EBR_News Sep 2, 2026

The Brazilian Trade and Investment Promotion Agency (ApexBrasil) inaugurated its first permanent office in Africa in Addis Ababa on Tuesday, positioning Ethiopia as Brazil’s institutional entry point into the continent after years of declining trade between the two sides. The ceremony was held at the Skylight Hotel and brought together senior Ethiopian and Brazilian officials, business representatives and diplomatic missions.

Jandyr Ferreira dos Santos, Brazil’s ambassador to Ethiopia, said Brazil had also expanded its institutional presence in Addis Ababa in recent years, establishing an agricultural attaché office and a federal police attaché alongside the new ApexBrasil office, and that Brazil had backed Ethiopia’s accession process to the World Trade Organization.

The Addis Ababa opening capped a weeklong Southern Africa business mission that began on 26 August 2026 in Johannesburg, South Africa, and continued through Lusaka, Zambia, and Maputo, Mozambique, where Brazil served as Guest Country of Honour at the Maputo International Fair, according to Brasil 247. The Ethiopia leg was the mission’s final and only stop outside Southern Africa, and the one where ApexBrasil formally opened its new office. 

The office follows a proposal from the Ethiopian Investment Commission after ApexBrasil led its largest ever business mission to Ethiopia in February 2026, according to Meles Alem, director general for European and American affairs at Ethiopia’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs. That mission brought more than 70 Brazilian delegates to Addis Ababa, produced over 300 business-to-business meetings, and resulted in memoranda of understanding, including one between Ethiopia’s Kerchanshe Group and Brazil’s agricultural research corporation, Embrapa, Meles said.

The inauguration builds on recent diplomatic momentum. President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva of Brazil visited Ethiopia in 2024, while Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed (PhD) visited Brazil the following year, with the two leaders agreeing to deepen economic ties at the Rio Summit in July 2025, Meles said. Ethiopia and Brazil are marking 75 years of diplomatic relations this year, and both countries are members of the BRICS bloc.

Laudemir Müller, president of ApexBrasil, said Brazil’s trade with Africa had grown from around five billion dollars in 2002 to 28 billion dollars in 2013, before falling to a low of 11.5 billion dollars in 2020. Trade has since recovered to 25 billion dollars in 2025, Müller said, adding that Ethiopia was selected for the agency’s first African office partly because its economy is projected to grow nine percent this year and its imports already exceed 23 billion dollars.

Ethiopian Investment Commissioner Zeleke Temesgen (PhD) said the office arrives as Ethiopia carries out reforms under its Homegrown Economic Reform Agenda, including a market-determined exchange rate, a modernised monetary framework and steps to strengthen financial sector resilience. 

Zeleke said these measures had contributed to declining inflation, expanding foreign exchange availability and rising investor confidence, and noted Ethiopia’s recent accession to the New Development Bank as a further source of financing for large scale investment.

Meles said Ethiopia’s position as a diplomatic and aviation hub, supported by Ethiopian Airlines’ daily direct flight to São Paulo, gave Brazilian companies unmatched access to the continent, while the country’s membership of the African Continental Free Trade Area opens a market of over 1.4 billion consumers. 

The office is expected to focus on sectors including agriculture, agroprocessing, pharmaceuticals, textiles, mining and renewable energy, according to the Ethiopian Investment Commission.

Müller said the new office would allow ApexBrasil to pursue opportunities in Ethiopia and the wider East African market on a continuous basis rather than through periodic missions, describing permanence as a way to carry relationships and projects through from start to finish.

#ApexBrasil #EthiopiaBrazil #ForeignDirectInvestment #BRICS #TradeAndInvestment #EthiopianEconomy #AfCFTA

#EBR_News Aug 31, 2026

Ethiopia has been independently confirmed as a new source of paraíba tourmaline,one of the rarest and most commercially valuable gemstones in the world, by two of the global gemstone industry’s most authoritative laboratories, in a development that could open a significant new chapter for Ethiopia’s mining and gemstone export sector.

The Gemological Institute of America and the Gübelin Gem Lab of Switzerland announced their separate findings in a joint press release on August 27, 2026.

According to the press release, both laboratories independently examined copper-bearing tourmaline from a newly reported Ethiopian deposit and established, through separate scientific investigations using distinct reference samples and analytical protocols, that the material meets the widely accepted definition of paraíba tourmaline.

The confirmation makes Ethiopia only the fourth known geographic origin of paraíba tourmaline globally, alongside Brazil, where the stone was first discovered in the 1980s Mozambique, and Nigeria.

Paraíba tourmalines command exceptional prices in international gem markets, with top-quality specimens from established sources regularly fetching tens of thousands of dollars per carat due to their distinctive neon blue and blue-green colour caused by copper content.

Reports of copper-bearing tourmaline from Ethiopia began circulating in the gemstone trade earlier in 2026. The Gübelin Gem Lab said it first encountered the material in early May 2026, when several stones displayed an unusual chemical composition that did not match existing reference data from any known origin.

A senior Gübelin gemmologist subsequently travelled to Ethiopia to work with local dealers with direct access to the mining area, assembling approximately 300 rough and faceted stones for analysis. GIA began examining Ethiopian material in June 2026 and received a parcel of more than 100 rough and faceted samples from the Ferreira Group in July for detailed scientific investigation.

Both laboratories found that the Ethiopian material is chemically distinct from paraíba tourmaline of all other known origins and notably, identifiable without the need for research-grade laboratory equipment.

“What is most striking about the Ethiopian material is that despite considerable, complex chemical variation between individual samples, they share a remarkably distinct and coherent compositional signature,” said Peter Tollan, Head of Research and Development at the Gübelin Gem Lab.

GIA senior research manager Aaron Palke added that the institution can now confidently identify Ethiopia as an origin on its Tourmaline Identification and Origin Reports. The material encompasses blue to bluish green colours as well as violet, purple, and colourless specimens, with many stones displaying pronounced colour zoning.

Betegbar Yaregal

#EBR_News Aug 28, 2026

Ethiopian Electric Power has cut electricity supply to data mining operations by 75%, delivering only around 23% of contracted volumes, as declining water inflows into the country’s hydroelectric dams forced the corporation to prioritise public electricity access over its largest single revenue-generating customer segment, chief executive officer Ashebir Balcha said at the corporation’s annual performance briefing in Addis Ababa on Friday.

The disclosure helps explain a trend flagged in EEP’s own 2025/26 fiscal year performance report, which showed capacity utilisation falling to 60%, against a target of 67%, even as the corporation’s installed generation capacity grew 23% to 9,730 MW during the year.

Ashebir said the reduction was deliberate and pre-emptive, rather than the result of unforeseen technical failure. “We had agreed to deliver 98% under the Power Purchase Agreement (PPA) we signed. However, recognising that a dry period is approaching, we reduced the supply by 75% and are currently delivering only around 23%,” he said.

According to Ashebir, EEP’s decision-making was driven by seasonal water inflow patterns into its hydro reservoirs, which supply 95% of the corporation’s total generation mix. He said the highest water inflows typically occur in July and August, with the peak inflow for the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD) specifically occurring in August, and some continued inflow into September.

“Because we anticipated this through early forecasts over the past few months, we acted quickly to reduce power supply to data mining,” he said, adding that monitoring and meteorological forecasts now indicate incoming water levels are decreasing by at least 20%, prompting the corporation to lower both its revenue and supply projections for the year ahead.

Ashebir was direct about where data mining, a segment that generated 50.37 billion birr in the past fiscal year, more than any other customer category, ranks in the corporation’s order of priorities.

“Data mining and energy exports are secondary priorities for us, our primary focus is our public and domestic industries,” he said, noting that despite complaints lodged by affected data mining clients, EEP would not restore their supply “while leaving our people in the dark.”

The CEO said the corporation would reassess its position in October, once clearer data on generation capacity for the new water year becomes available, and would then decide whether to increase or further reduce supply to the segment.

He also detailed the direct technical link between falling water volumes and output, saying that as reservoir levels drop, generation capacity decreases proportionally, with EEP losing up to 50 megawatts of capacity per generating unit.

Betegbar Yaregal

#EBR_News Aug 17, 2026

When Ethiopia’s EPRDF government allowed private insurers back into the market in 1991, the expectation was that competition would deepen the sector. Thirty-five years later, the data tells a different story. Insurance penetration premiums as a share of GDP stood at 0.56% in 1991, according to World Bank records.

By 2026, the National Bank of Ethiopia reports that figure at approximately 0.27%, according to a historical analysis compiled by Fikru Tsegaye Wordofa (PhD), Executive Officer for Strategy and Business Development at Ethio Re, and presented at Skylight Hotel in Addis Ababa last week.

The finding directly challenges a widespread assumption: that opening a market to private players automatically deepens it. According to the analysis, Ethiopia has added insurers, brokers and products since liberalization yet the sector has lost ground relative to the economy.

The presentation attributed this to structural gaps that private competition alone cannot close: low financial literacy, limited product innovation, shallow digital distribution, and the absence of an independent regulatory framework with a development mandate.

The numbers illustrate the problem concretely. Ethiopia today has 19 licensed insurers generating a total gross written premium of approximately 54 billion birr (USD 334 million) less than 0.45% of Africa’s insurance market and below 0.03% of the global total, according to AIO and Swiss Re data.

Life insurance, a standard measure of market maturity, accounts for just 6.9% of Ethiopia’s total premiums. In Kenya a market that liberalized under stronger regulatory conditions life insurance makes up over 50%.

The presentation drew on comparative experience from India, China, Kenya and Morocco to argue that liberalization must be accompanied by an independent regulator, real competition, adequate capital, product innovation and consumer confidence.

Without all five conditions, market opening produces insurer proliferation without meaningful penetration growth. According to the analysis, India’s post-1999 experience where penetration grew from 1.93% to 4.2% after insurers multiplied from 7 to 67 demonstrates what structured liberalization with regulatory independence can achieve.

Betegbar Yaregal

#EBR_News Aug 17, 2026

Zambia Airways has appointed Aman Wole Gurmu as its Chief Executive Officer, effective 1 August 2026, the airline announced from Lusaka on 6 August. Aman joins the carrier directly from the Ethiopian Airlines Group, where he built over 19 years of experience spanning airline leadership, commercial strategy, sales, market development, and strategic partnerships across Africa, Europe, and Asia.

According to the statement released by Zambia Airways’ Board of Directors, Aman’s career includes serving as Regional Director for Mainland China and Mongolia, Regional Director for France and the Maghreb, Area Manager for Zambia, and Director of Sales in Addis Ababa. His familiarity with the Zambian market having previously served as Area Manager there makes him a particularly known figure in the country he now leads the national carrier for.

Board Chairperson Jomo Matululu welcomed the appointment and expressed confidence in the new CEO’s direction. “This appointment reflects the Board’s commitment to strong leadership and our vision of building a competitive, safe, customer-focused and market-driven airline that connects Zambia to regional and global opportunities,” Matululu said in the statement.

Commenting on his appointment, Aman said: “It is a great honour to lead Zambia Airways at this important stage of its journey. Together with our Board, employees, Government, regulators and stakeholders, we will continue building a safe, reliable and customer-focused national airline that reflects the pride and aspirations of the Zambian people.” He identified safety standards, operational excellence, people investment, strategic partnerships, and customer service as his immediate priorities.

Aman is the third consecutive Ethiopian to lead Zambia Airways since it resumed operations in December 2021. Asrat Jiru served as the airline’s first CEO under a five-year mandate granted to the Ethiopian Airlines Group to nominate the initial chief executive. Thomas Gabreyohannes Woldesenbet succeeded him from April 2024, and now Aman takes over the role. The pattern reflects the broader influence of the Ethiopian Airlines Group, which has become a significant source of aviation leadership talent across the continent.

Aman’s appointment adds to a growing list of Ethiopian aviation executives leading African carriers. Tewolde Gebremariam has been newly appointed CEO of Air India; Esayas Woldemariam Hailu leads ASKY Airlines in Togo; Mesfin Biru Weldegeorgis serves as Director General of Air Congo in the DRC; Solomon Bekele heads Malawi Airlines; and Girma Wake has served as Interim CEO and Consultant at Uganda Airlines.

The pattern underscores how Ethiopian Airlines’ training and management pipeline has become a continental resource, placing its alumni in the cockpits of national carriers from West Africa to Southern Africa to South Asia.

Zambia Airways currently operates regional routes to Dar es Salaam, Harare, Johannesburg, and Nairobi, alongside domestic services covering Lusaka, Ndola, Livingstone, and Solwezi. Whether Aman can leverage his network development experience to expand that footprint further will be closely watched by the regional aviation industry.

Betegbar Yaregal

#EBR_News Aug 17, 2026

Ethiopia has 157 million registered mobile money accounts, but less than 15% of accounts across the country’s digital financial channels are active, according to the National Bank of Ethiopia (NBE).

Solomon Damtew Metaferia, Director of the Banking and Payment Systems Directorate at the NBE, disclosed the figures while speaking at the 29th Connected Banking Summit and Innovation and Excellence Awards 2026 in Addis Ababa on Wednesday.

Solomon said activation rates vary across digital financial channels, with mobile banking recording relatively higher usage while mobile money and agent-based accounts have lower activation rates. Overall, however, the activation rate remains below 15%, indicating a significant gap between account registration and actual use.

He also pointed to continued gaps in access to financial services, particularly between urban and rural areas. According to Solomon, women in rural areas still travel an average of six hours to access basic banking services.

The NBE is seeking to address these challenges through the National Digital Payments Strategy 2.0. Solomon said the first National Digital Payments Strategy helped establish the digital financial ecosystem, introduce non-bank financial service providers and build interoperability infrastructure. Ethiopia now has more than 35 non-bank digital financial service providers, he said.

Digital transaction volumes have also increased significantly. According to Solomon, transactions across Ethiopia’s financial ecosystem reached 33 trillion Br in the current fiscal year, compared with 4.7 trillion Br in mid 2023 and 240 billion Br in 2020.

The NBE’s strategy includes developing a Digital Public Infrastructure framework by 2030, consisting of real-time payment infrastructure, a national digital identity and trust layer, and a data exchange layer.

The strategy also includes open APIs, cloud platforms, a common fraud compensation fund and plans covering central bank digital currency, virtual assets, stable coins and tokenization.

The NBE’s focus is therefore shifting from expanding the number of digital accounts to increasing their actual use and improving access to digital financial services, particularly among underserved groups.

Betegbar Yaregal

#EBR_News Aug 7, 2026

Ethiopian Electric Utility uncovered electricity theft and meter irregularities worth 2.89 billion birr during the 2025/26 fiscal year following an inspection of 2.47 million energy meters, with 1,089 individuals now facing legal proceedings and 124 people already prosecuted for infrastructure theft and vandalism some receiving prison sentences of up to 15 years. The figures were presented by utility CEO Getu Geremew at a media briefing on August 7, 2026.

According to the performance report, the inspection programme covered 111.9 percent of its planned target, examining meters across the utility’s service area and identifying 87,716 cases of irregularities. The losses associated with those irregularities totaled 1,493 gigawatt-hours of energy, valued at 2.89 billion birr.

Through corrective actions and enforcement, the utility said it recovered 2.237 billion birr of those losses during the fiscal year leaving a remaining gap of roughly 653 million birr unrecovered from detected theft alone. The 2.89 billion birr figure does not capture undetected losses, meaning the true cost of energy theft across the network is likely higher.

Beyond individual theft, the utility is also contending with organized infrastructure vandalism. The report indicated that 124 individuals were prosecuted during the fiscal year for sabotaging physical infrastructure including power lines, transformers, and distribution equipment with courts handing down custodial sentences of up to 15 years.

The short code 908 was launched during the year to allow the public to report infrastructure damage and theft directly to the utility, and an e-receipt application was introduced to reduce opportunities for off-system billing manipulation.

Internal misconduct added a further dimension to the governance challenge. According to the report, the utility received 621 whistle-blower tips 505 through digital channels and 116 through other means and investigated 595 of them.

Of those investigated, 169 employees were found guilty of misconduct, with administrative actions including warnings, salary penalties, demotions, and dismissals taken against 166.

The involvement of utility employees in facilitating or enabling theft was not explicitly quantified in the report, but the scale of the whistle-blower programme and the employee misconduct findings suggest the problem extends inside the institution as well as outside it.

Aging infrastructure, substation capacity constraints, right-of-way clearance difficulties, and fuel shortages for field operations were all cited as ongoing institutional challenges.

The utility rehabilitated 4,892 kilometers of distribution network during the fiscal year and resolved 86 percent of identified network vulnerabilities through preventative maintenance, but large portions of the grid remain aged and susceptible to technical losses that can be difficult to distinguish from commercial theft in the absence of advanced metering infrastructure.

#EBR_News Aug 3, 2026

A striking revenue concentration sits at the heart of Ethiopia’s large taxpayer system: fewer than three in ten registered companies within the country’s Large Taxpayers Branch Office are responsible for generating four-fifths of everything it collects.

Figures presented by the Ministry of Revenue’s Large Taxpayers Branch Office at Skylight Hotel show that the office collected 522.67 billion birr in the 2025/26 fiscal year from 746 registered taxpayers. However, 29 percent of these taxpayers accounted for 80 percent of the total revenue, while the remaining 71 percent contributed only 20 percent.

The breakdown by taxpayer category makes the imbalance even more stark. According to the presentation, state-owned enterprises numbering just 31 companies, or four percent of the 746-strong taxpayer base contributed 217.87 billion birr, representing 42 percent of all branch revenue.

Foreign direct investment private companies, comprising 127 taxpayers or 17 percent of the base, added 102.24 billion birr (20%), while 50 banks and insurance companies contributed 65.37 billion birr (12%). The remaining 532 private companies’ 71 percent of all registered taxpayers generated only 104.60 billion birr, or 20 percent of total revenue.

The top ten taxpayers alone crystallize this concentration. The presentation showed that ten companies together paid 254.44-billion-birr 48.71 percent of total branch revenue with Ethio Telecom Share Company leading at 65.84 billion birr (12.60%), followed by Commercial Bank of Ethiopia at 36.87 billion birr and Ethiopian Airlines Group at 30.87 billion birr. Eight of those ten spots are held by state-owned or government-linked entities, with Heineken Breweries Share Company and Awash Bank Share Company the only private companies in the group.

This pattern is not unique to Ethiopia. According to the presentation, IMF guidance recommends categorizing taxpayers into large, medium, small, and micro tiers, and the global norm is for large taxpayers representing just one to 1.5 percent of the total taxpayer population to generate more than 70 percent of total revenue.

Ethiopia’s large taxpayer segment broadly fits that model, though the degree of concentration within the large taxpayer group itself where a handful of public enterprises dominate reflects the particular structure of Ethiopia’s economy, where state-owned companies control the telecoms, aviation, banking, power, and logistics sectors.

The numbers also reveal the fiscal work the system still cannot extract from its private segment. Five hundred and thirty-two private companies registered as large taxpayers contributed an average of roughly 197 million birr each last year while Ethio Telecom alone paid 65.84 billion birr. Even Awash Bank, the top-ranked domestic private taxpayer, paid 15.77 billion birr, nearly 80 times the average private company contribution within the same portfolio.

The challenge that this concentration poses is an explicit one in the branch’s own planning documents. For 2026/27, the office has been assigned a revenue target of 816.70 billion birr 56 percent above what it collected in 2025/26 representing 76 percent of the country’s entire domestic tax revenue target. Achieving that on the back of the same narrow cluster of state enterprises and a handful of large private firms is a structural risk.

The presentation acknowledged persistent compliance failures among smaller taxpayers, including under-declaration of sales, circulation of fake invoices, and failure to submit audited financial statements on time suggesting the gap between what the private sector earns and what it declares remains a material one.