Ethiopian Business ReviewThe UN projects average world GDP growth at 2.7Pct in 2021, up from 2.5Pct in 2020 and 2.3Pct in 2019—a ten-year low since the 2008 global financial crisis. The pickup in global activity will likely be driven by somewhat faster growth in developing regions, where several large economies are expected to recover from adverse shocks. East Asia remains the world’s fastest growing region.
Ethiopia has been impelling for the expansion of Djiboutian ports to accommodate its mushrooming foreign trade on top of exploring alternative sea gates, including the purchase of a stake in Somalia’s Berbera port. The country is also under negotiations with Eritrea to develop the ports of Massawa and Assab. The recent establishment of a one-stop border post (OSBP) between Kenya and Ethiopia alongside the completion of the Hawassa-Moyale road project provides Ethiopia, with its heavy and increasing dependence on imports, another option with Lamu, Kenya’s second largest port after Mombasa.
Source: Mo Ibrahim Foundation, The Sustainable Development Goals Center for Africa. Sustainable Development Solutions Network
In the 2020 Africa SDG Index and Dashboards Report, most of the 17 SDG goals have witnessed serious setbacks, mainly due to COVID-19.
The slowdown of domestic economic activity translates into revenue shortfalls. The financing gap for SDGs in Africa that was already large is expected to widen, increasing the fiscal vulnerability of African governments. Without financial resources, sustainable development is elusive.
Mehrteab Leul Kokeb, a leading corporate financial services Lawyer in Ethiopia, has been practicing law for nearly three decades. After earning his law degree from Addis Ababa University in 1992, he worked as a judge in the high court and also as a litigator in the early 2000s. He then partnered with DLA Piper, a London based global law firm with offices in more than 40 countries, and joined the firm’s network by founding Mehrteab Leul & Associates (MLA) Law Office, a de facto law firm advising and representing corporate clients on business and investment issues in Ethiopia. Mehrteab has also studied financial services law at the University of London.
Following the demonetization of the Birr early Septemeber this year; and the strict regulation of the financial sector, a huge sum of money circulating outside the formal banking industry is fast declining as citizens rush to open new bank accounts and change old notes with new ones.
This has increased banks liquidity by six-fold. How are the banks going to deal with this increased liquidity? Will it lead to reduced lending interest? Will it improve access to finance to cash-starving companies in the agriculture and manufacturing sectors?
EBR had an audience with Muluneh Aboyeh, vice president of risk and compliance management at the Commercial Bank of Ethiopia (CBE) to discuss about the possible impacts of excess liquidity in CBE and the banking industry at large and how they are working to utilize it.
Ministry of Mines (MoM) revokes 63 investment licenses, of which 38 are mining and the rest are exploration companies. Underperformance, failure to renew licenses, and wasting public resources are mentioned as the rationales, according Takele Uma (Eng.), recently appointed minister of MoM.
Over the last five months, the mining sector generated USD302.9 million from export, of which USD299.1 million is from gold export, a magical comeback from a mediocre USD27.9 million for the whole 2019/20 fiscal year.
Foreign currency generated from export of Gold exceeded coffee, for the first time. Gold generated USD265.3 million during the first quarter of 2020/21, while coffee USD230.5 million, followed by cut flower and khat, at USD138.2 million and USD129.5 million, respectively.
The National Bank of Ethiopia (NBE) announced there are only 12 days left to transact with the old currency notes. After the 12 days, people can bring the old notes to banks and change it with the new ones, but cannot transact with it.
The Addis Ababa city administration has discovered over 1,000-hectare plots of land whose owners are unknown and held illegally. The administration also found 100 houses unidentified with legal owners.
The informal land and housing market mushroomed in the capital, is under reform, according to Adanech Abebe, deputy mayor, while disclosing findings of undergoing land and housing audit assessment.
Number of Ethiopian asylum seekers crossed into Sudan has surpassed 25,300, according to United Nations for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (UNOCHA). “the UN is alarmed by the escalating conflict in north Ethiopia, increasing insecurity in western and southern Oromia, as well as eastern Benishangul Gumuz region,” stated the organization, on November 16, 2020.
