Globally, various bonus schemes are used to keep employees satisfied and motivated. This strategy is increasingly seen adopted by banks, insurances and corporations in Ethiopia. It is becoming common to witness banks and insurance companies showering two to four months of salaries on employees as bonuses. Although these companies are benefiting from the strategy, there are still concerns, as EBR’s Ashenafi Endale writes.
It has been over a decade since the government discovered that a little more than 40Pct of the total arable land of Ethiopia is affected by soil acidity. As a result, the fertility of most Ethiopian soil has already declined posing another challenge to crop production. Soil acidity affects crop growth because acidic soil contains toxic levels of aluminum and manganese and characterized by deficiency of essential plant nutrients such potassium, calcium and magnesium, among others. Had acidic soils been neutralized the country would have increased the production of crops such as cereals four folds. Yet this does not seem like it will be realized soon. EBR’s Ashenafi Endale reports.
Martin Plaut is not new to the geopolitics of the Horn of Africa, having amassed more than three decades of experience in the region, starting as a journalist with the BBC World Service in 1984. He has reported from most of East Africa, as well as some parts of West Africa, and but his specialty lies in the Horn of Africa and Southern Africa. He later served as the Africa Editor for the BBC World Service News and published extensively on African affairs. Currently, he is working as an adviser to the United States Department of State and Senior Researcher at the Institute of Commonwealth Studies.
Fake news means news articles or information sources that are intentionally and verifiably false, and are meant to mislead readers. There are two key characteristics of fake news. First, fake news includes false information and fabricated news reports produced either for profit or political purposes. Second, fake news is created with dishonest intentions. It is deliberately fabricated and disseminated with the intention to deceive and mislead others into believing falsehoods or doubting verifiable facts. As a result, fake news shows circumstances in which objective facts are less influential in shaping public opinion than appeals to emotion and personal beliefs.
Images of desperate people on the move have blinded Westerners, in particular, to the fact that people have always moved, and that migration is necessary and beneficial for human development. Nowhere is this fact more relevant today than in Africa.
Soil acidity has been a big concern in Ethiopia for a long time. Although the problem has been known for over a decade, the level of action taken by the government was minimal. To avert this problem and develop policy to help farmers improve their yield, the Ethiopian Soil Information System (Ethio SIS) was launched by the Agricultural Transformation Agency in 2012, to bolster the growth and transformation of Ethiopia’s agriculture sector. Tegbaru Belete, program leader of the project, sat down with EBR’s Ashenafi Endale to talk about some of the ins and outs of the project and how the soil acidity problem can be solved.
The service sector in Ethiopia has suffered from a lack of government attention for a long time. It is still not part of the government’s strategy, even though it contributes close to 40Pct of the country’s gross domestic product. In Ethiopia, earnings from service export have long been dominated by traditional sectors- mainly travel and tourism services. This has undermined the competitiveness of firms that export services and the country’s ability to boost its service export earnings. Although service exports have potential, they have not grabbed the attention of policy makers so far, as EBR’s Samson Berhane reports.
Since its creation in 2009, Bitcoin has grown popular across the world. During its earlier years, it was almost monopolized by mega investors. But later on, with the establishment of Bitclub, ordinary people became able to invest in Bitcoin and to own small computing machines on their farm. This includes Hanna Teklie, an Ethiopian entrepreneur and many others who are investing in cryptocurrencies, as EBR’s Ashenafi Endale writes.
Life expectancy, one of the methods used to measure health in various countries, has drastically risen in Africa from 50.9 years in 2012 to as high as 54 years last year, according to UNDP. The gain in longevity is observed despite the fact that large section of the African population still suffers from poverty, malnutrition, illiteracy, and low access to health facilities, communicable diseases, and a lack of access to clean water. Despite the improvement, the lowest life expectancy in the world is located in the continent. Africa’s Sierra Leone has a life expectancy of only 50.1 years, the lowest in the world.
The Horn of Africa is one of the most unstable regions in the world. It has long been known for economic, political and humanitarian crises. However, these challenges have not repelled global and regional powers, chiefly because of the region’s strategic geopolitical importance for global security and international trade. This makes the region a battleground among global actors whose economic and security interests exceed their national boundaries. The United States, France, China, the United Arab Emirates, Turkey and Iran have already set up military bases in the region. Germany, Japan and India are also focusing on the area. More recently, with the security bloc formation, spearheaded by Saudi Arabia and Iran respectively, the region has further become a battle of religious, economic and security influences. In fact, the Horn countries have been highly influenced to side with either of the two blocs. Despite this influence, Ethiopia has remained neutral for many years. Recently, however, worries are mounting that Ethiopia will likely side with the bloc led by Saudi Arabia. However, the government claims that it is firm in its neutral position. EBR’s Samson Berhane investigates.
Ashenafi Endale
Samson Berhane
Misker Getahun
Mukhisa Kituyi
Ethiopian Business Review