STOCK MARKET WATCH -- Monday, 12 November 2012 (Holiday -- US markets closed)

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24. Portuguese head to former African colony to escape euro crisis

http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/africa/portuguese-head-to-former-african-colony-to-escape-euro-crisis/2012/11/11/b19b8660-237e-11e2-92f8-7f9c4daf276a_story.html

MAPUTO, Mozambique — When Marcio Charata lost his well-paying job in southern Portugal two years ago, he fired off résumés to all his contacts. Determined to survive the economic woes strangling Europe, he secured 20 interviews — but no job. So he set his sights on a faraway and unlikely market: Mozambique, Portugal’s once war-torn former colony.

Today, Charata is a senior executive at a Mozambican media company, joining thousands of his fellow Portuguese who have arrived here in recent months seeking refuge from the euro crisis. “This is an oasis in the desert,” Charata, 33, said with a smile.

Faced with mounting unemployment, rising taxes and cuts to social welfare programs, many Portuguese are traveling to former colonies in search of work, to the very places their colonial ancestors were forced to leave more than a half-century ago — countries such as Brazil, Angola and Mozambique, which boast some of the world’s fastest-growing economies, fueled by vast deposits of oil, minerals and other raw materials.

Sub-Saharan Africa, to be sure, is no economic promised land. Much of the continent still struggles with high poverty, disease and unemployment, and businesses face major hurdles, including corruption and red tape.