The government reaffirmed that the gangsters under the TPLF will be dismantled shortly and rule of law and peace will be prevailed in the area.
It has disclosed several successes have been achieved in the operation held in the northern part of the country since the gangsters launched an offensive act on the Ethiopian Defense Force on Tuesday November 4.
The government disclosed that the operation is focusing on librating areas that were controlled by the gangsters force and encircled illegal actors some of whom have already been charged on treason and other massive criminal acts by the Federal Attorney General.
Redwan Hussein (Amb), State of Emergency Task Force Spokesperson, told media on Tuesday November 10 that the TPLF has crossed the non-negotiable red line in attacking the northern command based in Meqele and other parts of Tigray region.
“In Meqele we do not have combatant military personnel except health workers and administrative staffs. In other posts we have soldiers but the attack actually occurred simultaneously in several posts, in Meqele and thus it was easier because we do not have several troops. But in other areas they try to execrate themselves, first repealing the attack and protecting themselves and as a result they manage to escape and retreat in some area in the Eritrean border and other areas,” Redwan said.
“In some post it took three days for the force to keep itself safe from attack and additional forces arrived and rescue them,” he added.
According to Redwan, on November 5, the gang issued a declaration that it had armed itself with weaponry including missiles, which they took from the defense force as they stated that they shall attack anybody whoever comes to face them.
“This shows the account of who began the conflict in the first place,” he said.
He said that if Ethiopia has to sustain like any country; rule of law has to be reviled, the constitution has to be appealed and has to make assured not any entity, a group or individual, whether armed or not could not be runamok and become the law to self.
“So a country has to be run by the rule of law. Therefore,any region or district has toabide by the constitution and the federal government has a moral and constitutional right and obligation to make sure that happens,” he added.
The ongoing operation in Tigray Regional State targets mainly to salvage the whole nation and prevail the rule of law in the land.
“The very objective of this operation are three, it includes; making sure those who are involved in treason face legal measures, and to make sure that any weaponry taken by the illegal group to be possessed by the government, who is responsible to control the arms, and lastly to impose the rule of law in the area,” the Spokesperson said.
Stating the damage of having dangerous arsenal in regional state and TPLF junta group alone, Redwan said one of the objectives of the continuing operation is disarming the arsenals which are in the hands of the group.
He appreciated the concept of negotiation that the government had tried in its best to solve the difference, but the group of gangs at TPLF refused. He added that the upcoming talk will be going based on the end of the operation that the government set to accomplish on the latest rule of law mission.
“We may talk when the three targets that the government set to attain have been achieved, that is, the rule of law restored, the hostage freed and arms obtained with the gang members arraigned into the legal process,” he explained.
He said that in the eve of the attack the regional leader called the Prime Minister and had a conversation on handling the issue amicably. The PM just promised him that they can manage issues in cordial way.
He underlined that the Defense Force that retreated, have regrouped and come back to engage in offensive attack and have since ceased several areas. Since the press conference was given the government disclosed that its forces have controlled massive areas and strategic towns and plots from the gang force.
The advancements in Ethiopia’s Tigray crisis
The NGO focused in improving favorable coffee markets
Love to nation non-governmental organization is going to prepare an international coffee and tourism event that creates a favorable environment for the promotion of Ethiopia coffee as a country of origin.
The organizers announced that the event will be a six day consecutive event as from the25th to the 30th of January to be held at the Elily International Hotel in Addis Ababa. The event seeks to increase Ethiopia’s foreign exchange earnings from coffee exports.
Love to nation is a non-profit organization that focuses on the proper use and development of country’s agricultural, minerals and tourism resources.
“In collaboration with partners from around the world, we are introducing Ethiopian coffee to international business and community investors and technologists,” said Henock Megersa founder of love to nation NGO.
“Love to nation is an institution that came to Ethiopia seeking to invest and work in partnership with our country’s investors,” he explained.
The organizers explained that the forum will bring together coffee growers and processors as well as coffee exporters and international buyers, who will be present at the event.
Henock, said the purpose of the event is to help coffee growers make a better income. He said the capacity building training will be a convenient platform for them to get technology and finance.
“The exhibition will feature coffee buyers and tasters from different countries,” he added.
THE CURIOUS CASE OF BOTTLED WATER
By The ETHIONOMIST
I recently went out scouring the market to shop for my bare essentials, (which are shrinking by the day, darn inflation!) and decided to look for my favorite bottled water brand (I am not telling you which one, being a respectable journalist and all that, ok, I am freelance but should it matter?), and was faced with a lot of new brands that have crowded the shop front of my corner grocery shop. It seemed completely foreign to me, faced with brand names for almost anything and everything. You probably have noticed it too; it’s become the norm to see new bottled water brands on a monthly basis. For a split second, I felt sorry for the people coming-up with the names, who seem to have exhausted local and gone continental, global. No offense. I will keep it real. Bear with me. Anyway, I asked the shop keeper for my brand,
“May I have a bottle of…”
“Yelem” came back the dreaded reply, which apparently has become the first Amharic word foreigners seem to be learning these days, ‘allegedly’.
My apologies, unfortunately, I keep going on tangents, I can’t help it, but I will eventually get to my point. Don’t bother telling me to “focus”. Sometimes it’s about the journey. Really.
Anyway, I asked the shopkeeper “why?”
Instantly came back the reply, “who cares, water is water.”
WRONG. I didn’t have time to explain. As a consumer, shouldn’t I choose what I want? Anyway, I felt a bit irritated and decided to do a little bit of research, a little digging to find out what is going on in the industry, why not? Isn’t it John Wooden that said, “Little things make big things happen”? And in this case, they certainly did. Big time!
First of all, let me give you the low-down, the 411. I have friends in the industry, (as you do), so I started asking for what is going on. Apparently, a few heavyweights in the industry are locked at loggerheads, and we are in the middle of what Economists call a “price-war” for almost a year now, and here is where ETHIONOMICS comes in, as it is no longer Economics. Apparently, wholesale prices are now well below what they were a year ago, and even two years ago in some cases. Who would have imagined this, especially in a time of rampant inflation of over20%? Competition is no longer led by realities in market, but has become a simple piss-contest as that between 5th grader boys. It has become a show of who has the deepest pockets, and who hasn’t. Pure ETHIONOMICS.
- You ask, isn’t this good for consumers though? Well, you would be right, except for the retail trade, that would be the corner-shops for you and me, are benefitting the most and not passing this down to consumers. AHA! So, shops are chasing small discounts, and hence stocking-up on the brand that has the smallest wholesale price for the day, but charging the same old prices to consumers (that would be you and me). Welcome to the other side of ETHIONOMICS.Of-course they can always fall back on the usual, “Yelem!” and who would challenge that?
Gossip has it that a lot of bottled water companies are under financial distress, and commercial banks are struggling to collect debts. Well, it’s barely a secret that you can “buy” new business proposals on the open market when applying for a loan when setting-up your company. Legend has it that it is in-fact the same business proposal that makes the rounds to set-up a bottled water company. So who is to blame for the rising NPL (non-performing loans) that were granted without proper consideration of existing firms and industry past and future trend analysis and prospects? Another side of ETHIONOMICS, you say? You would be right.
By the way, for those of you who like facts and figures,
- It all started with HIGHLAND, from APEX Bottling Co. in the mid-nineties, some 24 years ago, (thank God for pioneers!) the Ethiopian bottled water market is still relatively young by some measure.
- Today, the Ethiopian bottled water industry has 103 players as of October 2020. (No, really, I checked. This is data from the Association’s website.) here’s another tangent, have you noticed how our news outlets are quite liberal with numbers? (Ethiopia has over 80 languages, yadayadayada, how difficult is it? Count them!)
- Total production capacity is 10.4b Liters per annum. (Assuming 20k bottles per hour on average, at 50% capacity utilization). This does not consider capacity up-grades by existing firms that are in the pipeline, or new investments that are preparing to join the industry.
- Between the years 2013 and 2020, the industry production capacity has grown over three fold!
- Total demand for water is 3B Liters per annum. (Assuming 100m population with 20% urbanization rate, and a further 20% of consumers having the ability and preference to consume bottled water over tap-water).
- There clearly is a latent over-capacity of bottled water, with supply outstripping demand by at-least 3.5 fold.
- This means, at a growth rate of 30% per annum (3 to 6 times that of annual GDP growth), it will take at-least 5 years before demand meets current supply levels, if supply is constrained at current levels (without additional investment).
- This excess supply is creating unhealthy price competitions that harm the health of the industry as a whole, is leading to inefficient resource allocation, especially in a country like ours.
- This trend doesn’t seem to be slowing down, and new entrants are joining the industry regularly, exacerbating the situation even further. This has exposed some firms with-in the industry to be under financial distress, with a number of firms at the brink of collapse.
- Existing firms with-in the industry face grim prospects, as bottled water is also heavily dependent on scarcely available foreign exchange, and limited “exit strategy options”. The main input material used to make the PET bottles is also heavily reliant on global oil prices, which is currently going through favorable prices, but could heavily impact the industry at times of rising oil prices.
- Gone are the daysof excess demand, and for over three years “excess-supply” has become the “new normal”, while investment continues to pour into the sector. (“Still going strong!” Remember that ad? Oh no, I am getting old… never mind.)
- Talk about a piss-contest, we are doing it at regional levels too. Ethnicity and politics have popped their ugly-head here as well; they are contributing factors for new plants being established where consumers are non-existent!
- The three main reasons contributing to this trend, IMHO, are as follows.
- Government’s blanket tax relief incentive schemes – well, it seems nobody has told the government that the bottled water industry is already saturated, and the different blanket incentive schemes (tax relief for a few years etc…) are actually backfiring and making the situation worse on top of losing it precious tax revenue. I wonder if any of the government ministries ever measure the effectiveness of incentives as policy instruments, by economic sector or industry, and see the overall impact they have brought, or is this borrowing a page from the book of ETHIONOMICS? And mind you, this is all happening in a country where other sectors are starving for resources.
- Here is an example: try providing incentives for only those that use local inputs, or those localizing their supply chains. For example, what does the government have to lose by incentivizing local juice manufacturing to replace juice imports (yes, we do import juice believe it or not, even at the worst of the forex crunch), and give those specific firms a 5-year tax incentive (just pulled this out of the hat actually). But the principle holds. What does the government lose here? Absolutely nothing and everything to gain.
- Irresponsible lending by financial institutions – Our banks and financial institutions need to learn from mistakes elsewhere, irresponsible lending has the power to drag economies into unexpected crisis, the sub-prime mortgage lending scandal is a recent example, although drawing parallels could sound far-fetched, the principle is the same. By the way,I challenge anyone contesting this fact, to check and compare past business proposals in the same sector submitted for funding, and look for similarities, even across time.
- Destructive sentiments and emotional motivations, exhibited by some owners of firms in the industry, making price undercutting decisions based on pride, that require them to subsidize their firms from other operations. But, who cares, right? No one is saying anything.
- Government’s blanket tax relief incentive schemes – well, it seems nobody has told the government that the bottled water industry is already saturated, and the different blanket incentive schemes (tax relief for a few years etc…) are actually backfiring and making the situation worse on top of losing it precious tax revenue. I wonder if any of the government ministries ever measure the effectiveness of incentives as policy instruments, by economic sector or industry, and see the overall impact they have brought, or is this borrowing a page from the book of ETHIONOMICS? And mind you, this is all happening in a country where other sectors are starving for resources.
Hey, all is not doom and gloom, as long as we learn to live another day. On the side of our policy makers, investigating how East Asian Tiger economies in their heyday, especially South Korea, utilized different sector specific economic incentives as policy instruments that influence an economic sector’s value chain to bend to their will effectively, might come in handy. Our financial institutions should lend responsibly, and perhaps a bit more due-diligence might do everyone good, and a bit less NPLs on the balance sheet are not bad either. If there is one take-away from this, it would be to think how horrifying it is to gamble with hundreds of millions of Birr worth of investment, when the country desperately needs it elsewhere. Anyone who’s planning to come-into the sector, and I’ve heard there are quite a few, should seriously consider their prospects and do your due diligence, DULY. Have you ever wondered why it is that we only get reports on investments coming-in, and almost never hear about those going out? On the side of our investors, business should be strictly business, and a bit less ETHIONOMICS for everyone? What do you say?
You can reach the writer at the.ethionomist@gmail.com
Eight African athletes nominated for World Athlete of the Year award
A total of eight African athletes were nominated in the World Athlete of the Year category, athletics’ world governing body, IAAF announced.
Ugandan duo Joshua Cheptegei and Jacob Kiplimo and Kenyan Timothy Cheruiyot were nominated in the Male World Athlete of the Year category.
The Kenyan trio of Peres Jepchirchir, Faith Kipyegon and Hellen Obiri and Ethiopians Letesenbet Gidey and Ababel Yeshaneh were nominated in the Female World Athlete of the Year category.
The eight athletes delivered outstanding performances in 2020 ranging from breaking world records, running world leading times, going undefeated and winning titles.The eight are among a list of 20 nominees for the award, with ten in each category. They were selected by an international panel of athletics experts, comprising representatives from all six continental areas of World Athletics.
A three-way voting process will determine the finalists with World Athletics, the World Athletics Family and the public participating.
The World Athletics Council’s vote will count for 50 percent of the result, while the World Athletics Family’s votes and the public votes will each count for 25 percent of the final result. Voting for the World Athletes of the Year ends at midnight on November 15.
After the end of the voting process, five men and five women finalists will be announced by World Athletics. The World Athletics Awards 2020 are scheduled to be held virtually on December 5.
