Ministry of Trade and Regional Integration (MoTRI) drafts the first ever trade, quality and livestock trading policies to streamline the country’s economic backbone of commerce and standards.
The draft trade policy targets that the country’s trade will be liberalized in the medium run of the policy implementation.
Despite trade being one of the longest economic rocks of the country, a clear policy to lead the sector has yet to be set.
Because of the sector’s problematic nature, the government over the course of the last five years has placed the gas on the pedal to alleviate these challenges by drawing a clear strategy to curve out a trade policy.
As a result, a draft directive was developed by MoTRI and has been published for additional inputs before its ratification by the Council of Ministers.
The preamble of the draft document indicated that the policy will lead the country’s trade system and will consider trade negotiations, agreements, unification, international practices and trade chains. It will also focus on commodity, service and agro industry sectors that the government and international trade players give priority to.
The trade policy is noted to be based on the creation of a robust trade sector, fair trade, and on the acknowledgement of government’s involvement on selected sectors, in consideration of the efforts of filling the gaps.
As the writings cited, “Even though the country has several bilateral, regional continental agreements to expand its trade relation, lack of a policy framework on the trade sector has created a gap for those who have ample knowledge about the agreements and the opportunity that they made. Due to that the policy will narrow the gap and create opportunity for its citizens.”
The policy also considers the global value chain (GVC) on the trade sector that will allow trading actors and SMEs to be part of the GVC and AfCFTA.
It also mentioned barriers like customs procedures; transport and logistics supplies will be eased through the policy.
The policy documents are said to demand the coordination and involvement of several ministries and other stakeholders.
As noted, the document will be an instrument for the Ethiopian trade system, and is signaled to increase productivity and diversity in the economic drive in order to build reliable and tangible development in the country.
The trade policy also gives priority to harmonize the country’s trading system, export access to input and in the expansion of the international trade besides facilities that open the market.
The policy has put three execution strategies that are classified as short, medium and long run. The initial period will focus on building a capacity for intuitions that are responsible to implement the policy.
The second phase will focus on liberalizing the commerce and the joining of the World Trade Organization on the aim to expand the potential that shall be attained when the market will be opened for global actors.
In the long run, it has targeted to boost the country’s trade and through diversified export items, it aims to attract more investments that shall be backed by a strong economic system.
In related developments, MoTRI has also drafted the first ever quality policy and livestock trading policy.
Currently, the country has regulatory bodies like Ethiopian Standards Agency, Conformity Assessment Agency, and Ethiopian National Accreditation Office which have been formed to control quality and standards but they do not have policy that helps them run on a given legal framework.
The draft policy is said to offer a solution for this and shall abide by a legal framework that allows the country to be competitive. It is further expected to allow the country to develop a required legal framework under the goal of the policy. The quality policy will cover every dimension of production quality whether it is service or goods.
The livestock trading policy also targets to use the country livestock resource properly and expand the benefit from it.
The draft document stated that despite Ethiopia being one of the richest countries on livestock resource, the potential is yet to be fully exploited; as a result the policy was crafted to guide the sector to be run accordingly.

Flintstone Homes, one of the pioneering private companies engaged in the real estate and construction sector, prepares to go public with offerings of ten million shares.
The company plans to start share selling as of July 15, 2023 and targets to generate 5 billion birr from the share sale.
According to the company’s founder, Tsedeke Yihune, during a press conference held at Hyatt Regency Hotel on Tuesday, May 16 2023, the minimum amount of shares offered for sale is 20 thousand birr while the maximum is two million birr, at one thousand birr a share.
The sale of the shares was said to be necessary mainly to transform the company from a five-person partnership to a public property, as well as to obtain additional capital. The company plans to build ten thousand houses and deliver them to consumers in the next five years.
“If an individual can start out with a capital of 6,000 birr and do in billions worth of work then it accordingly means that thousands of shareholders’ money and good management will enable to do more transcendental work,” Tsedeke noted, indicating that the plan is also to solve the company’s serious financial problems.
As indicated on the press conference, Flintstone Homes is expanding its reach in different regions. Tsedeke stated that they had plans to expand real estate construction in Oromia, Amhara, Tigray and Afar regions, especially in rural towns. The founder further pointed out that although the security problem prevented them from achieving their plans, they will implement their projects as soon as peace prevails.
During the company’s response in a series of frequently asked questions that pointed towards not delivering houses on time, the firm cited that over the last eight years it had not been able to deliver projects as per said timelines since delivering cost friendly homes takes time. Likewise, financial problems and the recent rise of cement and steel prices have aggravated the issue.
Flintstone Homes is a real estate business which was launched in 2008 by Flintstone Engineering s.co, which was formerly known as ‘Tsedeke Yihune Construction’ when founded in 1992 whist joining the Ethiopian construction sector as a level 8 building contractor. A year later the company was named Flintstone Engineering.
The firm in last 15 years has handed over five thousand houses including shops to customers. The company has about 3,500 houses under construction, and about 6,500 houses that are about to be completed and placed on the market. In the next five years, a total of 10,000 houses are planned to be handed over to customers.

Ahadu bank pens partnership agreement with two tech companies, Chapa Technologies Solution and Laki Pay Fin-tech.
The companies signed the agreement on Friday May 19, 2023 in a ceremony held at the Inter-luxury hotel. According to the bank, the technology companies will provide a digital payment gateway service which will streamline all its banking activities.
“In terms of improved efficiency, the bank will be able to streamline its process and reduce the time and resource required to complete various tasks, including mobile apps. Furthermore, online bank customers can access their information and easily transfer fund, pay bills, and much more which enhances customer experience,” stated the bank in its statement.

Ahadu bank which is in its maiden financial year started its operation on July 16, 2022 making it the 20th financial entrant to the country’s expanding financial sector with a 671-million-birr capital.
The bank has now more than 140k customers and 60 branches all over the country, and is now on track to reach 70 branches before the end of the fiscal year. As indicated on the signing ceremony, the bank has more than 1.2-billion-birr in deposit.
Its partner in this endeavor, Chapa, was established in 2020 by a team of home-grown engineers, researchers, and entrepreneurs who now serve as an Ethiopian financial service provider and data engineering company. As the firm outlines, the inevitable increase in global trade which has been visibly troubled by inconvenient payment methods has served as the strongest initiative behind the establishment of Chapa.
Laki pay is also a payment gateway and hardware free soft mPOS that processes online payment authentication and safely passes cardholder data among the parties within the transaction flow.

Big 5 Construct exhibits in Addis

Government’s high engagement in the construction sector has come at a cost of inflation, balance of payment pressure and debt risk, the Ministry of Finance underlines.
Speaking on the opening ceremony of the Big 5 Construct Ethiopia exhibition Ahmed Shide, Minister of Finance pointed out that over the last 15 years, the government has heavily invested on massive infrastructures including road networks, railways, airports, irrigation development, and expansion of universities.
Nevertheless, as the Minister contrasts, despite the merits of the projects whose outcomes are rapid economic growth, the flipside has led to inflation, debt risk, as well as a balance of payment pressure.

“The government for the last few years has been working a lot on the home grown economic reform agenda to sustain and achieve fast economic growths and to have a price stability on the economy as well as sustainable balance of payment availability,” Ahmed stated, adding, “As part of the home grown economic agenda, we are working to rebalance the role of the State in terms of investment, and in encouraging more private sector engagement in to the economy. The government is now paving the way for meaningful and significant private sector development in the economy.”
In recent years, it is well known that government has mainly been investing in infrastructure developments including parks, palaces, roads, railway, irrigation systems, housing and industrial parks.
“Significant portion of our budget goes to infrastructure related activities for which construction is atop,” the minister cited indicating that the government will continue to maintain its strategic investments only on huge flagships such as hydropower dams.
On matters exhibition, the first edition of the Big 5 Construct took place from 18 to 20 May 2023 at the Millennium Hall in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.
Highlighting the top opportunities, products, services and stakeholders in Ethiopia’s construction industry, the exhibition brought together 6,000 plus building, construction, and infrastructure professionals to network, inspire growth and uncover the latest trends and innovation in construction.
“The exhibition is aligned with the objectives of the nation’s 10-year perspective development plan, Ethiopia 2030: The Pathway to Prosperity, particularly the goal to prioritize a thriving construction sector. The country offers many prospects in industries including construction, manufacturing, and infrastructure,” said Chaltu Sani, Minister for Urban and Infrastructure while endorsing the exhibition.
At least 15 countries comprising 100 plus manufacturers and distributors exhibited their latest products and services, innovations and solutions pertaining to the full construction cycle from inception to completion in the Ethiopian construction industry.
Availability of foreign currency, lack of raw materials and construction products, bureaucracy are said to be some of the challenges in the construction sector.

“Government has given significant incentives for the construction sector in general terms of making free of charge importing materials, supporting the capacity building of local construction and in addressing some of the micro economic challenges like inflation, and Forex,” said Ahmed, adding, “To enable investors to best navigate forex challenge for strategy investors, we are going to allow the convertibility and transferability guarantee as part of PPP or a joint venture project involving either Ethiopian Investment Holding as well as major investors across the globe.”
“We have been supporting domestic construction industries for the last years and will continue to do so. Nonetheless, we are also attracting more international construction companies into Ethiopia,” he further elaborated on the progress made over the years.
The twelfth edition of Addis build, now in the global portfolio of construction events as Big 5 Construct Ethiopia was organized by dmg events, a leading organizer of face-to-face events and publisher of trade magazines and information services, alongside Ethel Events & Communications as its local partner.
According to global data, the size of Ethiopia’s construction market reached USD 41 billion in 2021. Its average annual growth rate is expected to increase by more than 8% over 2023-2026, indicating a promising future for the industry. Whilst key sectors for growth include construction in the industrial, commercial, residential, energy and utilities and infrastructure sectors.