Angola: Oil-Rich but Dirt-Poor

By: Jad Mouawad

Published: March 20, 2007 in the International Herald Tribune

This article is about the country of Angola. Angola is a poor nation, with a terrible record on corruption. It ranks among the lowest rungs of nearly all development indicators according to the UN. However, everything may be about to change for Angola.

“In recent years, Angola has become the fastest-growing source of exports to the United States and, along with Nigeria and smaller West African countries, it is about to become an important component of American energy security.”

With the discovery of rich oil reserves off the shore of Angola, a bidding war has begun between the richest and fastest-growing nations of the world, to get a hand on some of the oil coming from Angola. In fact, Angola is finding itself at the crossroads of today's energy geo-politics. The country has become the latest battlefield in a global rivalry playing out among Western, Russian and Chinese oil companies.

This is an extremely important issue in the era of globalization because the flattening of the world means the opening of previously closed markets. Those now open markets drive up consumption, causing scarce goods to become even scarcer. This may be the future of global conflict if our production and our consumption cannot come into greater harmony.