Africa’s Five Regions

Africa’s 53 countries are typically grouped into five regions, according to the African Development Bank:

North Africa: Algeria, Egypt, Libya, Mauritania, Morocco and Tunisia.

West Africa: Benin, Burkina Faso, Cape Verde, Cote d’Ivoire, Gambia, Ghana, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Liberia, Mali, Niger, Nigeria, Sao Tome & Principe, Senegal, Sierra Leone and Togo.

Central Africa: Cameroon, Central African Republic, Chad, Democratic Republic of Congo, Congo, Equatorial Guinea and Gabon.

East Africa: Burundi, Comoros, Djibouti, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya, Rwanda, Seychelles, Somalia, Sudan, Tanzania and Uganda.

Southern Africa: Angola, Botswana, Lesotho, Madagascar, Malawi, Mauritius, Mozambique, Namibia, South Africa, Swaziland, Zambia and Zimbabwe.

Vessels sail out of Antwerp “chockablock full” of machinery, oil and gas equipment and other breakbulk and project cargo headed for North Africa, said Albert Pegg, an external adviser and breakbulk expert at the Port of Antwerp. Turkey and the Middle East also supply cargo to North Africa, while the Middle East and Far East supply much of the region’s consumer goods.

“North Africa tends to be more developed in general and more investor-friendly in terms of the certainty of policies and regulations and addressing social development. In sub-Saharan Africa, you have a melting pot of issues and priorities and differences,” an official at the U.S. Department of Energy said.

South Africa is sub-Saharan Africa’s most developed nation, eager to work with international business and easy to move material in and out of, said Janette Marlowe, president and chief operating officer at Houston-based project forwarder Jaemar International. South Africa is the only developed manufacturing country in Africa capable of supplying substantial amounts of materials to developing countries.

The 2010 World Cup, which will be held in South Africa, is driving Olympics-like investment in infrastructure, Pegg said.

Angola is developing its oil and natural gas resources. Large amounts of mining, infrastructure and agricultural equipment go into Zambia and the Democratic Republic of the Congo. West Africa, particularly Nigeria, is dominated by oil- and gas-related breakbulk cargo, although bagged wheat flour and other products are also important, Pegg said.

Cargo for East Africa out of Antwerp tends to be steel, cars, non-containerized consumer goods and rolling stock headed for the mining industry, Pegg said. Although Africa’s east coast may appear closer on the map when moving material to inland sub-Saharan regions, cargo typically enters from the west coast, Marlowe said. East Africa’s chaotic political situation has cut off most potential cargo movement.

“We haven’t had any inquiries for the east coast for the past year or two,” she said.

Contact Janet Nodar at jcnodar@bellsouth.net.