Africa-Press – Angola. The Angolan market has proved, in recent years, to be very fertile for entrepreneurs, and is therefore considered a kind of “blue ocean”, full of opportunities.
According to several national and foreign specialists, the country, which is working to improve its business environment, today offers enormous scope for entrepreneurship.
With an estimated population of more than 33 million inhabitants, Angola has an unemployment rate of 30.20%, according to data from the National Institute of Statistics (INE) for the second quarter of 2022, which leads thousands of citizens to invest in their own business .
Official data indicate that Gross Domestic Product (GDP) growth accelerated from 2.4% in the last quarter of 2021 to 2.6% in the first quarter of 2022, driven by the oil sector.
International consultants, such as Fitch Solutions, have estimated that the Angolan economy will grow by 3.5% for 2022, projections that indicate that the Angolan economy will resume its growth path, opening up more space for entrepreneurship.
According to analysts, this market segment could become a lever for the national economy, which is still very dependent on the oil sector.
A study carried out to map entrepreneurship in the world points to the entrepreneurial population “early-stage” (in the initial stage) in Angola, in the period 2020/2021, as being around 50%, the highest figure of 47 economies analyzed, five of which African.
The survey, presented in June 2022, in Luanda, considers several criteria and indicates that the number of entrepreneurs in Angola has grown from year to year.
It advances that failure has been relatively low in recent years, with values close to those seen in 2014 in 2020 (35% and 37%, respectively), with an 84% increase in risk perception from 2018 to 2020.
The report states that the intention to start a business (estimated at 83%) continues to be higher among the Angolan population than in any other country analyzed by the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor, GEM Angola (GEM 2020/2021 Global Report).
The study highlights that entrepreneurial activity in the 18-24 age group has registered the greatest growth, having even had the lowest rate in 2014 (15%) and almost the highest in 2020 (54%).
In this period, the difference in this age group was only one percentage point compared to the 25 to 34 age group (55%).
The research was carried out by Sociedade Portuguesa de Inovação (SPI) – a consulting firm created in 1996, in partnership with the Center for Studies and Scientific Research of the Catholic University of Angola (CEIC-UCAN) and Banco de Fomento de Angola.
It involved two thousand individuals, from 10 provinces, and the consultation of 37 national specialists, who evaluated 11 structural conditions.
Among the countries evaluated are the United States of America, Brazil, Togo, Burkina Faso and Germany, which surpass Angola in some criteria analyzed, such as the period of survival of a business. In the country, out of five, four do not survive.
The GEM brings together information collected over the last 22 years, having analyzed over 120 economies during this period, with the collaboration of more than 500 specialists, as well as the contribution of more than 300 research institutes and two hundred thousand interviews.
On the subject, the head of Bureau Feerie, Amílcar Tchinguelessy, understands that, although he is unaware of the aforementioned study, Angola is a fertile market.
The expert is of the opinion that entrepreneurship should be treated seriously, as a true foundation to leverage economic diversification.
“If we look at the big nations, we realize that the business community has actually been a strategic partner in generating jobs. Well-established entrepreneurs become entrepreneurs who create business opportunities to later employ more people”, she argues.
He considers that entrepreneurship is a shortening of what would be a person’s lifestyle, and should create business, generate impact, boost the economy and help the country to grow, “stopping looking for a job and ending up generating more jobs”.
He highlights the fact that there are several companies that, regardless of Angola’s problems, undertake business in the country, which demonstrates the existence of market opportunities.
The master in Big Data Tecnologic (Big Data) Euclides Fumo considers the search for information, that of entrepreneurs, to be fundamental for decision-making.
For him, the more data the entrepreneur gets from the business, customer knowledge, delivery performance, failures and errors, the better he can decide on how to expand the business.
“First, you need to analyze the market and access public reports of data about the business. If you don’t have a report, you can take a pencil and a notebook to analyze, for example, how many bakeries there are in the neighborhood, the people and the time they shop”, vinca.
From his point of view, this is important data that will show whether, in fact, the interested party can create a bakery in the place where he is or not, and if he will only sell bread, cookies or other things in his future entrepreneurship.
Euclides Fumo corroborates the idea that entrepreneurship in Angola has grown a lot, but thinks that the competent institutions should help this sector more.
For him, there are regulators in the country carrying out incubation initiatives, but there is no follow-up, thus regretting the fact that, after these entrepreneurs leave the incubator, the economic situation is not favorable.
“It is necessary to define the objectives well, we need to strengthen the focus, so that we have more entrepreneurs, with a certain sustainability”, he emphasizes.
The entrepreneur defends the need to create an open data platform, in which any company can add information and add questions such as, for example, the areas with the most taxis and the number of bakeries.
With this information, he explains, the entrepreneur can direct his business better. “The country needs to have a platform to improve the data that helps decision-making”.
However, the National Institute of Support for Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (INAPEM) presented, in July 2022, the digital network developed to train and promote interaction between service providers, in ways to generate business.
INAPEM also has the new version of the INAPEM 2.0 digital network, which brings innovation in terms of access and application for partners in the country’s 18 provinces.
The vision, with the digital network, is to provide more support for economic operators who need help in formalizing, restructuring projects and business plans.
According to the chairman of the Board of Directors of INAPEM, João Nkosi, the institution provides a set of services to facilitate access to the internal market.
The manager highlights consultancy and technical assistance, formalization of economic activity, access to financing, training and business promotion, certified and made in Angola.
Stresses that in 2022 around two thousand 37 companies benefited from consultancy and assistance, 245 thousand micro, small and medium-sized companies were formalized, and, through the Ministry of Economy and Planning (MEP), one thousand and 705 projects were approved for have access to finance, with 994 business projects having been disbursed.
With the financing, the amount of which he did not disclose, 6,373 entrepreneurs were trained. INAPEM was also able to register 30 companies on the stamp made in Angola, with more than 200 products registered and 10 stamps issued.
With regard to the certification of companies, in accumulated terms, INAPEM registers 35 thousand and 818, of which 1962 are classified as small and 2 thousand 812 are classified as medium-sized companies.
Reinvigorated startup market
Meanwhile, the Angolan market is witnessing the mass emergence of startups – innovative companies that use technology to solve a market problem.
In Angola, the universe of startups is growing and many of them have already reached millions of kwanzas in market value. There are even those who say that undertaking a startup can be an extremely rewarding challenge in Angola.
In addition to enabling financial growth for the entrepreneur and his team, startups have great potential for economic growth, transforming the market and greatly improving the lives of consumers.
Only in July 2022, for example, several startups presented their potential at the 37th edition of the Luanda International Fair (FILDA).
On the occasion, the Executive Director of Startup Kwanzas.ao , Kelvin dos Santos, said that its platform is an electronic commerce platform, developed to connect people, companies and create communities, in order to provide opportunities for economic trade for all.
“With Kwanzas.ao, companies can find new customers, providing individual sellers and companies with the ability to expand their business, with few barriers to entry”, he stresses.
He explains that the said platform allows anyone, as long as they have the NIF, to sell their products, having the ability to encourage self-employment.
In turn, the director general of the Wedo Brand Agency, Justo Elizeu, reflects that the marketing agency presents solutions capable of helping companies adapt to the digital world, uniting marketing, performance, consultancy and the brand.
“Our digital solution is Metaversa 2 D. We created an office in metaversa and prepared a new era of 3.0. The office works like meetings via Zoom, being a digital space where the secretary is created, an office, with a figure where the superior controls whether the person is present or not”, he adds.
The supervisor of the commercial area of the application “Aki gets everything easier”, Leopoldo Calenga, says it is an application that is available on the Android and iOS platforms.
“The advantage of the application is to make payments for services. It has existed since 2018, with more than 60,000 users”, he reinforces.
Startap Student Carneiro presents a solution that seeks to reduce failure levels, using online home tutoring, consultancy and preparatory courses.
According to the Deputy Director of Startup, Sara Bastos, the aforementioned project consists of helping students to achieve student success, to overcome the difficulties faced during the teaching-learning process, presented in the academic phase.
A startup is a company that aims to grow aggressively, and it usually offers innovative products or services, aiming to solve a problem, bringing innovation to goods that already exist.
Data indicate that startups almost always base their business model on digital technology, but this is not a rule.
These are companies that operate in a high-risk market and that continually seek foreign investment. Thus, they can leverage their growth and develop their solutions more profitably.
According to the master in business, Rossana Manjata, Angolan entrepreneurs need, however, to change their attitude and believe that any business can succeed, as long as they have the right knowledge and the attitude, because “undertaking is making things happen”.
In the specialist’s view, entrepreneurs should start from the assumptions that their business has to have a “very specific” purpose and solve people’s problems.
It draws attention to entrepreneurs that difficulties exist in everyone and that the problem is not having difficulties, but the way in which the entrepreneur is willing to solve them.
“Every problem has a solution and entrepreneurship arises to solve problems. We cannot be afraid of the problem, because solving it is one of the greatest competences of the century. The differential must be the ability to resolve ”, he emphasizes.
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