabili-ty and dynamism.” The rapid developmentof the financial industry is spurring theopening of new banks, which are at-tracted by the country's strong econom-ic growth and recent regulatory changes.

Cabinda is also benefiting from the in-creased interest on the part of banks inexpanding within the country. The num-ber of bank branches in the province re-cently increased to nine, including theBanco de Poupanca e Credito (BPC), Ban-co de Comercio e Industria (BCI), BancoAfricano de Investimentos (BAI), Bancode Fomento de Angola (BFA), Banco Tot-ta de Angola (BTA), Banco Internacionalde Credito (BIC), Banco Sol and BancoEspirito Santo Angola.

Several more banks currently have plansto open offices in the province, includ-ing Banco Millennium, Novo Banco andBanco Internacional de Negocios, whichwill introduce more competition and con-tribute to more savings and investmentin Cabinda.

Many of the banks in Angola are en-tirely owned by, or at least controlled by,financial groups from Portugal, the coun-try's former colonial overseer. Banco Mil-lennium is half-owned by Banco Comer-cial Portugues, Portugal's biggest publiclytraded bank. BFA is 100% owned by Ban-co BPI, and Banco Espirito Santo Ango-la is controlled by the Espirito Santo Fi-nancial Group.

Banco Totta de Angola is the Angolanunit of Banco Santander Totta, which isa formerly independent Portuguese bankthat is now controlled by Spain's BancoSantander, that country's biggest lender.

Angola's banks have risen to close tothe top of the rankings for African financialinstitutions, according to a recent reportby the BNET Business Network. Angolanbanks were three of the top 10 banks onthe BNET website's Top 25 African Banksranking, accompanied on the list by sev-en South African lenders.

BFA was the highest ranked, at numberseven, followed by BAI in the eighthposition, whileBPC came in atnumber 10. Allthese banks aregrowing rapid-ly as they ben-efit from An-gola's stronge c o n o m y ,BNET said inits report.

The banks are also

contributing to that growth, of course,as the deposit and credit figures from KP-MG demonstrate. Privately-owned banksaren't the only ones that are lending tobusiness. The Banco de Desenvolvimen-to de Angola, or BDA, is also very active.

The BDA was set up in 2006 by theAngolan government to “accelerate thebalanced and sustainable development

of Angola, byproviding for the creation

of employment and income, themodernization of social and economicstructures and the increase of competi-tiveness in the country.”

The BDA has been very active in Cabin-da, particularly in financing the expan-sion of businesses that make construc-tion supplies. Demand for such suppliesis strong because of the boom in con-struction, and shortages are slowing someprojects down.

One company, called So Cargas, bor-rowed 22.3 million kwanzas ($296,000)to buy new equipment, including twonew saws, to help increase production.The owner, Luis Gomes Sambo, is con-fident he'll be able to repay the loan be-cause of the low interest rates and highdemand for his company's products.

“The market is lucrative, and with thisnew equipment I'm going to in-crease sales, not just here but al-so in Luanda, where I've just got-ten some new orders,” Sambosaid.

Another beneficiary of creditfrom the BDA is a brick-makingcompany called EMPEBAT-Em-presa Exploradora de Burgau,

Areia e Terra. EMPEBAT borrowed $2 mil-lion to buy equipment to increase out-put and help supply materials for theconstruction of new housing in theprovince.

Between the growth in financing byprivate banks and the funding of pro-jects by the BDA and other lenders, An-gola's banks are becoming increasinglyimportant contributors to economic ex-pansion.

Angola's government has played a keypart in the growth of both the bankingsector and the economy itself. By pur-suing macroeconomic stability and re-forming the country's banking regula-tions, the government has created theconditions necessary for the expansionto begin and to continue, all of whichis benefiting regular Angolans.

The U.S. has long had commercialrelations with Angola, based ini-tially on interest in the Africancountry's abundant oil and gasresources, but more recently on

the desire to help spread peace and devel-opment across the continent.

American oil companies began their op-erations in Angola while it was still a Por-tuguese colony, and that involvement con-tinued after independence in 1975 and dur-ing the civil conflict that wracked the coun-try in the following decades.

Peace agreements signed in 2002 and 2006brought stability to the entire country, andopened the way for groups including theUnited States Agency for International De-velopment, or USAID, to come and help withthe task of rebuilding Cabinda and the restof Angola.

The 2006 Memorandum of Understand-ing signed by the Cabindan separatist forcesand Angola's central government finallybrought an end to the conflict in the province,an advance the U.S. strongly supported, call-ing it a “significant step” towards peace.

“For the people of Cabinda, this Memo-randum of Understanding is more than justa document on peace and reconciliation,”the White House said in a statement releasedat the time of the signing. “It is the promiseof economic development and increased po-litical influence.”

The U.S. has since then been actively con-tributing to development in Cabinda. USAIDjust agreed to continue funding a non-gov-ernmental organization called Search forCommon Ground that is helping to reduceconflict in the province while also improv-ing infrastructure.

USAID agreed to increase its funding ofthe group to $600,000 over the next twoyears, from $490,000 in the previous twoyears, after judging that the NGO had man-aged the original funds satisfactorily.

Search for Common Ground holds semi-nars and other meetings intended to helppeople find peaceful ways to resolve con-flicts, and has also participated in fundingthe construction of a 25,000-liter water tankin the Cabindan village of Man-darin, and in improving localroads.

“This agreement we're signingtoday to support Search for Com-mon Ground's program is also anopportunity to commemorate ourmutual commitment for the de-velopment of Cabinda,” said Su-san Brems, Director of USAID, during thesigning.

USAID is also working with other groups,including Chevron and its partners in theBlock Zero oil field, to help improve the livesof Cabindans. The oil companies recentlyagreed to contribute $3 million, and USAID$1 million, to a project to promote com-mercial agriculture. The money will be usedto train farmers to improve productivity andquality, and to help set up warehousing and

distribution infrastructure. The program isexpected to create 5,000 new jobs spreadacross 1,000 farms. The goal is for at leastsome of the extra food produced to be soldto Chevron's Malongo oil terminal, locatedonshore in Cabinda.

“Chevron is determined to increase its pur-chase of supplies from Angolancompanies as much as possible,”said Alan Kleier, general director ofChevron's unit in Angola. “Com-panies here have benefited in thatway.”

USAID and several partners alsoparticipate in the Municipal De-velopment Program, which is in-

tended to promote participation in govern-ment and to make local governments moreefficient as they work to meet citizens' needs.

The program operates in several Angolanprovinces, and was first launched in thecountry in the province of Cabinda, withfunding of more than $8 million to improvelocal administrators' ability to plan, budget,implement and oversee local developmentprograms.

An interesting project started in 2006, and

funded by Chevron through the CabindaAgribusiness Development Alliance (CADA),is helping to start up a local honey-pro-ducing industry. As part of the program, CA-DA has brought in experts to train bee keep-ers and teach them how to build and main-tain hives.

All of these efforts to help Angola are partof the U.S.'s desire to improve relations withthis key African country. During the admin-istration of George W. Bush, the U.S. workedconsistently toward that goal, and it willcontinue to do now that President BarackObama has been inaugurated, according toU.S. Ambassador Dan Mozena.

Angola, and in particular, Cabinda, arethe site of some of the biggest investmentsin oil made by U.S. companies abroad, andthe new administration will want to work toexpand investments into other economicsectors, the ambassador explained.

Angola can also play a larger role in therest of Africa, Mozena said. It has one ofthe continent's biggest and most profes-sional armies, and so has the ability to playan important part in peacekeeping tasks invarious conflicts.

Cabinda’s special statute means more autonomy for the provincial government and, with the assistance of USAID and donorship from major oil

companies, the province is beginning to implement a range of social and infrastructural programs to improve daily life for its citizens

USAID has worked with several partners and donated funds to improve the lives of Cabindansthrough various projects, such as investing in agriculture

Peace has paved the way for astepped up U.S. presence inCabinda, spurring development

Understanding and reintegration openingpath to peaceful future

Cabinda recently celebrated the second anniversary of the agree-ment that brought peace to the province, after decades of

armed conflict between Angola's central government and sep-aratists fighting for independence.

The Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) signed on Au-gust 1, 2006 by the government and the group representingthe separatists, the Cabinda Forum for Dialogue, marked thebeginning of a new era for the province, in which its consider-able mineral wealth can now be used to improve the lives ofthe region's people. The Chief of Staff of the Angolan ArmedForces said in October that the province is now enjoying a calmand stable environment, another positive sign for Cabinda as itmoves forward.

“This is an irreversible process that removes all negative fac-tors from the past, to build a nation united in the values ofdemocracy, social justice and respect for human rights,” said Al-dina Matilde da Lomba, the director of the provincial agency incharge of helping reintegrate the former separatist fighters in-to the province's civil society.

That reintegration was one of the main promises made bythe central government to theForum, along with promisingCabinda certain special rightsand guaranteeing Cabindanspositions in the president'scabinet.

To date the central govern-ment has been diligent aboutfulfilling its responsibilities un-der the MOU, according to An-tonio Bento Bembe, the headof the Forum. Bembe recentlypraised President Jose Eduar-do dos Santos for the close at-tention he has paid to the rec-onciliation process.

“Those of us involved inthe process have always believed that the government wouldhonor its commitments with the FDC,” said Bembe. “The gov-ernment would never abandon this important process ofpacifying Cabinda.”

The central government has already budgeted funds to car-ry out two of the most important tasks remaining, said Bem-be, which are helping fighters from the Front for the Liberationof the Exclave of Cabinda as they return to civilian life, andhelping refugees still in nearby countries return to the province.

Angola held national elections on September 5 of last year,which were won by president dos Santos's MPLA party, bothat the national level and in Cabinda. The election was judgedto be free and fair, and marked another step along Angola'spath towards development, as well as Cabinda's integrationinto the country.

“Political parties have been able to carry out their activi-ties without any impediment or irregularity,” said AnibalLopes Rocha, governor of the province of Cabinda and a mem-ber of the MPLA. “As you can see we have strong indica-tions that democracy is now a fact in our country.”

Province receives benefits of the banking boom

The central government is committed to the peace process, andto integrating Cabinda more fully into the Angolan economy

Cabinda is thesite of some ofthe biggestinvestments in oilmade by U.S.companiesabroad

Elections were held onSeptember 5th, 2008. Thecountry’s ruling MPLA partywon both nationally and in theprovince of Cabinda

Angola’s banks have risen to close to the top of the rankings for African financialinstitutions, according to a recent report by the BNET Business Network

CABINDA nytsab pp1-4.qxd 04.02.2009 12:22 Página 2

The burning flares that used to be visible atop manyoil wells, and can still be seen in some areas, are

fueled by natural gas, as oil producers dispose of anunwanted by-product in the cheapest way possible.About 150 billion cubic meters of natural gas areburned in this way every year, equal to one-quarter ofall the gas used in the U.S. annually.

Many countries now ban the practice, which spewstons of pollutants into the atmosphere every day andis wasteful. Natural gas hasalso become a valuablecommodity and source ofenergy, encouraging oilcompanies around theworld to capture the gasfor sale.

Chevron and its partnersin Cabinda's Block Zero oilproduction field, Sonangol,Eni SpA and Total SA, re-cently inaugurated theTakula Gas Processing Plant(TGPP) to eliminate theneed to burn off the gas andto permit it to be processed,stored and transported sothat it can either be sold orused to generate electrici-ty in Angola.

The Takula field, located in Area A of Block Zero,has been one of Angola's most productive areas. It wasdiscovered in 1971, production started there in 1982,and it is expected to keep producing until after theyear 2025.

“TGPP represents a major accomplishment for theArea A project as it will provide additional compres-sion and gas sweetening in Block Zero,” said ChevronProject Manager Bob King, referring to his company'slocal long-term Area A Gas Management Program, orAAGM.

The AAGM consists of three parts, including theTGPP, the Cabinda Gas Plant and the Flare and ReliefModification project, which together will eliminate theroutine burning of natural gas in the area by permit-ting the fuel to be collected and processed. The AAGMis expected to be completed this year.

The TGPP can process approximately 100 million stan-dard cubic feet per day of gas, which will be delivered

to the new gas facility onshore in Cabinda. Chevronand partners are also building a natural gas liquefac-tion plant in a province near Cabinda that will permitthe export of the gas.

The liquefied natural gas plant was announced in2007, and construction has begun. It is forecast to processabout 1 billion cubic feet of natural gas a day and toproduce about 5.2 million metric tons a year of LNGand related products.

The TGPP, locatedoffshore in the Takulafield, stands in waterthat is about 186 feetdeep. The supportstructure was built lo-cally, in Lobito in An-gola's nearby Benguelaprovince, while the pro-cessing plant was builtin South Korea by Sam-sung Heavy Industriesand then transportedto the site.

The giant, four-sto-ry facility will allowChevron to meet An-golan environmentalregulations that requirethe reduction of pollu-

tion, and will also help contribute to the economic de-velopment of the country by providing another ener-gy source, as well as export revenue.

“This project will provide more strength for the coun-try's economy,” said Feliciano Toco, Vice-Governor ofCabinda, while speaking at the inauguration ceremo-ny. “It will provide resources for various social programsalready underway.”

Chevron and its partners in Angola are already a ma-jor funder of such programs in Cabinda and the restof the country, placing a particular emphasis on com-bating illiteracy and improving health care.

Sonangol and the Angolan government have beenworking to reduce the burning of natural gas at oilwells throughout the country, with the goal of cuttingpollution and increasing revenue. Angola's boomingeconomy also requires more energy, and the gas canalso be used to produce electricity for homes, busi-nesses and manufacturers.

SPECIAL ADVERTISING SUPPLEMENT TO THE NEW YORK TIMESFriday, February 20, 2009

Cabinda

3CH

ARTS

OIL

& G

AS

Angola is the third-biggest oil pro-ducer in Africa, after Nigeria andLibya. With national productionrising to about 2 million barrelsper day this year, Cabinda has long

been the most important region for the coun-try's petroleum industry.

Since the end of the civil war in 2002, thegovernment has been able to devote moreof the revenue from the oil industry towardhelping its citizens. Cabinda's local govern-ment keeps 10% of the income from localproduction for its own projects, which includeprograms to improve the health and educa-tion of the province's population.

Currently the bulk of the region's oil pro-duction comes from offshore platforms, inthe areas known as Block Zero and Block 14.Block Zero is one of the country's most pro-ductive areas, pumping about 370,000 bar-rels per day in 2007.

Production from Block 14 is scheduled toincrease in the next few years. While dailyproduction levels at the Kuito field is declin-ing, output from the Benguela, Belize, Lo-bito, Tomboco project (BBLT) was expectedto peak last year and the Tombua Landanaproject will come on stream this year, addingabout 130,00 barrels per day by 2010.

Tombua Landana is an ambitious projectwhich includes the construction of one of thetallest structures on the planet. At 474 me-ters (1,554 feet), most of that submerged, thedeepwater drilling rig is taller than the SearsBuilding in Chicago and dwarfs the EiffelTower.

The Angolan unit of Chevron Corp. of theU.S. operates the Tombua Landana projectand has a 31% stake. Other partners in theproject include Sonangol, the Angolan na-tional oil company, and ENI SpA of Italy,both with 20% stakes.

Total investment in the project will bemore than $3 billion, which will includemore than $250 million of local contentspending. The project maximizes the useof Angolan engineering, procurement,

construction and installation capabilities. Chevron Corp.'s local unit, Cabinda Gulf

Oil Company, or CABGOC, is one of the biggestplayers in the Cabindan oil industry. It has a31% share in Block 14 production and a 39%stake in Block Zero.

Much of the oil produced in Cabinda is ex-ported through Chevron's Malongo terminal,a largely self-sufficient encampment on thecoast whose loading terminal can accom-modate Very Large Crude Carriers (VLCCs). TheVLCCs can hold as much as 950,000 barrelsof crude oil.

Chevron is in fact one of the biggestoil producers in Angola, with a total dai-ly production of 171,000 barrels of oil.It's the country's biggest foreign oil in-dustry employer, with about 2,700 An-golans on the staff, or about 87% of thelocal company's total workforce. Angolansmake up 75% of Chevron's professional

and supervisory staff in the country. Chevron is helping the community in Cabin-

da and the rest of Angola in many ways, notjust by providing thousands of well paid jobs,but also by helping reduce poverty and spurringeconomic growth in other ways as well.

The Angola Partnership initiative, a coop-erative effort launched in 2002 to promotepeace and stability, and improve the coun-try's education and health care infrastructure,set up a micro lending bank called NovoBan-co, in 2004.

Since opening, NovoBanco has made morethan $27 million of loans to more than 5,000micro and small enterprises. Another part ofthe initiative has provided seeds, tools andfood to approximately two million peoplespread across six provinces.

Chevron expects to invest an addition-al $2.5 million each year through 2012 inprograms that are intended to help make

local governments more efficient by im-proving their organizational and adminis-trative skills, and to further reduce pover-ty by encouraging the growth of small andmedium-sized businesses.

As part of its investment in Cabinda,Chevron is spending $2 million to helpfund the construction of a maritime wa-ter testing facility. The local governmentand the Fishing Ministry are also con-tributing to the project, which will carryout biological, chemical and heavy metaltesting of the sea water in the region.

For decades, most of the oil producedin Cabinda came from offshore wells be-cause of security concerns arising from thecivil strife and turmoil that had prevent-ed investors from seeking more wells in on-shore areas.

Now that peace has come to Angola,more is being spent to identify promisingareas and to develop any interesting dis-coveries. One field, called Massambala-1,was estimated last year to contain 170million barrels of oil, more than five timesthe amount originally estimated.

The Cabinda South block includes the Mas-sambala field and others, including Coco,Milho, Cevada and Soja, which mean co-conut, corn, barley and soy in Portuguese.The entire block is located within 50 kilometers(31 miles) of the Malongo terminal, whichwill make it easier to export its oil once pro-duction starts.

Roc Oil of Australia, with a 60% stake inthe Cabinda South block where Massambala-1 is located, has already begun explorationin other areas of the province. Sonangol owns20% of the block, and Force Petroleum Ltd.owns the remaining 20%.

Cabinda's people stand to gain from theincrease in onshore exploration, as well as fromthe production offshore, as programs to hiremore workers from the region benefit theprovince's economy, and as the decline of civ-il strife permits expatriate workers to mixwith the locals and further add to growth.

Economy

Outside investment rolls intoCabinda as scale of production risesMassive output and the coming on-line of new fields have propelled Angola, and Cabinda, to the forefront of African oil

production. With 10 percent of revenues being pumped back into social development programs, the province is a winner

In 1997 and 2001, oil-indutry scientists made a re-markable discovery. Under the seas off the Angolan

province of Cabinda, they found the Tombua and Lan-dana oil and gas fields, which hold over 1 billion bar-rels of crude oil. Perparing to draw from these deep un-dersea fields has been an enormous undertaking anda major engineering effort. Petroleum giant Chevronhas linked up with global partners to meet the techni-cal challenges, and is training a workforce of Angolannationals to apply world-class skills to the project.

These oil and gas de-posits, which rank amongthe world’s richest, willbe tapped with one ofthe largest man-madestructures in the world.The Tombua LandanaCompliant Piled Tower– a massive lattice ofsteel, anchored to theseabed and topped witha drilling and productionplatform that extendsout above the ocean sur-face – will pump up to100,000 barrels of crudeoil per day. Even amongthe giant towers andplatforms that alreadydot the world’s oceans,the Tombua Landanastructure is impressive.On land, the tower would stand 1,554 feet tall – over500 feet taller than the Eiffel Tower, and almost 100feet taller than the Empire State Building.

The tower, only the fourth of its type yet built, willserve as a hub for extracting undersea oil and gas. Atthe surface, the platform will house control rooms tomanage drilling, processing and storage, while on theseafloor, networks of pipes and conduits will extendfrom the tower’s base. Some pipes will carry the oil andgas out from the deposits underneath the seabed, whileothers will be used to inject water into the subterraneanreservoirs. Injecting water into the deposits will increasetheir pressure, allowing the wells to extract the mostoil possible from the reservoirs and helping to push thethick crude oil up to the platform above the sea.

Injection can consume millions of gallons of water,so practices that help maintain water quality are an im-portant part of the overall environmental commitmentmade by the Tombua Landana partners. Most waterused for injection will be “produced water”, foundmixed in naturally with – and contaminated by – theundersea oil and gas. The Tombua Landana project willrecycle its produced water, injecting it back into theunderground reservoirs, helping to reduce discharges

of contaminated water in-to the surrounding ocean.

The facilities are alsodesigned to help protectair quality by avoiding“flaring”, the practice ofburning off the excessnatural gas that is pro-duced while extracting oil.Instead of wastefully re-leasing its millions ofpounds of CO2 into theatmosphere, the gas willbe processed and storedin empty undergroundreservoirs. Later on, whenthe natural-gas compo-nent of Tombua Landanais fully operational, thegas can be tapped andsold – a win-win solutionfor the atmosphere as wellas the project’s bottomline.

Tombua Landana isn’t just an effort to devel-op natural resources. It’s about cultivating humanresources as well. The established Angolan pe-troleum industry training center in Malongo is run-ning at capacity to supply qualified workers forthe oil and gas sector. To relieve the pressure onthe Malongo facility, Chevron is sending some An-golan trainees to its deepwater training center inLafayette, Louisiana, where they will acquire thespecialized skills that are used on deepwater rigsin the Gulf of Mexico. Other Angolans are visit-ing and working on Gulf of Mexico deepwater plat-forms, gaining firsthand experience abroad andbuilding the skills needed on Tombua Landanaback at home.

Getting Angola’s offshore petro-leum resources out of the

seabed is hard enough, but ex-porting the crude oil and liquefiedpetroleum gas is an even tougherjob. Safely docking huge tankerships at floating storage platformsand onshore terminals, loading them,and sending them on their way isthe work of skilled seamen calledmooring and loading masters. Ittakes roughly ten years of work ex-perience and training to become amooring or loading master, and fewAngolans have had the chance tobecome certified.

That’s why Chevron is aiding the“Angolanization” of the country’soil and gas industry by training An-golans to work on their tankers andloading platforms. Under the pro-gram, Angolan nationals are giventhe work placements and advancedtraining to meet the internationallyrecognized “Standards of Training,Competence and Watchkeeping” cri-teria. With their STCW credentials,these Angolans will be able to standproudly among the world’s mostqualified oil-industry professionals.

The three-phase training effortstarts with recruiting Angolans whoalready have some shipping indus-try experience to work as loadingmasters. As an assistant to the moor-ing master, the loading masters learnthe position by working on seago-ing tankers and studying at a mar-itime academy to gain their STCWqualification.

The next phase of the programgives Angolans the chance to acquirethe experience to become loadingmasters. These cadets gain their sealegs by serving on oil tankers andtraining vessels, and can also studyfor the STCW certificate. At the CapePeninsular University of Technolo-gy in Cape Town, they can take theexamination to get a South Africanmaritime license. Some of thesecadets have already been hired tosupport the program and operateoffshore loading platforms.

A totem of innovative extraction

TrainingAngolanmasters

Cabinda’s Tombua and Landana deposits hold over abillion barrels of oil, and will be tapped using some of thelargest man-made structures in the world

Taking on the burning issue

Natural gas has become an important commodity, socapturing rather than releasing it is a priority

Angola’s oil wealth is being redistributed through government health and education grants

PH

OT

O:C

HE

VR

ON

Top African Oil Production by Country, 2007

Nigeria

Libya

Angola

Algeria

Egypt

Sudan

Equatorial Guinea

Gabon

2,120

1,700

1,680

1,370

660

470

420

240

0 500 1,000 1,500 2,000 2,500

Thousand Barrels per Day

Source: EIA Short Term Energy - Outlook March 2008

Angola’s Oil Production and Consumption, 1997-2007

1,8001,6001,4001,2001,000

800600400200

01997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007

Year

Source: EIA International Energy Annual. Short-Term Energy Outlook

TotalProduction

CrudeProduction

Consumption

Net Exports

Top sub-Saharan Africa* Proven Natural Gas Reserve Holders, 2008

AngolaCameroon

MozambiqueCongo (Brazz)

SudanNamibiaRwanda

Equatorial GuineaMauritania

Cote d’IvoireGabon

0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

Trillion Cubic Feet

Source: Oil and Gas Journal

*Excluding Nigeria (183,9 Tcf) to maintain scale

CABINDA nytsab pp1-4.qxd 04.02.2009 12:23 Página 3

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Turkey

Modern, well-functioning transportationinfrastructure is vital to any economy.

It speeds the movement of people and prod-ucts from one place to another, reduces costsfor companies and individuals alike, and opensup new areas where businesses can expandand create more wealth and employment.

Angola’s central government and Cabin-da’s provincial government are both wellaware of this, and have been investing heav-ily for years to improve all the different facetsof the country’s transportation systems.

Cabinda’s seaport has been one of thebiggest beneficiaries of the increase in spend-ing. Since new management took over theport in 2004, there has been a concentratedeffort to renovate and modern-ize its equipment to make itcheaper and more competitivewith other ports and forms oftransportation.

The new management, led byDirector General Osvaldo Lobodo Nascimento, didn’t just reno-vate the facility’s physical side,though. The port’s operators also worked toimprove its administration, legal set-up, andits marketing and other efforts to gain morebusiness.

“The challenge was large, and there weremany sticking points, because there weremany problems and deficiencies that were builtinto the company,” said do Nascimento.“Therefore, it was necessary to define prior-ities.”

Do Nascimento and his staffed identifiedthree initial priorities. The first was to changethe attitude of the port’s employees, includ-ing bosses, regarding their work. The secondwas to promote the port, to make it better

known within Angola and in the rest of theworld. The final priority was to transform theport and help it attract new business by im-proving quality, cutting costs, reducing tran-sit times and increasing security.

The port’s equipment and physical state,including its container-moving cranes and itspier, were deteriorated and needed much ren-ovation to bring them up to modern stan-dards. That work is well advanced, and shouldbe finished within the next two years.

The pier, when finished, will have capaci-ty to handle five 12,000-ton ships at thesame time. Five new cranes have been pur-chased that can stack containers higher thanpreviously possible at the port, which will in-

stantly increase storage capacity,while also allowing faster and nim-bler movement of containers.

“Each of these machines hasthe capacity to pile up five con-tainers, pile up three rows of con-tainers, and pull a 31-ton con-tainer out of the third line,” saidport operations head Artur Fer-

nandes Carvalho. The port already has four workers who

know how to operate the new loading cranes,which have been named after former work-ers at the port who have contributed out-standing work, and a training program willincrease the number of operators.

Big improvements are also being carriedout on the port’s physical layout. A bigger,deeper maneuvering basin is being dredged,which will be nine meters deep. That, com-bined with a new navigation canal that is eightmeters deep, will permit bigger ships to usethe port, and speed their entry and exit.

The port’s cargo holding area is being en-

larged, which will further increase its storagecapacity. Cement silos and flour silos are be-ing built in the holding area to add to thetype of products that can be efficiently movedthrough the facility.

The holding area and piers will also ben-efit from the construction of a new electricnetwork that will provide power to the wholearea, and the addition of an Intranet com-munications network, all of which will fur-ther increase productivity and efficiency.

A properly functioning port requires morethan just modern equipment, of course. Ef-ficient administration is also necessary, anddo Nascimento and his team haven’t ignored

that area. They’ve hired new people, increasedworker training, and changed the port’s le-gal structure as part of their strategic plan.They’ve also developed a marketing plan in-tended to attract more business from areasnear Cabinda.

“We will continue to work not just tomaintain operations at the level of pro-ductivity that we have already reached,but to unceasingly try to win businessfrom nearby areas that we don’t current-ly service, for instance from the petrole-um sector in the north of Angola and theGulf of Guinea,” said do Nascimento.

Along with the management training pro-

gram, the port is actively working to improvethe education of all its workers. It recentlyannounced a plan to eliminate illiteracy amongthem, and has started training instructors toteach the employees that need such help toread.

The classes for instructors, and later for stu-dents, will take place in facilities provided bythe port. Nine port employees who alreadyhave a high level of education will take theinstructor training, and then when they’vecompleted the course will use their new knowl-edge to help their co-workers.

The improvements carried out to date bythe port’s management are already boostingrevenue and port movements. The facilityearned $1.75 million in the first half, 60% ofwhich is kept by the port, while the rest goesinto the state’s coffers.

Improvements to efficiency and produc-tivity helped boost cargo movement, whichincreased 70% in the first quarter of 2008from the same period a year earlier. The portmoved 189,059 tons of cargo in the quarter,compared with 108,080 a year earlier, andmoved 8171 containers, up from 6,921 in thefirst quarter of 2007.

The revenue figure and the movementfigure should both increase in coming years,as the port finishes up its ambitious im-provement plan. With new equipment, abigger pier, the enlargements of the ma-neuvering basin, navigation channel, andcargo holding areas, the port will becomemore competitive and be able to gain newbusiness, while at the same time providingmore jobs, permitting the entry and exit ofmore merchandise, and spurring econom-ic growth in other ways that will help im-prove the lives of ordinary Cabindans.

Over the next few years thepeople of Cabinda will enjoya huge improvement in manydifferent parts of theprovince's infrastructure as

the government invests more and moreon roads, new buses and a new ferry, andon water and sanitation.

The objective is to give residents of theregion a higher quality of life by givingthem easier access to clean water, im-proving their health through the con-struction and renovation of sewage sys-tems and helping people and businessesgo about their daily lives by reducingtransport and telecommunications timesand costs.

The province is already about halfwaythrough a $190 million project to improve272 kilometers (170 miles) of roads con-necting the provincial capital of Cabin-da City to other parts of the exclave andto the frontier with the Democratic Re-public of Congo (DRC).

The provincial government is import-ing 152 new buses to take advantage ofthe new roads and improve connectionsbetween Cabinda City and other parts ofthe area. More than 30 of the buses arealready on their way to Cabinda and therest will be delivered by the end of theyear.

Another road project will link Cabin-da, which is cut off from the rest of An-gola by the DRC, with the rest of thecountry via a 20-km connecting roadthat will include a bridge over the Zaireriver. The road will cost an estimated$2.55 billion and is scheduled to be fin-ished by October, 2012 and connect theprovince to the town of Soyo, in Ango-la's Zaire province.

Transport to Soyo and the nationalcapital of Luanda will improve long be-fore the bridge is finished, however. A new,faster ferry will begin operation by theend of the year, cutting travel times fromCabinda to Soyo to one hour from three,and to Luanda from 15 hours to six. Thenew ship will carry almost four times asmany people as can fit on the ferry cur-rently making the trip.

Cabinda already has a new airport,which has been operating for a year. Thefacility has a 2.5 km airport that can ac-commodate planes of all sizes, and nowhandles more than 100 takeoff/landingoperations a day.

The airport already provides 60 directand 270 indirect jobs, and will providemore as it grows. Future improvementsto the airport include an illuminationproject that will permit nighttime oper-ations and a new cargo facility.

The port of Cabinda is next in line forimprovements. A $100 million expansionplan includes a nine-meter-deep ma-neuvering basin and an 80-meter accesschannel that will allow ships carrying over1,000 tons of cargo to use the port. Thenew facilities will permit use of the portto increase more quickly and provide newemployment opportunities. Communica-tions between Cabinda and the rest of An-gola have long been a problem for theregion, which is located about 200 kmfrom the capital. The national governmentis working to resolve those difficulties byinstalling a new system of satellite com-munications that will link together thewidespread regions of the country and per-mit faster transmission of voice, internet,data, television and radio.

Cabinda

4

Rebuilding in a time of peace

Boosting the economythrough improvedinfrastructure

Construction of bridges and roads are top priorities for the Cabindan government, and will help boost regional trade flows

The new ferry will bringCabindans closer to Angola

Infrastructure development, educational programs and social welfare projects are bringing a greater quality of life to Cabindans. The previously

war-torn province is well on the way to eradicating the memory of conflict and to delivering a future with prospects to its inhabitants

Cabinda’s distance to the rest of Angola is becoming less andless of a problem through the many efforts by the provincialand national governments to upgrade transportation links be-tween the enclave and the other parts of the country, in-cluding improvements at the airport, the seaport, and thepurchase of a bigger, and faster ferry.

The most audacious, and by far the most expensive, pro-ject to bring Cabinda closer to Angola is for a $2.55 billionbridge and roadway to link the two areas by land. The bridgeover the Zaire river will be about 20 kilometers (12 miles)long, and a stretch of highway will complete the connection.

The bridge “will bring benefits to development, not justfor the province of Cabinda, but also for the region of Soyoand the DRC,” said Jose Anibal Rocha, governor of the province.“Cabinda will be more integrated with the rest of the coun-try.”

Angolan and Cabindan officials have held meetings withtheir counterparts from the Democratic Republic of Congo,which separates the two parts of Angola, to decide on thebest route and the best combination of bridge/causeway/road-way to benefit the residents of the area on both countries.

Once a final decision on the project’s parameters is made,a Chinese construction company, the China Road and BridgeCorporation, will start the process of building the roadway,which is planned to be finished by 2012.

$2.55 billionbridge to openthe road toLuanda

Cabinda's government has been working to improve the province’seconomy by focusing on improving its transport infrastructure.The recently renovated international airport is an excellent ex-ample of how those efforts are already having a positive effecton people and businesses.

The renovations were completed in 2007, leaving Cabindawith Angola’s second biggest aiport, with a runway 2,500 me-ters long and capable of handling planes as large as a Boeing737.

The airport’s waiting room has been enlarged to handle upto 300 passengers at peak hours, and baggage handling equip-ment has been modernized as well, helping make passengers’transit through the facility faster and more comfortable.

New equipment has been installed in the control tower andin security areas, making travelling from the airport safer. Of-ficials from the International Civil Aviation Organization agree.They recently inspected the airport, and gave a positive opin-ion of the improvements.

The airport is a big employer in Cabinda, providing 60 di-rect jobs and about 270 indirect positions. There are alreadyplans afoot for more enlargements and improvements, whichwould mean even more work for Cabindans.

The next steps for the airport include lengthening and widen-ing the runway, so it can accommodate even larger aircraft, andby facilitating nighttime take-offs and landings.

ICAO givesthumbs up toairportimprovement

Cabinda has long faced diffi-culties because of its dis-

tance from the rest of Angola.The country’s central govern-ment is contributing to the ef-forts to improve transportationbetween Cabinda and otherparts of Angola by buying anew ferry boat called the Ebo,which began operating at theend of 2008.

The new ship’s turbine en-gines give it a maximum speedof 42 knots, which will permitit to make the trip betweenCabinda City and Soyo, in An-gola’s Zaire province in onehour, instead of the three hoursthat the current ship on thatroute takes. Zaire province isthe closest part of Angola toCabinda. The travel time be-tween Cabinda and the nation-al capital of Luanda will be re-duced to six hours, from 15now.

The Ebo is a much largership than the Lueji, which isthe ferry on the route now. TheEbo is 47 meters long and 13meters wide. It can carry 370people and cargo. The Luejionly has capacity to carry 96people.

“The Ebo is a modern, high-speed ship,” said Joao PedroPaxe, captain of the new ship.“Our population is used to car-rying merchandise with themwhen they travel, and it’s al-ways easier to take more kiloson a ship than on a plane. Sowhen the Ebo starts operating,it will more than meet thoseneeds.”

The Ebo will have two class-es for travelers, Economic andExecutive. The trip betweenCabinda City and Soyo will cost2,000 kwanzas in EconomicClass, and 3,000 kwanzas inExecutive Class. The trip to Lu-anda will cost 4,500 kwanzas($60) in Economic and 6,000kwanzas in Executive. The shipwas bought in Italy by Angola’sMinistry of Transport, and thepurchase price includes a main-tenance contract.

Ebo to cutferryjourney time

Port of Cabinda grows in capacity, demand and regional significance

Upgrades at the Port of Cabinda have increased cargo movement by 70 percent

Quality andefficiency are onthe rise as thePort of Cabindaworks tomodernize itsservices

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Cabinda

5

Timber is Cabinda's sec-ond biggest industry

after oil, and after years ofneglect because of the civ-il turmoil that punished theprovince until just a fewyears ago, the governmentand private banks are start-ing to lend to companiesin the sector to increaseproduction.

Angola's rapidly grow-ing economy, which ex-panded at a real pace ofmore than 16% in 2007,has spurred demand forwood amid the country’sextended rebuilding pro-gram following the end in2002 of the civil war.

“The case for investingin the timber sector is irre-sistible because wood isneeded for all the con-struction going on aroundthe country,” said Hercu-lano Abil di Amori, ownerof the biggest saw mill inCabinda.

Angola and its former ex-colonial ruler, Portugal,signed an agreement to helppromote the African coun-try's timber industry in 2007,with a special emphasis onCabinda. The province willbecome an important sup-port for the timber indus-try in the rest of Angola, ac-cording to the terms of theagreement.

The Banco de Desen-volvimento de Angola, orBDA, a state-owned lenderset up in 2006 to help fi-nance private businesses,loaned money to a com-pany called So Cargas lastyear to buy two new in-dustrial saws that will per-mit the company to in-crease output and qualityand to satisfy more of itscustomers' needs.

Last August,the BDAmade another loan, of about$200,000, to a furnituremaker. That money is alsobeing used to buy newequipment, including saws,other wood-working ma-chinery, and a generator tohelp the company increaseits productivity and its out-put, according to owner LuisGomes Sambo.

More investments inequipment are needed tohelp the industry grow be-cause of a new law that re-quires exported wood prod-ucts to have undergone atleast some processing with-in the country, said Alector

Araujo, director of the re-gional government's De-partment of Agriculture andRural Development.

“According to the newlaw, you can't have woodproduction without trans-forming it, which means thegovernment can only grantconcessions to companiesthat have a sawmill so thatwe're not just exportinglogs,” Araujo said.

Any investing in Cabin-da's timber sector also needsto be done under condi-tions that ensure that theproduction of wood fromthe region is sustainable,and felling without refor-estation will not be allowed,he added.

Cabinda's timber indus-try is undercapitalizedpartly because of the his-torical reluctance of banksto finance investment.That situation is slowly im-proving, said sawmill own-er di Amori. In the past hiscompany had to exportwood to raise funds forinvestment, now com-mercial banks are begin-ning to step in as they seethe chance to make a prof-it, he said.

As part of its programto encourage the growthof the lumber industry, theprovincial government isboosting efforts to im-prove the health of Cabin-da's forests. Areas that hadpreviously been deforest-ed are being replanted, of-ten with eucalyptus trees.

Eucalyptus is a fast-growing plant, so it willhelp to quickly replenishthe province's stock oftrees. New plantations nearCabinda City are growinga variety of eucalyptus thatis better suited to the lo-cal climate, after previousefforts with trees from thesouthern part of Angolawere unsuccessful.

Cabinda’s number two industry

Cabinda's small but growing industri-al sector is set to gain an important

new facility within a few years when theconstruction of the first phase of the Fu-tila Industrial Park, located on a plateauabout 35 kilometers north of Cabinda City,is finished.

The provincial government hopes thepark will attract factories that will helpcontribute to reducing Cabinda's de-pendence on imported goods, while atthe same time creating good jobs andspurring job training programs for localresidents. The first phase is expected tocreate 2,000 new positions and attractmore than 60 companies.

The plan to build the park was firsthatched 10 years ago, though it failedto move forward until the funding forthe $37 million first phase materializedlast year. The national government and the provincial govern-ment are both contributing financing for the project.

The work of clearing about 110 hectares of land for the firstphase has been finished, and now the area is being leveled andthe ground being prepared for the final stage of the park's de-velopment, the construction of infrastructure and buildings.

Roads, electrical lines, a natural gas distribution network anda water system will be built to supply the companies setting upin the park with basic needs. Later phases of growth could seethe park expanding to as many as 2,345 hectares.

The project is off to a good start and construction should befinished within about three years, according to Geraldo NduboPaulo, Director of the province's Department of Industry, Trade,Hotels and Tourism.

The plan is for companies in construction supply and foodprocessing to be among the first businesses to occupy thenew park. The government hopes to see sawmills, brick andtile makers, plastics companies and cement makers in the firstwave of companies.

The goal is for the businesses to make an immediate im-pact on Cabinda's economy by supplying basic necessities toresidents and much needed supplies for the booming con-struction industry in the region.

The industries setting up at the park will take as much ad-vantage as possible of local resources that in the past might havegone to waste, with the intention of producing more suppliesand materials within the province and cutting costly imports.

In later phases chemical companies and other businesses tied toCabinda's petroleum industry are also expected to make use of Fu-tila's facilities. The site, which is planned to eventually expand tooccupy 2,345 hectares, was chosen partly because of its proximityto Chevron Corp.'s Malongo oil camp.

Malongo is an oil terminal that in the past was completely closedoff to the surrounding territory and totally self sufficient in termsof supplies. The camp has begun to buy some supplies locally, in-cluding fresh fruits and vegetables.

The agency that is in charge of the development of Futilahopes that the companies operating within Malongo will startto buy some supplies from the businesses that set up opera-tions at the industrial park.

Some of the companies that are currently based inside Ma-longo should take advantage of the return of peace to Cabin-da to relocate to Futila, or open new operations there, in or-der to benefit from the greater space available, said Joao Mar-tins, a member of the Futila agency.

“There are many American companies working in Cabinda in thepetroleum industry,” Martins said. “They're aware of this region'spotential in terms of natural resources, and that should get theminterested in investing more in the area.”

Foreign companies wishing to take part in the construction of anew gas pipeline from Cabinda to other parts of Angola should al-so be attracted to the park. The pipeline will permit natural gas thathad previously gone to waste to be used as an energy source by An-golan industrial companies.

Foreign partners and new industries

Cabinda’s path to diversification: The Angolan government is taking steps to create a robust non-oil economy by focusing

on the agriculture, timber and industrial sectors, and producing more of what Cabindans need

Cabinda's farmers and theprovincial government areworking together to help boostagricultural production so thatthey can provide the region

with enough of the basic foods that arethe staples of Cabindan's diets.

The goal for the 2007/2008 farmingcampaign, which ended in October, wasto increase output of Cabinda's 38,000family farms to 48,592 tons of foods, in-cluding banana, mandioca, peanuts, corn,macunde beans and sweet potatoes, fromthe 37,498 tons produced in the previ-ous year’s harvest.

“Our ambition is for our family agri-cultural sector to increase its productionlevels,” said Alector Araujo, director ofthe regional government's Department ofAgriculture and Rural Development. “We'reentering a phase in which we want farm-ers to increase production by using newtechnologies.”

Previous years' efforts to boost outputhave already helped, and Cabinda now pro-duces surpluses of mandioca, banana andginguba, which are exported. The regionis also self-sufficient in peanut produc-tion, and all the positives results are thefruit of the success of government pro-grams to encourage their cultivation.

The production of mandioca is a spe-cial success because the plant was near-ly wiped out in recent years by disease.The government helped introduce newvarieties of the plant, enabling the grat-ifying comeback of the crop.

“It was important to understand the eat-

ing habits of the people of Cabinda,” saidAraujo. “The staple foods of our popula-tion are mandioca, banana, peanut and ma-cunde beans. During the years of theseprograms the government has tried to reacha stable production of these crops becausethey're the basis of the people's diets.”

The government reaches out to helpfarmers in the rural parts of the countrythrough Agrarian DevelopmentStations, which offer techni-cal advice on how to increaseproduction and improve thequality of crops.

Four new stations are beingbuild around the province.Three have already been fin-ished, in Buco Zau, Cacongo,and another one in Belize. The new sta-tions cost 11 million kwanzas ($146,000)to build and equip, and each has a ware-house to hold equipment, seeds, fertiliz-er and other items.

The region is working to produce othercrops, some for local consumption and somefor export. Cabinda already grows pineap-ples for export, though increasing such ex-ports are difficult at the moment becauseof a lack of transport infrastructure.

A better strategy now is to producevegetables for the nearby Chevron oilcamp at Malongo, said Araujo. Last yearthe camp bought produce worth $400,000and that figure can be increased oncemore regular production and delivery canbe arranged.

The regional government is buyinggreenhouses, and has sent a technician

to Brazil to learn their greenhouse pro-duction techniques, to help with this ef-fort. A proposed liquefied natural gasplant would also boost demand for lo-cal produce.

“We're speaking with big companiesthat need a regular supply, but unfor-tunately we're still at a phase where wecan't ensure regular deliveries,” explained

Araujo, adding that the gov-ernment is so concerned aboutthis that it just bought 20greenhouses to help provide asolution.

Now that Cabinda is close toproducing enough food for thelocal population, other agricul-tural projects are starting. Con-

struction of a palm oil refining and bot-tling plant has already begun, and palm treesare being planted to provide supplies.

The local and national governmentshave various programs to help the farm-ers increase production. The national gov-ernment has for years provided farmersthroughout the country with micro-cred-its to help them acquire equipment andseeds, and the local government recent-ly started a similar program for Cabinda'scoffee farmers.

Since 2007, more than 22,000 farmersfrom around the country have formed co-operatives to benefit from micro-credit pro-grams. The programs lend between $100and $1,500 to the cooperatives, which con-sist of at least seven farmers each.

Over $6 million has already been lentto buy farming equipment, of which more

Futila Industrial Park will house Cabinda’s rapidly expanding industrial sector

The development of new, non-oil industries

From agriculture to industry,Cabinda is diversifying

“We are entering a phase in which we want our farmers to increase production by using new technologies,” explains Director of Cabinda’s Dept of Agriculture & Rural Development Alector Araujo

Banks are beginning to finance the expansion of Cabinda’stimber industry

Angola's central government isdetermined to increase agri-

cultural output, and is also work-ing on several fronts to boost thecountry's fishing catch as well, tohelp people become more self-suf-ficient for their food supply.

In Cabinda that has meant thedonation of 20 boats over thepast two years to fishing coop-eratives in the province, alongwith other equipment including25 stern engines, 12 central en-gines, 17 canoes and large num-bers of nets.

The local fishermen are limit-ed in where they can fish be-cause of the prevalence of oilplatforms off Cabinda's coast.The government gave the coop-eratives the boats and engines sothey could travel farther and car-ry more fish, said Alector Arau-jo, director of the regional gov-ernment's Department of Agri-culture and Rural Development.

“Right now the main sourceof revenue for the governmentis oil, and in an area where wehave fishing and oil production,it's natural that oil be the pri-ority,” he said. “Today the sup-ply of fish at the beach is muchmore than a few years ago be-cause the new boats can carryfour or five tons of fish.”

Cabindan fisherman will alsobenefit from the opening of twoice factories, one in Cabinda Cityand the other in Cacongo, as wellas from a series of engine repairshops that will be built along thecoast to help boats suffering frommechanical difficulties.

The delivery of canoes andfishing nets will help increase theprovince's fishing catch by per-mitting fishermen in Cabinda's in-terior to exploit the provincesrivers and lakes, Araujo said.

An officialboost forfisheriesandfactories

than $700,000 has already been repaid.The program has been extended to allthe provinces in Angola, with 1,078 Cabin-dan farmers involved.

Another project sponsored by the gov-ernment is importing cattle into theprovince. In October of last year, 1,000head of cattle arrived in the region fromthe Democratic Republic of Congo, boost-ing the total number of cattle in Cabin-da to about 2,400.

A previous attempt to introduce morecattle to the region was unsuccessfulbecause the animals came from south-ern Angola, where the climactic condi-tions are different from in Cabinda. TheCongolose cattle are expected to farebetter because they're more accustomedto the local weather.

The Angolangovernment hasreached out tofarmers in ruralareas to stabilizebasic cropproduction

The timber industryis seekinginvestments for newequipment to exportwood products

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The people of Cabinda are seeing their liv-ing standards improve every day, as the

government dedicates more and more of themoney it gets from the region's oil industryon basic requirements such as health care.

A new hospital was opened last August,equipped with $6 million in the latest tech-nology and specializing in cardiology, diabetes,blood analysis and other ailments affectingCabindans. The new facility will spare peo-ple from the region a trip to the national cap-ital of Luanda, or further, for many treatments.

The new hospital “shows the path followedby the government to improve the lives ofthe people,” said Jose Anibal Lopes Rocha,Cabinda's governor, at the opening ceremo-ny. “It's a clear indication of how the mon-ey from the oil taxes are being spent.”

As in other areas, the region's children area special focus of the increased spending. Avaccination program inoculated more than130,000 little ones against polio in May andJune. The kids also received a vitamin A sup-plement and an anti-parasite medicine whilegetting the shots.

A program administered jointly by the ed-ucation and health departments will treat90,000 school children between the ages offive and 14 for parasites this year. In 2007,the program treated 87,000 kids. The chil-dren will receive a drug called Albendazol,which will help rid them of the pests that can

gravely affect their health and their ability tolearn.

The government has begun to acquire mo-bile health care clinics that will also help im-prove the health of the region's youngest res-idents. The units will travel from school toschool to do check-ups, diagnose illnesses,and aid in the prevention of malaria and par-asites.

A program to vaccinate people of all ages

against polio and malaria was recently be-gun by Chevron. The project has a budget of$1.27 million and is aimed at residents of theregion's rural areas. The drugs will be ad-ministered by mobile clinics to make it easi-er to reach the most isolated residents.

The rest of the population is also benefit-ing from the increase in spending, of course.In addition to the new hospital, an older hos-pital has been renovated and new clinics arebeing opened up around the province thatwill bring doctors and treatment closer to allCabindans.

The 40-bed hospital at Cacongo received

a face lift and new equipment and will spe-cialize in pediatrics and maternity care, as wellas working general medicine and AIDS treat-ment. The facility has a staff of five doctorsand 32 nurses. A new hospital is also underconstruction in Buco Zau, which will beequipped with the most modern technology.

New clinics have been opened in the Mass-abi and Sanga Planicie areas. The Massabi fa-cility has 25 beds, three nurses and can car-

ry out clinical analyses that pre-viously weren't available in thearea. The people of Sanga Plani-cie have gained a facility with amaternity ward and a vaccinationclinic that will improve the healthand the lives of the local popu-lation.

One indication of the improvement inhealth care in recent years is the fact thatno new cases of leprosy have been re-ported since 2005, according to the coor-dinator for public health in the regionalgovernment, Fuete Henry da Costa.

The success of the region's leprosy pro-gram can be attributed to the residents ofthe region taking advantage of all the newhealth care facilities being offered, he said.The region's leprosy program currentlymanages 35 people who suffer from thedisease, who are being treated on an out-patient basis.

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Cabinda

6

IN BRIEF

Building newclassrooms�� Cabinda's regional gov-ernment has been very ac-tively increasing the num-ber of schools and class-rooms available for theprovince's students, and atthe same time is workingto improve the facilities al-ready in use.

One construction projectis in the process of build-ing more than 170 newclassrooms spread aroundthe provincial capital ofCabinda City and its near-by townships. The classes areexpected to be available foruse this year.

The rooms will replaceother, inadequate, facilitiesthat are currently beingused to hold classes, in-cluding church chapels andother spaces. Builders havealready this year finishedconstruction of two newschools in the region, onewith 15 classrooms and theother with 24, which willbe used for primary andsecondary level classes.

Association helpsdisabled veterans

�� After Angola's long civ-il conflict, the country hasmany former soldiers withdisabilities that the gov-ernment is working to rein-tegrate into civil society.The National Association ofAngolese Handicapped issetting up various programsthat will provide work forthis group of people.

The Association, knownas ANDA, recently openeda sewing shop in theprovince that will providejobs for 25 people. Theworkshop is equipped withnine sewing machines, in-cluding an industrial sewingmachine that will be usedto make shirts and African-style clothing for women.

Another cooperative pro-ject has provided 10 taxisthat will be used by twopeople each, providing an-other 20 jobs for formersoldiers. ANDA recentlyopened a carpentry work-shop and a sawmill, creat-ing still more employmentin Cabinda for the handi-capped.

The educational system inCabinda has made great stridesover the past six years. Thegovernment has recognizedthe importance to the coun-

try's future and its economy of improv-ing the educational system still more atall levels, and is committed to increas-ing education spending, according toDr. Joao Chissina Mabiala, Cabinda'sProvincial Education Director.

“We want to guarantee an adequate ed-ucation that will give all citizens the chanceto help develop the country,” said Mabiala.The government has plans to “improve thesystem in terms of quality, teacher compe-tence and social help for students.”

The program of social help is especial-ly important for the youngest students,and it's here where the government hasmade a special effort. Of the approxi-mately 130,000 students in the primaryeducation system, about 89,000 partici-pate in various aid programs.

The children in the programs get milkand nutritious cookies every day. They al-so receive two school uniforms and a pairof sandals per year, as well as a backpackcontaining six notebooks, pens, pencilsand a pencil sharpener.

The next step will be to provide anoral hygiene kit. That program is beingprepared right now and will provide everychild in school with a tooth brush, toothpaste and a pamphlet explaining to chil-dren what they need to do to take careof their teeth.

Even without all those programs, the sit-uation for primary education has improvedtremendously since the end of the war. Thenumber of students in Cabinda, includ-ing at the secondary and adult level, hasrisen to 150,000, from 70,000 in 2002.

In that same year, the region needed 400more classrooms than it had, a figure thatwas cut to 100 this year and will be re-duced to 50 next year as new schools arebuilt and existing facilities are expanded.

Between the end of the war, the ex-pansion of facilities and the number ofteachers at work, the government hasbeen able to slowly raise the number ofyears primary students go to classes. Pri-mary education now goes through thesixth grade, instead of the fourth grade,and the plan is to further extend that asit becomes workable.

Teachers have also benefited from thereforms to the education system. Theirsalary has tripled since 2002, and the to-tal number of instructors has also in-creased, to 4,200 from 3,600 six yearsago. Training programs, for teachers andadministrators, have improved, helpingtheir students receive a better educationas well.

The goal is to give teachers and ad-ministrators more up-to-date training sothey can better meet the new realities ofthe needs of their students, Mabiala said.

The regional government is also work-ing on expanding the educational possi-bilities for the province’s residents. Workhas already begun on an ambitious planto build a 90-hectare university campus

Education leads to progress

Halls of learning open wideIn Cabinda, education is

drawing a growing crowd

as improvements show pos-

itive results among students

who are eager to join a glob-

alized, professional world

Two new professional centers will soon be inaugurated in the province in addition to a new university engineering faculty

Residents of Cabinda have already begun to enjoy the benefits of improved healthcare

Are there more resources available for edu-cation now that there is peace and stabilityin Cabinda?

Yes, peace has brought great benefits be-cause, though Cabinda hadn't been oneof the provinces most affected by the armedconflict, the country's resources were be-ing used up at the national level. It's nor-mal in that situation for other areas of thecountry to have limited resources becausethey're being used for defense spending.

After signing the peace agreements,there have been six years in which wehave begun to receive a bigger part ofthe budget for the area that I direct.We've begun to build more infrastruc-ture, in the form of schools, etc. Beforethe signing of the agreements, Cabin-da had about 245 schools, with 966classrooms. By 2004 we already had 278schools with 1,249 classrooms.

What are your goals for the future for educa-tion, and how soon do you expect to achievethem?

Our general goals are the same as in therest of the country. By 2015 we want allchildren, at a national level, to be withinthe school system. We're working hard toeliminate illiteracy, which is our main ob-jective.

At this time we have obligatory school-ing up until sixth grade, and our goalis to lengthen that period by 2015.Cabinda is a province with oil and wood,and also with good land. We have to in-vest to improve other parts of the econ-omy, and that will be possible if we usethe income from oil to educate peopleto develop other areas such as agricul-

ture, fishing, the environment etc.

Can you give us some recent figures on thenumber of teachers and students?

Our system is divided into four parts.The primary cycle goes from first throughsixth grades and has 131,000 children init. Then we have the second cycle, whichgoes from seventh through ninth grades,and the third cycle goes from tenththrough twelfth or thirteenth grades, de-pending on which course the student isfollowing. There's a total of 150,000students in the system.

We have close to 4,170 teachers, whichis a sufficient number for the province,though some of them could use moretraining, especially in technical areas.We have technical schools that providevarious training courses, but we don't

have a lot of people that want to workfor us, possibly because big companiesare offering the graduates of thoseschools better salaries.

Nevertheless, we're confident that thisproblem can be resolved soon becausewe've already seen the return to theprovince of many young people whowent abroad for higher level educationsin many different areas.

At the moment we have almost 500people with government grants who arestudying for degrees, including Mastersand Doctorates, in countries such as Por-tugal, the U.S., Namibia and Spain. Ourbiggest difficulty at the moment is find-ing teachers trained in engineering andother technological areas.

Are there local programs to train teachers?The country is in the process of re-

forming its educational system based ona series of international conventions andon decisions made by our own govern-ment. The reforms began in 2000 for pro-fessional and technical training and havesince been extended to the primary andsecondary school systems.

All of this requires changes to the cur-ricula and the teaching programs, andthe people who carry out the changesare of course the teachers. That is whyit's so important for them to be preparedfor new challenges and that's why we'vestarted short-, medium- and long-termtraining programs.

There are frequent seminars to trainteachers and school directors and provin-cial directors and all the other people in-volved in this system.

Interview with Joao Chissina Mabiala

‘By 2015, we want all children to be within the school system’

New medical clinics are kept busy

Joao Chissina MabialaProvincial Director of Education

Clinics receiveincreased fundingfor vitaminsupplements andessentialimmunizations

south of the provincial capital, with thefirst brick laid in August of 2007 by Pub-lic Works Minister Francisco HiginoCarneiro.

The university complex will encompass10 colleges, recreational areas, studentresidences and will even boast a maritimewildlife reserve. The campus's main build-ing will house administrative offices, thecentral library and the main lecture hall.

The university project is for the long term,but the government has more immediateplans that are already helping students start-ing from primary school through to the lev-el of technical preparation for employmentpurposes. One technical school that openedrecently is training workers for the coun-try's hugely important oil industry and thenational oil company, Sonangol.

The new school “will teach courses as-

sociated with chemistry to meet the de-mand from the oil sector,” said Mabiala.“We've also had direct cooperative effortswith Sonangol regarding the curriculumfor the technicians we train.”

Also, 40 students from Cabinda havebeen awarded scholarships to study in Cu-ba this year, most of them in the facultyof medicine given the current shortage ofphysicians in the province.

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Cabinda, with its sandy beaches, lush forests and abun-dant, exotic wildlife, has huge tourism potential. The

local government is already promoting the province asa destination and is preparing to spend more on the in-frastructure that is needed to attract visitors.

The region's biggest tourist attraction is the Mayombeforest and the gorilla population that lives there. Thegovernment has plans to develop parts of the forest andmake it more hospitable for visitors and more produc-tive for residents, all in an environmentally sound way.

“Mayombe is being protected and we're even build-ing a tourist center in the heart of the forest that willinclude a mini-hydroelectric plant to produce energy forthe population, and a resort that will give tourists thechance to come in direct contact with nature and ap-preciate its beauty,” said the region's governor, Jose Ani-bal Lopes Rocha.

Mayombe is one of the largest animal and plant re-serves on the planet, second in size only to the Ama-zon. It has many species of rare and valuable trees, aswell as an animal population that includes gorillas, chim-panzees, elephants and parrots.

Cabinda's beaches are another part of the region's

many attractions. Mandarim beach is a popular spotfor bathers and sport fishermen, and for campers andcanoists as well. Landana is a beautiful, clean sandybeach where tourists and locals alike gather at thearea's bars and restaurants.

Futila beach is close to the oil installations of Ma-longo, and so attracts many of the expatriates whowork there. Malongo is one of the region's more de-veloped beaches, with restaurants, bars and suitesavailable for bathers.

The regional and national governments are commit-ted to improving Cabinda's infrastructure to benefittourists and residents alike. The budget for building andimproving airports, highways, ports and other projects

has more than tripled in recent years, rising to $250 mil-lion this year, from $72 million not long ago, accordingto Rocha.

The government is also promoting the region in oth-er countries. Angola had a pavilion at the Zaragoza In-ternational Exhibition held last year in Zaragoza, Spain.The focus of that expo was water, and it included rep-resentations of Bakama dancers from Cabinda.

Bakama ritual dancers wear masks and are present atmany Cabindan festivals. They represent spirits that area link between the worlds of the living and the dead,and were included in the Zaragoza Expo because of theirecological background, in the sense that the spirits aresaid to interact with plants and animals without caus-

ing them any harm, and because the dancers' costumesare partly made of biodegradable banana leaves.

As part of a growing focus on Cabindan culture, thelocal government is investing in the renovation of theCabinda Regional Museum. Among the museum's manyexhibits are displays of typical clothing, jewelry, house-hold items, medicine, tools and weapons. The museumis also one of the most important centers for the studyof Cabinda's rich oral history tradition.

Although the tourism industry can't hope to equalthe importance to the regional economy of the oil in-dustry, it is growing and employing more and morepeople. In 2006 the tourism sector's sales rose to 39million kwanzas ($518,000), with 12 million of thatamount coming from hotels.

The region of Cabinda already benefits from a part ofthe revenue from its oil wealth. A proportion of the mon-ey the oil industry generates stays in the region to fundthe local budget. The government is wisely dedicatingsome of that money to improving Cabinda's tourism in-dustry, in an effort that will attract more and more vis-itors, whose spending will boost employment and spurthe region's economic growth.

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Cabinda

7

Cabinda’s cultural heritage is pro-found but not widely known be-yond Angola’s borders. For theinhabitants of the Congo Riverdelta enclave, the traditional per-

formers known as Bakamas are an essen-tial part of how Cabindan communitiescommemorate important events. Appearingto help Cabindans mourn, celebrate or showrespect, the Bakamas perform ritual danceswhile wearing special garments, decorationsand masks. While their true identity and hid-den rituals are a closely-guarded secret, itis clear that the Bakamas are an essentialpart of the cultural and spiritual life ofCabinda’s people.

As worshippers of Lusunzi – an invisibledeity that protects the people’s virtue andpurity – Bakamas are honored as guardiansof the community’s moral values. Cabindansbelieve that Bakamas intercede between thepeople and the gods, reconciling the livingand the dead and combating evil spirits.These beliefs are most prevalent in south-ern Cabinda, where the villages of Tchizo,Ngoyo, Povo Grande, Tchinzazi, and Sussoare home to the strongest Bakama tradi-tions.

While getting ready to perform, the Baka-mas seclude themselves to maintain theirsecret rituals. For five days before a dance,the Bakamas will not eat food prepared bya woman, and they stay away from theirfamilies. The preparations for the perfor-mance are carried out in secret, in a hidden

place where others are not admitted. Thus,their identities as Bakamas are kept hiddenfrom the community, and the roles theyplay are a mystery even to their own kin.

In costume, Bakamas hide their faceswith rough-hewn and brightly painted wood-en masks, wrapped in layers of colorful fab-ric, and cover their bodies with garlands ofdried banana leaves. The leaves are burntafter every appearance, and the masks andwrappings are hidden deep inside the for-est. Traditional Cabindan beliefs hold thatanyone who tries to find them will go blind.

When they do appear in public, Bakamasmark significant moments in the life of in-dividual Cabindans and their families. Baka-mas dance to give thanks for good times,like the investiture of a new chief or to con-secrate a new building, and to note the badtimes, such as natural disasters, illness, ordeath.

At the event, a group of Bakamas will typ-ically include nine or twelve members, vary-ing their numbers and roles according tothe nature of the celebration. While theBakamas themselves lead the dance, witheach masked dancer led by a guide, sup-porters sing along and keep time. Africandrums, made from tree trunks and coveredwith animal skins, set the beat.

The roles taken by the dancers, calledzindunga, offer a glimpse into the surpris-ingly nuanced traditional Cabindan view ofhuman nature and psychology. Many con-note different facets of authority, wisdom

and knowledge. Mabobolo is the headdancer, the leader of the Bakamas, who car-ries a walking stick and wears a cap to showhis superiority over the others. MakaiaMakonde-Konde acts as a devil, becomingenraged during the dance seemingly with-out reason, and his eyes are painted in mis-matched colors. Vanha Nsi gives commandsthat must be obeyed, and has the power totwist the mouths of any who dare to resisthis orders. Matona Mambuambu Kum-bukutu is also an authority figure, a strongman who acts as a police officer in timesof peace and an army commander in timesof war. During the performance, he movesthe most of all the dancers, lurching at thespectators and brandishing a wooden rifleand a javelin.

Other roles taken by the Bakamas reflectless strident realities of nature and humanlife. Tchilamba represents a plant that growswithout roots, while Mbenge Meso is a red-eyed drunk. The mask worn by DuengieMeso makes it appear as if his eyes areclosed, but in fact he is omniscient, seeingand noting each and all. Mampana, theleopard, has just snuck into the chickencoop to steal a feather from the rooster’stail, which he fixes to the forehead of hismask. Bevolumuana Benvo is a calm, re-spectful character in a colorful mask, whoadvises against anger. N’Temndekele, mean-while, reminds viewers of the cycle of growthand decay, telling adults to respect theyoung as they will someday replace them. A typical Bakama costume and mask, shown above, with garlands of dried banana leaves

Cabinda’s unique cultural heritage fascinates and intrigues with its mysticism,

celebratory spirit and deep sense of ritual that serves as spiritual guidance

Dancing with the Bakamas

Performance art

Mayombe is the second-largest nature reserve on theplanet after the Amazon

Cabinda will be one of four Angolan cities thatwill host the finals of the CAN2010 African Na-

tions Championship football tournament in 2010,which will bring together national teams, their fansand journalists from all over the continent to en-joy this important international sporting event.

The championship will give Cabinda an excellentopportunity to increase the world's awareness ofwhat the region has to offer in terms of art, cul-ture and travel, said Jose Anibal Lopes Rocha, gov-ernor of the province.

“This is our momentto show the world ourgreat potential, and fortourists to see ouruniqueness,” he said. “Itcan open a doorthrough which foreign-ers will feel attracted toCabinda as a result ofhaving contact with itsofferings in the field ofart, traditions andtourism.”

A major contructionplan includes a new,20,000-seat stadiumwhich will have specialseating sections forVIPs, journalists and thehandicapped. The planalso has a program to increase and improve Cabin-da's hotel offerings.

The region offers about 280 hotel rooms now,and that figure is planned to rise to 450 rooms bythe start of the championship. Three new hotels arebeing built, which will have three or four stars.

Just this October, the Cabinda provincial gov-ernment's head of Industry, Trade, Hostelry andTourism, Geraldo Ndubo Paulo, guaranteed the re-gion's hotels will be prepared to welcome and housethe tourists who come for the matches.

The athletes, trainers and other team staff will

be housed in separate facilities, similar to an Olympicvillage. That arrangement was already successfullyused for the athletes who came to Cabinda for theAfrobasket 2007 competition, and the African hand-ball tournament in January of last year.

The construction program, and the influx oftourism, will help spur the local economy, which isheavily dependent on oil at the moment. The cham-pionship coincides with, and will help boost, a gov-ernment effort to attract more tourism to the re-gion and diversify sources of growth.

The tourism industryin Cabinda currentlyemploys more than1,000 people, spreadout through 46 differ-ent businesses, includ-ing three existing hotels,13 hostels, six otherlodging establishments,four tourist complexes,13 restaurants and sev-en other tourist servicecompanies.

Residents of Cabindawill benefit in otherways as well. They'll beable to use the facilitiesbeing built for CAN2010once the competition isover and young people,

low-income Cabindans and injured war veteranswill have special access to reduced-price tickets tosee matches.

Inspectors from the African Confederation of Foot-ball recently visited Angola to evaluate the prepara-tions for the tournament. They were generally en-couraged by what they found, though they notedsome delays in Cabinda due to the delays of deliv-eries of construction supplies. Those delays are nowbeing overcome, construction is moving forward andthe province's stadium, hotels and other tourist in-frastructure will all be ready on time for the event.

Province to co-host Cup of African Nations

The country is improving infrastructure to accommodatethe influx of tourists for the 2010 African Cup

Angola’s rugged deserts, thick forests, high moun-tains and other unique land environments have

long attracted interest from nature lovers and envi-ronmental researchers. However, the recently forgedpeace has allowed additional investigation into theocean environments that flourish beyond Angola’slong South Atlantic coastline. The seas off the north-ern province of Cabinda, in the Congo Delta region,are particularly rich in nutrients and home to an as-tonishing variety of marine life. Today, scientists arestarting to record the diversity of species presentalong the Angolan coast,and developing pro-grams to conserve them.

Under the waves, ason land, areas where dif-ferent habitats coexist inclose proximity are fre-quently home to thegreatest variety ofwildlife. Angola’s coastis one such place, wherethe warmer, shallowerseas along the conti-nental shelf give way toundersea slopes and cliffsthat slope down to deep-er and colder waters.Where the mighty Con-go meets the sea, the riv-er has carved an under-sea canyon over a mile deep into the ocean floor, ex-tending some 125 miles out from the coastline.

Dolphins are commonly seen in Angolan waters. Thesefamously friendly and inquisitive marine mammalscan be found in the open ocean, but prefer the shal-lows close to the coast, where reefs and beds of sea-grass harbor the small fish, crustaceans and squid thatmake up the bulk of their diet. Different species ofdolphins will often mingle in large groups and are dif-ficult to distinguish from one another by sight, so re-searchers have had to carry out genetic studies tomore accurately estimate dolphin populations. Along

the Angolan coast, they have found not only com-mon short-beaked and long-beaked dolphins, butlesser-known species of bottlenose, spinner, striped andspotted dolphins.

The shallow Angolan coastal shelf is also a breed-ing ground for humpback and Bryde’s whales, wherethey raise their calves until they are strong enough toventure out into the deeper waters. Short-finned pi-lot whales are frequently spotted in the warm seas offof Angola, along with their long-finned cousins thatwere previously thought to stay closer to cooler wa-

ters. Killer whales, moreaccurately known as or-cas, are only occasional-ly seen in Angolan shal-lows and may travel forhundreds of miles insearch of food. Beakedwhales are more myste-rious and difficult toidentify, though theyhave been sighted at theextraordinary depths ofthe Congo Canyon wherethey make their home.

Meanwhile, onCabinda’s shores, aneven rarer find has beenmade: a population ofOlive Ridley sea turtleshas been discovered

nesting on Malongo beach. This opportunity to studythe breeding habits of an internationally-listed en-dangered species is being taken up by EnvironmentMinistry scientists and researchers from Chevron.To reduce the threat to the turtles, the research pro-ject has partnered with local fishermen who are adeep well of untapped knowledge about oceanfauna and who can take a leadership role in in-creasing awareness among the community. Thiseffort to tag, track and protect the vulnerable tur-tles has already identified 700 nests and observed5,300 hatchlings since the project began.

A preserved nature-lover’s paradise

Many types of dolphins can be seen in the waters offCabinda’s shores, including lesser-known species

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