Ethiopia continues to receive thousands of migrants returned from countries across the region and the Middle East, in response to the COVID-19 global health pandemic. IOM, the International Organization for Migration, is assisting more than 9,400 migrants in the country’s quarantine facilities. Migrants have been sent back to Ethiopia from the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, Djibouti, Somalia, Sudan, and other countries over the last few weeks.
IOM is supporting the Government of Ethiopia to ensure returning migrants receive medical care, food, shelter and other assistance during quarantine and after, including helping them return to their villages. There are 124 COVID-19 positive cases in Ethiopia and three have died from the disease. There are fears that, were the disease to spread, the public health system could not cope with a major outbreak.
On Thursday (23 April), Ethiopia’s Minister of Labour and Social Affairs, Ergogie Tesfaye, joined IOM’s Chief of Mission to Ethiopia Maureen Achieng, on a visit to one of the quarantine centres, Addis Ababa University’s Sidist Kilo campus, operated by the Government of Ethiopia.
IOM assists hundreds of returning migrants in COVID-19 quarantine sites
Report highlights importance of rural electrification as Ethiopia experiences threats to its economy and food security
Rocky Mountain Institute (RMI) launched a new report that shows how electricity can unlock billions of dollars in new value across six agricultural processing or small business opportunities in some of Ethiopia’s most important crops, while saving money for farmers who switch to electricity from expensive alternatives such as diesel.
In collaboration with the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI); the Ethiopian Ministry of Water, Irrigation and Energy (MoWIE); and Agricultural Transformation Agency (ATA), RMI’s Capturing the Productive Use Dividend: Valuing the Synergies between Rural Electrification and Smallholder Agriculture in Ethiopia report outlines the synergies between rural electrification and agricultural productivity, processing and businesses, and the value that can flow from closely linking the two. By mapping key value chains and opportunities, this report demonstrates the economic case for a national program to promote the productive uses of electricity.
Women leaders rise in solidarity to save lives and protect livelihoods
Supporting the UN Secretary-General’s call for solidarity and urgent action in response to the socio-economic impacts of COVID-19, an initial group of prominent women today joined a global advocacy effort to save lives and protect livelihoods, urging leaders in all countries, across all sectors, to address the human crisis of the pandemic.
Convened by UN Deputy Secretary-General Amina Mohammed, Rise for All brings together women leaders to mobilize support for the UN roadmap to tackle the development emergency, as laid out in the United Nations Framework for the immediate socio-economic response to COVID-19: Shared responsibility, global solidarity and urgent action for people in need, issued today.
“Like no other time in recent history, women are on the frontlines of COVID-19 and bearing the brunt of this human crisis,” said the UN Deputy Secretary-General. “It is time for us to rise as women leaders, taking action to conquer the pandemic and come out stronger so as to keep the world on track to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals by 2030.”
EthSwitch S.C achieves coveted PCI DSS v3.2.1 certification
EthSwitch S.C, Ethiopia’s reputed national payments system has received the most desired PCI DSS v3.2.1 certification from SISA information security, headquartered in India.
EthSwitch has achieved the milestone for successfully completing PCI DSS audits across its Issuing, Acquiring, and Authorization services. Payment Card Industry Data Security Standards (PCI DSS) is a set of stringent standards, mandated by the Payment Card Industry Security Standards Council (PCI SSC). Designed to ensure the better security posture of organizations, these standards are to be followed by entities that store, process, and (or) transmit cardholder data and prevent frauds pertaining to payment cards.
Speaking about the accomplishment, EthSwitch CEO, Yilebes Addis stated, “Data protection has the utmost importance in today’s rapidly evolving digital landscape. We at EthSwitch strive day and night to protect our customers’ sensitive data from cyber frauds. The PCI DSS certification depicts our continued commitment to securing data from payment frauds.” SISA Worldwide CEO and Founder, Dharshan Shanthamurthy said, “Maintaining such an exhaustive international benchmark is not a one-off activity but an ongoing process and the organization has now laid an excellent foundation to be vigilant and ready to face any security eventuality. When organizations go through the time and expense of achieving such coveted compliance, we understand how much they value the security of their customer data.” PCI-DSS is a payments industry standard issued the PCI Security Standards Council (PCI SSC) applicable to entities providing payments Card processing service involving data management & usage. Ethswitch is certified to comply with the latest version of this global standard, v3.2.1, which makes it the first & only in Ethiopia at the moment.
