Industrial Policy & Trade Monitor· 2662 actions· ✨ 89 recent

Angola's Ministry of Transport formalised a 30-year concession to Lobito Atlantic Railway (LAR — Trafigura 49.5% / Mota-Engil 49.5% / Vecturis S.A. 1%) for the operation, management and maintenance of the Lobito Corridor — comprising the 1,300 km Benguela Railway from the Port of Lobito to Luau (Angola-DRC border) and the Lobito port mineral terminal. The international tender was won on 4 November 2022; the concession contract was signed on 4 July 2023 at a ceremony attended by the Presidents of Angola, the DRC and Zambia. LAR commenced operations in January 2024. The concession is paired with the trilateral Lobito Corridor Transit Transport Facilitation Agency Agreement (LCTTFA), signed at Lobito Port on 27 January 2023 by the Transport ministers of Angola, the DRC and Zambia, which establishes the cross-border customs/transit framework for the corridor.

Angola's President João Lourenço signed Decreto Presidencial n.º 271/20 on 20 October 2020, replacing Order n.º 127/03 of 2003 and establishing the Regime Jurídico do Conteúdo Local do Sector dos Petróleos (RJCLSP). The decree divides petroleum-sector contracting into three regimes — exclusivity (reserved for Angolan nationals and companies), preference (Angolan-majority bidders take priority), and open competition with mandatory local-content scoring — covering all goods and services contracts entered into by concessionaires and their full subcontracting chains. The Ministério dos Recursos Minerais, Petróleo e Gás (MIREMPET) supervises compliance, with non-inclusion of mandatory local-content clauses penalised at USD 50,000–200,000 per infraction and escalating to contract cancellation for repeat offenders. The RJCLSP applies to all IOCs operating Angolan offshore blocks, including TotalEnergies (Block 17), ExxonMobil (Block 15), Chevron (Blocks 0, 14, 14K), BP (Block 31), Eni (Blocks 2, 14, 15/06), and Equinor, as well as their oilfield-services subcontractor chains.