Dashen Bank has introduced a new Mobile application dubbed ‘Meda’ which allows its customers to send and receive money through mobile transfer, the new app which includes video, picture and text chatting also allows customers to buy air tickets and supermarket goods.
Dashen Bank’s President, Asfaw Alemu said at the launching ceremony held at Intercontinental Addis hotel, the app will enable customers to transfer and receive money from their friends easily.
Previously Dashen also introduced Amole, which offers mobile subscribers digital payment capability and access to aggregated digital products and services from retailers, entertainers, airtime dealers, bill payment points, airlines, social media players and third-party service providers.
Dashen’s new app
Ekos Steel officially inaugurated
South Korean based company, Ekos Steel Plc was officially inaugurated last Tuesday in the presence of President Mulatu Tshome (PhD), who initially invited the company to invest here.
EKOs which obtained an investment license in June 2014 sits on 10 hectares of land plans to produce 210,000 tons of rebar and wire rod products to provide import substitution. When the second phase is completed they plan to enhance their capacity to 500,000 tons per year.
The company invested USD 30 million to create the company. It employs 100 people.
Finally our talk has changed into reality and I hope Ekos will play an important role in steel industry of my country,” President Mulatu said.
Shell H. Choo CEO of Ekos said his company will do his best to serve the local demand.
Claims lower for Global Insurance
Unlike the business trend Global Insurance Company, one of the oldest private insurers since the free economy was endorsed, indicated in their annual report that the claims incurred in the previous fiscal year were lower than the preceding year.
The insurance firm registered a ten percent higher gross written premium.
The annual report of Global Insurance indicated that in the 2017/18 financial year the total claims incurred were 38.7 million birr, which is 23 percent lower than the preceding period.
Usually there has been an increase in claims every year so this is a different result than normal.
In the 2016/17 fiscal year the total claims incurred at Global Insurance was about 50.6 million birr, which is the highest ever in its financial performance over the past 20 years.
The report added that the percentage of the gross claims incurred to gross written premiums also decreased from 61 percent to 47 percent in 2017/18.
Tibebe Tesfaye, CEO of Global Insurance, told Capital that in the reported period the insurance firm has taken several strict measures to reduce the claims.
“We have been applied a leakage control package and committee formed for check and balance mechanisms in terms of the settlement of claims,” he said. “It has helped us to control the claims strictly,” he added.
In addition, the insurance firm was prudently engaged in the mitigation of risks on underwriting selection, according to Tibebe.
Global, which formed in 1997, has sold 25,838 policies worth 88.3 million birr. Even though the stated amount is 26 percent lower than the target it went up by ten percent from the preceding year.
As the usual trend observed in the sector vehicle insurance generated the most premiums, followed by fire and marine, engineering and pecuniary classes of businesses respectively.
From the total claims paid in the year the motor sector stood at 27.2 million birr which is 79.4 percent of the total claims. The motor sector has continued leading claims in all insurance companies and continues to be a high risk for the sector. To tackle the challenges the insurers association has been undertaking a study to mitigate the challenge.
Despite challenging economic conditions in the past fiscal year because of the political condition, lack of adequate hard currency and low exports and imports, Global Insurance has registered significant growth compared with the 2016/17 financial year.
For instance, in the reported period the insurance company has achieved an underwriting surplus of 19.9 million birr, which was 12.7 million birr a year ago.
For the year the company has earned gross profits of 25.3 million birr before tax, while the net profit after tax stood at 19.5 million birr.
Compared with the preceding period the insurance firm has registered a gross profit of 29 percent and net profit of 15 percent.
Due to the paid up capital increase the earnings per share for the 2017/18 fiscal year stood at 98 birr, which was 112 birr a year ago.
The assets of the company has also increased by 13.5 percent in the ended fiscal year to 303 million birr from 267 million birr a year ago.
BT cotton price too high, company evasive farmers complain
The commercialization of BT cotton has not materialized yet because of the high selling price offered by Indian company, JK Agri Genetics which received approval from the Ethiopian government to sell the seeds. The company which offered USD 30 for a kilo of the BT seeds did not receive permission from the Ethiopian Cotton Producers Exporters and Ginners Association (ECPGEA). Hadsuh Girmay, ECPGEA vice president told Capital that JK’s price is not affordable to the majority of cotton producers.
“We buy a kilogram of cotton at less than two USD on the local market and JK has now told us that the price for one kilogram of BT cotton is USD 30 which is very expensive and does not take into account our capacity. We are also concerned about the effectiveness of the BT cotton, although the JK seeds fight ballworm we are hearing from farmers in Sudan that JK’s seed is not fighting the sack pests that live in the cotton.”
JK’s people have not explained these issues adequately and have not shown us what the cotton farms that are using their product look like.”
“Hadsuh Girmay who is a cotton producer also said he is not willing to plant the Bt cotton unless clear results are shown from the company.
The Betty Cotton that was planted in six parts of the country last July 2016 passed six field trial tests and have brought about promising results. The cotton was expected to be on the market last year.
The confined field trails which were conducted at farms in Asayta, Dufti, Wiyeto, Amorati, Pawe and Kemashe included insect and drought resisting cotton and the quality and the yielding also brought about good results. The trials were conducted under the terms and conditions set by the various governmental regulatory bodies and the Ethiopian Agricultural Research Institute leading the experiment.
BT cotton is a transgenic species of cotton in which the beneficial genes of bacteria Bacillus thuringiensis (especially those resistant to Bill Worm complex pest of the cotton are incorporated into the genome of cultivated cotton through genetic engineering.
In Ethiopia, the expansion of the textile manufacturing sector has seen an increasing demand for cotton. Furthermore, the introduction of industrial parks in the manufacturing sector is expected to push the increase in the supply of cotton production.
However, there is still a huge concern and criticism against BT Cotton from the environmental and consumers rights groups and against biotech industry in general. Even in India despite measurable outcomes and implementations of the biotech crops and other products, the country still faces stern oppositions from the wider rages of rights groups. At some point, the supreme court of India has been involved in the litigations of a case with regards to implementations of biotech engineering activities that involved Mustard.
Similarly, Ethiopian activists have never been shy about their anti-genetic engineering stance and its purported dangers to the country. The environmental, health hazards, toxicity and allergy and to some extent cancer and the likes are some of the repercussions the anti-GMO groups have been actively echoing.
