Tômbua, formerly known as Porto Alexandre, is a city and

municipality A municipality is usually a single administrative division having corporate status and powers of self-government or jurisdiction as granted by national and regional laws to which it is subordinate. The term ''municipality'' may also mean the go ...

Angola , national_anthem = " Angola Avante"() , image_map = , map_caption = , capital = Luanda , religion = , religion_year = 2020 , religion_ref = , coordina ...

, in

Namibe Province Namibe Province is a province of Angola. Under Portuguese rule it was the Moçâmedes District. It has an area of 57,091 km2 and had a 2014 census population of 495,326. The port and city of Moçâmedes is the capital of the province with a ...

. The municipality has a population of 55,494 and the city has a population of 46,573 in 2014. It is located on the shore of Porto Alexandre, an important harbor on the

South Atlantic Ocean The Atlantic Ocean is the second-largest of the world's five oceans, with an area of about . It covers approximately 20% of Earth's surface and about 29% of its water surface area. It is known to separate the "Old World" of Africa, Europe an ...

for oil production and fishing. The villages of

Yona The word Yona in Pali and the Prakrits, and the analogue Yavana in Sanskrit and Yavanar in Tamil, were words used in Ancient India to designate Greek speakers. "Yona" and "Yavana" are transliterations of the Greek word for " Ionians" ( grc, ...

and

Saint Martin of the Tigers Saint Martin of the Tigers (in portuguese: ''São Martinho dos Tigres''), sometimes referred to simply as Village of Tigres Bay (in portuguese: ''Vila da Baía dos Tigres''), is a ghost town in southern Angola, located on Tigres Island, currently s ...

are part of the municipality of Tômbua.

Economy

The port had refrigeration facilities installed with

European Union The European Union (EU) is a supranational political and economic union of member states that are located primarily in Europe. The union has a total area of and an estimated total population of about 447million. The EU has often been de ...

assistance at the Tombwe canning factory.Economic Report on Angola by the South African government
/ref> It was during Portuguese Angola the largest fishing port of Angola and one of the largest in West Africa. It was established by fishermen from

Olhão Olhão (), officially known as Olhão da Restauração, is a city and municipality in the Algarve region of southern Portugal. The population of the municipality in 2011 was 45,396, in an area of . Located near the regional capital Faro and form ...

Algarve The Algarve (, , ; from ) is the southernmost NUTS II region of continental Portugal. It has an area of with 467,495 permanent inhabitants and incorporates 16 municipalities ( ''concelhos'' or ''municípios'' in Portuguese). The region has it ...

around 1863 in a sheltered bay, and joined by the fishermen of

Póvoa de Varzim Póvoa de Varzim (, ) is a Portugal, Portuguese city in Norte Region, Portugal, Northern Portugal and sub-region of Greater Porto, from its city centre. It sits in a sandy coastal plain, a cuspate foreland, halfway between the Minho River, Minho ...

in 1921, who left Brazil not wishing to lose Portuguese nationality by becoming Brazilian nationals. Due to the fishing industry, Porto Alexandre gained city status in 1961. As of 2019 fishing harvests are declining. This is believed to have resulted from ocean warming, harvesting by industrial-sized foreign ships, and oxygen depletion. The movement of Angolans to the area based on its reputation for plentiful fishing has also contributed to the shortage of fish near the shore. As a result, anglers, usually from South Africa, who used to travel there for the fine fishing, no longer come. The prime fishing area, characterized by upwelling nutrient-rich cold water, has moved south along the Namibian coast.

References

Populated places in Namibe Province Lighthouses in Angola {{Angola-geo-stub

Economy

See also

References