Portuguese group buys Angolan state coffee company

A worker spreads out harvested robusta coffee cherries to dry in the sun on a coffee plantation

Angonabeiro, an Angolan company under the Portuguese Nabeiro group, will invest USD1 billion in the purchase of the entire share capital of Angolan state coffee company Liangol, said the managing director of the company.
José Carlos Beato told Portuguese news agency Lusa that the decision follows a joint executive decree of the Ministries of Economy and Industry, on 13 November, authorizing the privatization of this unit, located in Cacuaco, on the outskirts of Luanda.
“The Nabeiro group came to Angola in 2000, at the invitation of the Angolan government, with a view to revitalizing the coffee industry, which included the recovery of a factory. This was done and we were in Angola under a management contract [of the old Liangol], but there was the prospect that the asset would be privatized one day and that’s what happened,” said the managing director of Angonabeiro.
Since 2001, the subsidiary of the Portuguese group has taken over the management of the Liangol factory, after also ensuring its recovery and modernization, taking into account that it had been at a standstill since 1984.
The company covers an area of ​​4 hectares, with a storage area, roasting and packing area, where the Nabeiro group produces and sells 250 tons of coffee (2014) under its own brand Ginga, which is the market leader in Angola.
Before independence from Portugal in 1975, Angola was a major world producer with 4 million bags or 240 tons of coffee per year, but the civil war between independence and 2002 destroyed almost all the country’s coffee plantations.
In Angola, the Portuguese group’s business has been driven by the sale of the Delta brand capsules and by the Ginga brand, made from 100 percent Angolan coffee. MDT/Macauhub