Introduction: Angola is a country about twice the size of Texas, located on the west coast of southern Africa, its principal neighbors being the Democratic Republic of Congo, Zaire, Zambia, and Namibia. As the second-largest oil producer in sub-Saharan Africa, it is of potential global economic significance, but investment opportunities there were severely limited for many years by a long-running civil war. With the end of the civil war, however, Angola deserves renewed consideration by potential investors. The following presents a brief STEEP analysis of Angola, evaluating the sociological, technical, economic, environmental, and political dimensions of Angola's current situation and future prospects.
Sociological: Angola is a former Portuguese colony. While Portuguese is the official language, the great majority of the population speaks languages of the Bantu family, and social identity is largely along tribal lines. Principal ethnic groups are given as "Ovimbundu 37%, Kimbundu 25%, Bakongo 13%, mestico (mixed European and Native African) 2%, European 1%, other 22%" (CIA, 2005). The current population is 11 million, and life expectancy at birth is about 36-37 years, testimony to a health care system left in a shambles by the long civil war. This represents a decline from an average lifespan in the low 40s, as estimated in 1989 (Library of Congress, 2005). As of 2003, 3.9 percent of the population was estimated to be HIV-infected. Literacy was estimated in 1998 as 42 percent for males and 28 percent for females (CIA, 2005).
Technical: The transportation and communication infrastructure of Angola, never adequate to its needs, suffered severely from the civil war. The country has approximately 2800 km of railroad lines and 5300 km of paved highways, with a total road network of about 51,400 km. As of 2003, 96,300 land-line telephones were in service, along with an estimated (2002) 130,000
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